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 really needed to share with you about this, this morning.
YES! A part of "us" must die (or it feels that way). I really believe this is true but although its incredibly uncomfortable and feels painful I also believe its absolutely necessary and a good sign, ultimately.
What had died? For me, what felt like a part of me had died is what the lifting of denial is. When the blanket of denial is tossed over me, everything goes to sleep/goes numb/goes underground. Rip that blanket off and BRRRRR, its cold! OUCH that hurts! WOW I am awake and alive! HOLY SMOKES a part of me is dying- my denial is dying! TIME TO FREAK OUT!
We start to feel. We long for the deaf dumb blind coziness of denial and this is our illness. We slip back into it, we shake ourselves out of it. Its an ongoing process, not perfection, just like the one the alcoholic has with alcohol.
A part of us is dying. I understand what you are saying. For me, I try to look at it more as a rebirth. Denial reborn as acceptance. It's hard for me to really accept my role in the roller coaster I have been on, but in doing so, I am learning what I did and learning how to not do it again. We learn denial at a very early age. Maybe one of our first lession in life. Acceptance is something we learn later, if at all. I am accepting my shortcomings and working on improving them. I will not do everything right, I will not always move in the direction I should. I will probably slip back a lttle. I accept that I am human, with a past that has put me on the path of denial. I am choosing to take the fork in the road that leads me in the direction where I want my life to go. I am very thankful that there are so many more on that path to help me on my way.
Thank you for your post. Reading them helps me put my thoughts in some kind of order. They show me so many different ways of looking at our common problems and concerns. They help me grow.
Your description so fits what i felt. I did not think of feeling like I was dying or pieces were, it fits perfectly. My denial died, at least in one area anyway I keep working on finding the rest of it.
Jen
PS Your ice castle sounds beautiful, a little chilly but beautiful.
Yes, Jean, you are so right. Getting rid of the denial and accepting "what is", is painfully uncomfortable, but we have no choice if we don't want to live the same way anymore. I am following you, for it seems to me you are a few steps ahead of me on this journey, and you give me hope.
Blessings, Lou
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Every new day begins with new possibilities. It's up to us to fill it with the things that move us toward progress and peace. ~ Ronald Reagan~
Sometimes what you want to do has to fail, so you won't ~Marguerite Bro~
Sure sent my mind off on a lot of excursions too. Yes, having my blanket of denial ripped off of me sure was "invigorating". Kinda like this morning, the first really cold morning of the year, and I had to get out from under my warm blankies to a too cold house! (guess I am gonna have to start turning the heat on).
Reminded me how my heart was broken and the physical feel of it, when my wife told me she was moving out. How it pounded in my chest, so heavy, so loud. How nothing in the world seemed to make any sense anymore. How it felt like my life was over.
And the heartbroken thing made me remember with a smile, how she used to not like the term "love you with all my heart". She would say "hearts don't love, people do". So me, being the good natured wise ass that I am, would tell her "I love you with all my spleen". Why the spleen? I don't know, but my spleen sure did love her, along with all the rest of the internal organs.
AND this..lol... made me wonder if she just never had loved someone with her heart. I certainly can remember how my heart pounded and ached, in a good way, when we were falling in love. I understand the expression, with all my heart, because I have felt it.
Change has always been painful for me. Uncertainty sits in my stomach and makes me nauseus. And yes, when it is big enough, it makes me feel so very, very bad, "like I was dying".
That feeling that I was dying, the hopelessness, the despair, is what got me to al-anon. And since I am grateful for al-anon, I have to be grateful for those feelings too. They are the doors which I have always tried to keep closed which I now, try to buck up and open and walk through with faith.
The faith that comes with the knowing that my Higher Power, God, is there lovingly holding my hand (or in some instances lovingly shoving me thru ).
Awareness can sometimes painfully destroy denial.
Acceptance starts spreading a healing salve over the pain.
Faith in HP/Love lays a nice warm blanket over our shivvering, hurt bodies.
Thanks for such a thought provoking post this morning, my friend.
oh yes, but in a way, parts of us are coming to life, waking up, without the rose coloured glasses and though in the beginning it seems like we are so isolated, as we learn to express our feelings and thoughts, it seems like people come back to us or through denial themselves,
I think I have also had a hard time looking at how much I don't like reality. The A did not live in reality and certainly neither did I. We matched on that front and probably many others. I tend to steer clear of people now who don't live in reality.
I did not for years. Now I am trying to be in reality and I can't say I like it.
