The material presented
here is not Al-Anon Conference Approved Literature. It is a method
to exchange
information, ideas, feelings, problems and solutions on a personal
level.
Lately, I have been feeling like my life has sunk into a rut. Same thing day in day out. 4 days a week I get up early and go to a job an hour away, 2 or 3 nights a week I go to another job. I spend every weekend working. That affects both my social life and my daughter's. Neither of us has one basically. Sometimes I look at my life and think OK, is this it for the next 28 years till I can retire? SSDD day in day out? No adults to talk to, to hang out with, the kids don't even spend time with friends ever. It seems so abnormal. I feel so isolated but can't figure out how to get up out of it. How do I find my kids friends? How do I make friends? What is wrong with us that NONE of us have friends? Sure they have kids at school they talk to, the oldest anyway, but they never DO anything with them. My oldest seems to attract really unhealthy kids, what can be done about that? Am I just expecting too much? I want so much to improve my relationship with my teen daughter but don't know how to balance discipline and love/forgiveness. I guess I'm feeling a little lonely, and hopeless. I feel like I need a six month break from my life!
CG, yeah, I know what you mean and I have felt like that various times in my life. I guess the only ESH I have to offer is that eventually you will get sick and tired of it being that way and upset the apple cart of your life and it will change. For me, I would do drastic things to make that happen. I am learning that I do not need to necessarily do that although its worked for me in the past- just is harmful sometimes to others around me.
Example: deciding to attend grad school 4000 miles away from where I was instead of 1000 miles or 50 miles away??!! it was drastic but I really felt like I needed that level of drastic change in order to really shake the foundations of my life that were no longer serving me very well. I am certainly not recommending you or anyone else do this but I do recommend considering what one can change and how much- look at it all and re-evaluate. Do you like where you live? Do you like your jobs? Do you like your house? The Climate? the people? Why are you stagnating, anyway? What ingredients do you need in order to not stagnate? How old are you and where do you want to be in 5, 10 years? What is your vision for your life? Literally, what are the pictures you see in your minds eye every single day?
For me, I knew it was grad school and then a whole different career, different city, different people. I had no idea how to do it, in many ways it just happened because i was so sick of doing what I was doing before. I did not like where I lived. I did not like the house I was in. I did not like my old usual group of friends anymore. Like I my clothes did not fit anymore- I needed a new wardrobe. I did it- I went after this dream/idea.
I have certainly been there in the two job run run run issue. I have also been there in trying to reach out to others and having lots of blind alleys. I reach out, make friends and then something happens.
I think for me personally these times are a time to dig deep. There were lots of things that attracted me to the A, many of them were my charactor defects, inabilty to tolerate loneliness, fear of the future and more.
I dont' think because you are working two jobs right now you will always have to work them. Neither do I think you will always be without friends. For me the issue of having friends is problematic. I certainly know how to be enmeshed, anything else is pretty difficult.
Why not set small goals for yourself. Some social outings, some ways to reach out to others with small expetations. Expectation is everything to me. Right now one expectation is someone to go to meetings with.
I think the road after leaving the A is a treacherous one. For me I always ran from one relationship to the next or isolated and then eventually jumped into another relationship without really thinking clearly. I am trying to go differently so obviously things are going to be foreign and strange.
