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.
Friday night when I was going to bed I noticed some papers that were laying on a dressing table that is shared by my husband and I. There was a name writen on one of the papers that is someone both my husband and I know. My first thought was, 'Oh, he is doing some work for them; he didn't mention that.' As I look a little closer it reads under his name 'return voice recorder/GPS/spyware' This friend is a private investigater and has access to all of these things.
Now I am thinking, He is spying on me still/again.
So, I have some alanon under my belt and I decide that it will do me no good to even approach him about this. He will lie if I ask anything about it anyway.
Now it has been a few days and I keep thinking about having my own personal space violated like that and I am angry. Right now I am feeling like REVENGE would be so sweet. If it is dirt on me that he wants so badly, I will come up with some.
I know that it would net me nothing. Could someone please talk me out of this frame of mind.
I wish i had something for you.. .some bit of knowledge or some quote to help you through this but I don't. Truth is that if I were in your shoes I'd be posting the same thing. I'm sure someone will be along shortly with just the right words. I'm thinking of you.
Take a look at yourself. When I get into these thought-patterns it is because MY illness is taking over. It's called OBSESSSION.
Take inventory. You didn't cause this. You can't control it. You can't cure it. I try to put this focus on EVERYTHING going on with other people around me - regardless if it's their drinking or if it's their doing just plain STUPID stuff. It's a reminder to me that this is not MY deal. It's the other person's.
Do you have One Day at a Time in Al-anon? Go back and read Sunday's passage (March 23), if you can. That passage says it best (and I wish I had it in front of me so I could quote it!). I got caught in the obsession on Sunday, and at the end of the day on Sunday, I read that passage and was just floored. I was so floored by it I read it two more times over, and then the following morning, I read it yet AGAIN.
In any case. Live in the NOW, my friend. Stop your voices, your planning, your outrage. FEEL your body. Is the air cool, hot, muggy, crisp? Is it bright or dark outside? Is the wind blowing the leaves on the trees? Can you smell your neighbor's cooking? Bring yourself back to the PRESENT. Your present.
Now - do you have a sponsor? If yes, CALL that Sponsor! If you don't have a sponsor, can you get yourself to an Al-anon meeting? No? Do you have Al-anon literature? Read it. Can you not settle down enough to read? Call ANYONE who's a voice of reason in your life. I hope it can be an Al-anon member, but at this point, whoever can listen and help you remove yourself from your knee-jerk reaction.
If none of that is possible, keep reading here, posting.
Call ME, if you want! I'll PM you with my phone number right now.
I have to admit that my first thought when I read your post was... leaving a note out like that, makes him a pretty crappy spy. *smile*
Second thought was .... if the notes true, he must be giving up since you don't do anything he found interesting...
Third thing was in my marriage I wasn't hiding from her... if she is so crazy and paranoid as to follow me around, let her. Be good enough for her to not ever see me do anything I don't tell her right up front that I am doing. Hope it drives her so nuts she runs screaming to an AA meeting... (course that is the uncured alanon in me... *grin*)
If you know your friend well enough, you might confront him about supplying a non-licensed person with equipment that would be illegal for him to use...
Personally I wouldn't go about staging anything that you might have to explane to anyone someday... might be harder to talk your way out of than you think.
Hang in there girl!
Take care of you!
-- Edited by rtexas at 18:30, 2008-03-25
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"Good judgement comes from experience... experience comes from bad judgement" - unknown
I read the A's text messages listened to his voice mail the works. I also found that he had recorded my tirades to him on some tape recorder. He was obsessed often with proving what a rotten person I was. One message I left him recently was that he had told everyone we knew for years he did not want me around and how sick he was of me and my being upset at his antics. Now I was not around and I didn't plan to be anymore so please don't call. I have to say it was a sweet moment because I felt betrayed and abused by him for years and always desperate to "know". Now I "know" nothing and it is such a liberation.
