Aloha Tickle and welcome to the family.   You have started some positive change
for yourself that are necessary for you and also for the alcoholic.   Face to Face
meetings will help the understanding and change alot expecially if you do it for
you and not because of the alcoholic.  You will hear and learn how to hate the
disease and love the alcoholic and how to stay in balance in your life.  The
program is partly about "our part in it" and we get to understand what part we
play in our own sick reactions in the disease of alcoholism.   Thank God for my
own alcoholic(s) for their part in helping me find this program for life.

One of the most important lessons when I first got into program came in reading
at the closing of our meetings.   It says, "If you keep and open mind, you will find
help."  Open mindedness is a foundation rock in my own recovery and has been
once I learned how important it was and how to apply it.   Don't shut out anything
you hear here.  Open your mind to it and consider it, then "Take what you like and
leave the rest."

I will include you and your husband and child in my thoughts and prayers for all
who suffer at the hands of this disease.

Keep coming back...this works if you work it.

(((((hugs)))))

Indeed you have made a big step! Give yourself credit, gal! You just keep doing what you need to do for you and the little one, and I am convinced God will lead you to better things! (((((hugs)))))

I know God has a plan for me. I am just having trouble figuring out if this man will continue to be a poison in my life or if he is really getting it together this time. That is the question that makes me so sick to my stomach. I want to be smart about this. I appreciate all the words of encourgaement. This has been a very hard time for me. I want to forgive but, I am at a point where I have forgiven so much that I have become numb. Any smiliar stories are welcome...

Hi Tickle,

Congrats on taking such a big step. And congrats for doing it for the right reason...YOU!

I was in almost the EXACT same situation over 3 years ago with my husband. I'm happy to say it won't last forever.

I used to say all the time "The only reason I'm still here is because I love you. But eventually, this is going to make me stop loving you and then I will have no reason to stay." And right about the time that I hit my ultimate breaking point and cut him off physically and emotionally, and really packed my bags, he finally got the message and sobered up. He's been 100% dry for 2 years. But getting there was a difficult road (for both of us) and the begginning was the hardest because he was so unbearable. Especially since I didn't know if I really wanted to invest too much into it AGAIN only to be let down in the end. I felt that he had wasted enough of my time and I wasn't sure that he was capable of a sober life.

I went through the same thing you're going through right now, I just couldn't feel. I had been burned so badly by everything he did to me (and to himself) for so long, that I had managed to totally numb myself from anything that he was going to throw my way, good or bad. And it was sad because I knew how much he really needed my support, but I just didn't have anything left to give and didn't care to give it. And I know the reason why I was so cold and detached at first when he was trying to make it up to me, it was because I didn't want him to start to feel that everything was alright and that we were fine again (because I knew what it would lead to). It wasn't alright and we weren't fine, things had to change and stay that way for a long time. I felt that if I made things too comfortable, I was making it look like no damage had been done and that it wasn't a big deal. I was afraid in is head that he would be like "good, put that fire out. Now let's get back to drinking." It is a powerful feeling that comes over you when you've taken control of your life after worrying about someone else for sooooo long.

And to be honest, the numbness couldn't have happened at a better time because it gave me the ability to just focust on me and what I REALLY needed, which was clarity. All I cared about was how I (not him) could make MY life better, not his. Only after I was able to get my head in the right place and had a clear idea of how I wanted my life to be was I able to invite him back into it and to have the compassion to help him get sober.

I'd be lying if I said I didn't have one foot out the door for a long time emotionally, because it's hard to trust that you wont be burned again (i know that sick feeling) or to trust your self in not being fooled back into the way things were. There is a reason they call it recovery for us too. It will take time.

Keep going to meetings, keep reading the books, keep reaching out, and keep faith in yourself that you will get through this. It is a long and difficult road ahead.