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.
I have been thinking a lot lately about my capacaties for things. I have had various people in the house being sick including myself over the past few months and have been having to really push myself to make up time leading to working 14 hour fridays every week. After that I have to get up at 7 the next morning to have my daughter there for saturday school...
Mentally, I feel like I have been growing in capacity since leaving the A. It has been over 1 1/2 years and still I don't feel fully functional. I know that a large part of my problem is just letting things slide (particularly with the kids and school) and not being attentive to what is going on with them. I was thinking that in the beginning, I was incapable of thinking about what they were doing at all. Slowly I was able to change my mental energy from thinking about him and us to me and what I need, still the children came after. Then my focus began to shift to the kids, what they need but intermittently including myself too but it seems that the clarity of "THIS IS WHAT NEEDS TO HAPPEN" has not been there all along. Since learning about the 3rd grader possibly failing the grade I have come to I HAVE to focus. I have to follow through, take steps and have the mental clarity fo be intentional about consistency with checking work, diligence about doing additional stuff to help them catch up, and Focused about the priorities of my time.
I guess for me, I don't have a problem with "letting go" my problem is with taking action. I know lots of times it felt like I was in a fog, the world was whizzing around me and out of control. Now my kids are out of control because I have let them be by not being clear and consistent and diligent and mentally available to them.
I wonder sometimes as things are revealed to me how could I have not seen this before? And I try to be gentle with myself and think I just wan't capable of being focused my mental clarity was like pea soup and I just didn't know what to do or chose to spend my energy on what's important. I feel a little guilty now because my children have suffered because of my inability to fully be there. I try to tell myself that I have been through extreme circumstances and my head has not been on straight for a long time but it seems like excuse making. I realize now that they are screaming for my attention and I have an oldest child who HOGS all the time and attention and the other two suffer. I have to be constantly on the ball to keep her from breaking every piece of china in the shop! I haven't had the ability to do that until recently and I feel like it's a revelation that I am seeing it now.. finally... THIS IS WHAT I NEED TO DO...
Seems like after so long of living in fantasy land, listening to lies, knowing full well they were lies and taking them as the truth and being surrounded by insanity all the time (ie. trying to decide who is lying my A or my child, or which child for that matter - seeing/hearing things and being told my perceptions are wrong, etc.) I lost my ability to think rationally, to think clearly, to know what should be the logical next step.
I still don't feel quite right, but I feel a lot better! I have a meeting tomorrow at the school regarding the two youngest and the girl from the counseling place is coming with me! I have support. I will be able to talk with the teachers and I will be unafraid to accept my responsibility here AND hold them accountable for theirs!
Wish me luck! and I'd love to hear your stories about mental clarity and decision making.
Morning! Most of your post I could of wrote myself. It is easy for me to see so many things when another person says or posts it but seems like forever when I am going through similar things. A couple of weeks ago when I had a moment of "is this as good as it gets?" I decided that I had been slipping with my program. I have not given myself 10 minutes to do what I need to do for my own sainity. So I picked up my daily reader "The language of letting go" dusted it off and opened it up. Wow, the reading that day was on denial, something I didn't think I did...lol but then as I read on it explained how things will be shown to us only when we are ready.....wow huh? Keep being gentle with yourself...remember "every step of the journey IS the journey" Hugs Mary
Carolina Girl: I can relate very much and this is my ESH.
I can feel guilty and beat myself to a pulp at the drop of a hat. One thing I do is to try to work on what I need to do next. I have to start from where I am rather than where I would like to be.
I do know that for me being around the A is exhausting. He calls now I do not answer. There is nothing left to say. For me it took a while to get there but I am there. I can't beat myself up for having a process about it. I get better with boundaries and reinforcing them.
I also get better at working out what my needs are and how I can meet them. Obviously for me I am on "survival" right now. The more I embrace rather than fight survival the more I change it. When I fight it, beat myself to a pulp, think if only, look for rescue whatever nothing changes I just go more into survival and thrash around in it.
I certainly lived in a fog for a long time. Some of that for me was total exhaustion. The A created an enormous mess, he made it worse. I got out by the skin of my teeth. Any human would be exhausted with that. My living situation has been less than ideal for a year. I am a human not a miracle worker.
Lately I have been embracing where I am rather than killing myself for being here. That seems to help, I get a lot clearer on what I need to do to move from here. I still have to take it really easy on myself because I can only do so much. I would drive myself into the ground in much the same way the A drove me there.
I do not have anymore to do with the A at all. I have no intention of dealing with him anymore. I owe him nothing. At the moment I am not even going to entertain dealing with the few belongings he has left in my storage. I have no doubt he'll use that at some point. I will be very boundaried with him around it.
Letting him go was very very difficult it has been a process for me and I couldnt' make the process go quicker than it did.
I thinkn for me it's okay that something doesn't come to my attention until I'm ready to be attentive. Sometimes I'm just not paying attention. Others, I'm paying so much attention to so many other things that I just can tpay attention to everything. I think, for myself, you've come to a point in your life where you've come to see that life is not going to be how you want it or need it and so long as you do everything you can, everything you can't will be taken care of by god. I'm really proud of you myself. Keep up the great work.
My ESH, you know the other really important piece that I think we tend to forget about is that when we finally do choose to leave the A, that is a massive life transition. I mean, I know we know this but really from a look at your whole-life perspective, a divorce or leaving your SO after many years is one of lifes most traumatic things, It is like dealing with a death. I have a friend who just got a divorce and I need to keep reminding her: this may be one of the most traumatic transitions of your entire life! HELLO! There is grief, TONS of it, there is adjustment, tons of that, too...and the list goes on and on. Top that off with suddenly becoming a single parent, no financial support, etc. its pretty grim, my friends. I mean, I think its pretty amazing that we are not all locked up in the bin somewhere...
So that fog is completely understandable. In other countries, particularly in scandinavia and europe, women who get divorced and end up with the kids and have husbands who do not pay support, the government will kick in for a certain period of time until the woman (or the man if he has custody of the kids) can get on their feet again. I mean, its the civilized thing to do for gods sake. In addition, there is high quality free childcare, all kinds of counseling and professional assistance, etc.
(I promise not to get wound up about the state of this nation, I won't go there and I won't get started on that or else I will never shut up)
I just needed to say that its important to acknowledge that this is incredibly difficult work, period. Add kids into the mix and its just quadrupled. I think we deserve to honor this 'cause believe me no one else out there is. Hugs, J.
