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.
Following on from my son's phone-call to us at 5.30 this morning, he also phoned his sister this afternoon and was telling her he has been hospitalized off and on over the last few weeks as his medical condition is deteriorating and that he would like to come home for a few days to get his 'head straight'.
He told her that he will possibly be moved to a homeless bed and breakfast accommodation as he is abusing the facilities he has been given. ie downright neglect of his accommodation, which I know will be in a terrible state as he is incapable of doing anything while alcohol is in control.
The fact that he has got in contact now tells me things are becoming desperate with him, and spiralling downwards...... I don't know where it's going for him but I continue to have hope that he will find the path back to recovery.
I am slightly uplifted that he felt the need to phone his sister after his Dad told him her situation, he has become completely self obsessed as his illness has progressed and of course his conversation with her soon turned round to his problems.
We are a small close knit family and I know he carry's terrible guilt over the effect this has had on us all, but he is immersed in his addiction.
So I'm going to have to be strong in keeping my detachment from his illness in place, it's easier because he's away from us, it's when I see the poor broken person he has become that makes me want to wrap him in a blanket and take him home....but as I keep reading the posts here and learning from them I know I can't, and won't do that.
The big difference I am noticing in me today is I currently feel no despair. I am exhausted but calm.
Yeah good for you. Of course an A in active mode is looking for a rescue. I don't doubt that is why the ex A (who I have not spoken to for a whole year) called me 8 times yesterday. Am I available for a rescue these days, nope. I know where rescue gets me to a lot of resentment. Alcoholism is curnning baffling and powerful. Sometimes people have to get to an awful bottom to reach out in a way that is concurrent with addressing their problem rather than passing it onto someone else.
I'm happy for you that you can be calm and centered.
Hope has a way of turning its face to you just when you least expect it!
Its so hard to have a loved on who is broken. But we, as loved ones, are broken too. We are any good for anyone around us if we don't take care of ourself.
I too am exausted. My Alcholic is my Husband and my Mother. I am learning that when I stay calm, I feel better. And doing what I can to feel better is taking care of me.
Yes, we are broken too. ((((hugs to you and all who are reading this post))))
I started practicing detachment from this horror of an illness when my son entered rehab last March, things were hellish before he went and we thought he had reached bottom...and I too thought I had reached mine.
I knew I could not stay in the terrible place I was in in my mind.
What I didn't know then was that I hadn't been working at detaching hard enough..... that realisation came when I saw him in this 'wet house' he is currently in.... undone from all the work he had done in rehab.
So.... when I tentatively pulled myself out of bed on the 3rd of Jan (if you've read my 1st post you'll understand) I started working harder, and the harder I work the calmer I am becoming...as you rightly say alcoholism is progressive but so is Alanon.