Of course it is difficult to know what to do when you find something you shouldn't. At the same time you are dealing with someone who has a disease and who is in denial. Of course he wants to project it all over you. The task of not responding to provocation is incredible. I took years to not be caught in whenever the A called or provoked me. Eventually he couldn't provoke me anymore. I took a long time and a lot of detachment to get to there.
My AH was obsessed with recording things and life in general. He recorded everything. I thought it was kind of artistic and now I can see its just another form of control and putting people on edge around him. My AH was very concerned about making sure I really understood what a horrible person I was at all times and how messed up I was. I reached a point where I just remained silent around his recording ipods and would turn my back on his cameras, etc.
Its another piece of evidence of how insane it can get and how quickly it can all tumble apart. Another great reason to keep the focus on ourselves and to let the wackos do whatever they think they need to do. Turn it over to HP yet again. They are so darn crazy...hugs, J.
My A has been extremely paranoid at times, I remember him being so sure I had done/said things that never happened. He had proof that he had strung together and it almost convinced me even though I knew better.
I agree, this is just madness, and it's not your madness, be thankful for that at least! I kind of agree with debilyn except I don't think you were snooping it sounded like you just came across them on accident. I think personally after dealing with madness such as this that he is going to make whatever he wants to make out of anything he finds. If he wants to think you're cheating, he'll make it fit together with bits and pieces that don't really go together but as a whole appear to be something they're not. My dad was bipolar, he was a master at proving nonexistent conspiricies and then I marry a man just like him... HMMMMM something for me to ponder.... But I digress, my point is it doesn't matter what HE does, he's gonna think what he's gonna think whether it's true or not. I usually go from this point with - well, he's a nut I'm going to go on about my business... I feel for you though, I remember how scary and frustrating it was to be accused of something I didn't do and have it go ON and ON and ON and ON and nothing you can say convinces them otherwise. I'm sorry, that's all I got, hope it helps.
Denoraphy that post sure reminded me about my lessons from my sponsor on suspicion. Yes I was the suspicious one and I would find little pieces of "evidence" and then let it own me completely. Until....my sponsor asked me after one of my rants, "Could you be wrong?" Gosh I never thought of that one!! And yes I can be wrong. Rather than be caught at it (the part I hate the worse) I dropped my suspicions. If I am mean't to know I will come to know.
Thanks for the trip down memory lane. All kinds of juices started to flow.
I just reread my post. Ick it sounded so cold. Did not mean to be like that at all.
Was not meaning to be judgemental at all.Crimany I used to look in my A's sock drawer, under his mattress, in his van......
It is all part of our journey to learn not to let the dang disease get us into that stuff.
It was so freeing for me when I did not care about it anymore,none of it. Didn't even want to talk about it. His problem not mine. I couldn't control his actions anyway.
Had a heck of a time hiding my meds. I swear he could get into my purse in front of me and I would not see it.
I finally started hiding them in the pettipants of the Raggedy Anne my mother made me!! lol
I know that his paranoid insecurities are something that is part of his disease and something that I will continually have to deal with. I try to remember to follow the rule of JADE. I do not have to Justify, Argue, Defend, or Explain my actions to him. That is something I learned here and has helped me emmensely.
Debilyn, I figured someone was going to think that I was snooping through his personal business. I have stopped doing that long ago. The papers were just there in plain sight. I don't even want to know what he is up to. Well.....mostly I don't. I really think that for what ever reason he has, he wanted me to see them.
I am better today, I don't feel the need for revenge anymore. I am going to go about my day and do what makes me happy. If he has a problem with that, then that is HIS problem.
I've learned when someone is trying to control us, they will purposely leave it out where they know only we will find it and "get the message." As rtexas said, if he really was trying to hide it, he would have.
That's exactly what he wanted you to do, IMHO, and he's controlling you.
Regarding revenge, it's similar to resentments where "we drink the poison while waiting for them (those we feel revenge for) to die"
Keep coming and posting, Maria
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If I am not for me, who will be? If I am only for myself, then who am I? If not now, when?
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