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 not posted for a long time but I come here often and I am eternally grateful for this site and the awesome people here. Some of you may remember me from when I started here back in 06.What a mess I was.After 37 years married to an A,17 of them in "sobriety",I discovered my AH had an online girlfriend.After my discovery he came clean said he loved her and wanted a divorce.He was actually,I believe,dry drunk at the time.His sponsor had died and he hadn't found a new one,had been missing meetings,etc.He was cruel after that,talking to her on the phone in earshot of me,sending her flowers and letting me know he took the money from the joint account for it.Hung the Christmas card she sent him over his desk,left printed out pm's laying around on his desk where he told her he loved her and wanting cyber kisses.There is more but I wanted you to get an idea what I went thru.When he left to go meet her on Easter Sunday he said "bye babe" and I went in the bathroom and bawled my heart out.It still hurts when I think about that day. Bottom line is I trusted him more than ANYONE on earth.There was NO ONE I trusted more.I married him at 17,he was 27,and he became my life.I rejected people who wanted to be my friend,focused completely on him,gave up everything I wanted to do for what he wanted to do and completely lost any self I ever had....at 17 maybe there wasn't much especially since I grew up in a crazy alcoholic home. I didn't love him when I married him,HE wanted Me and that was sooooo compelling,I could not resist. I never felt safe in my life until I was with him.Yet at the same time I chose a man I thought I could control.He was very insecure and not too attractive and he adored me.I thought. Soon after the marriage he started drinking so I turned to my drug of choice...food.We lived 'happily' ever after with our drugs.We had good times,trips,buying all the latest gadgets,had nice furniture and THINGS.The drugs we used ( alcohol and food) masked the truth that we really were not happy with eachother.Why did we stay? I wish I could answer that.We would say it was money...too many bills...we loved eachother...Maybe we did I really have no idea. I care about him now.he says he cares about me.Here we are still together without our drugs....well,I still struggle with food,but I am aware when I do it and why I do it and I am working on it. So that brings me to the reason for this post. We are living in a house we bought 10 years ago.It was stuck iin the 70's with ugly paneling and a host of other cosmetic things that just needed to be updated.We had started many of those things,finished some,when this whole relationship came apart. For the last 3 years I have been working this program and it is a process,it just doesn't get better overnight.The online girlfriend went no where,she just wants to be friends with him.He still communicates with her but he says he doesn't want a relationship with her either now.He got interested in another woman who goes to his meetings here in town and he was really interested in her.He took her shopping,to the hairdresser,to meetings,even to visit her daughter whom she does not have custody of.Now she just wants to be friends also.( Both of these women are recovering A's by the way) At first I didn't want to move.It was pure fear.I have never lived alone in 40 years except for a 3 month period in 1995 when he had fallen in love with another woman in AA ( who later rejected him).I got an apartment but I was miserable totally engulfed in the disease wanting my 'life' back.When she rejected him and his life started falling apart he called and asked me to come back and I did.I regret that now. Over the last 3 years I eventually came to trust myself to take care of myself.We have separate money and bills.The other thing is I love my house.We have put so much into it.Also there was the issue of not being able to sell it and make any money because of the work that is left undone.Over the last 3 years I have gone from wanting a divorce to wondering if I should...wanting to leave and wondering if I should..... He says he is not looking for anyone anymore.He says why can't we just live together as roomates....he doesn't want to live by himself...sometimes I do and sometimes I feel I am comfortable here.Apartment living has alot to be desired,nosiey neighbors,can't paint the walls or have a pet.I have my yard,things I like to do.He has a projector and big screen in his room.I enjoy watching movies on that. He is helping with the housework.We go shopping together,eat out,go to movies.We laugh.We are even planning a trip for next weekend.We have become sort of friends.I understand why he did what he did and I see my part in it,I really do.The marriage was bad,no doubt.Being the super codependent I was,I was still willing to try,to fix it.I didn't go looking for someone else. It's the way he did it,the cruelty,the sneaking,the lies.I would have preferred he had been honest with me,maybe we could have split on good terms.That's not his way I guess.On the other hand I also think that if he had done it my way I would have held on,clung to the relationship.It was the cruelty and brutal honesty that finally forced me to break the connection and start to look at myself and stop looking at him.To turn TO myself and not to him.Wow. There is no passion.No intimacy,we don't kiss or hug.Or touch.He doesn't want it and I don't want it with him.I am lonely,I crave to be held and kissed and cuddled.But am not attracted to him or he to me. I tell myself there is still alot I need to work on in me.I am always working a 4th step,and 10th.I am getting so much freer to be at peace inside.I can let things go at work that used to send me off the edge.I am still working on my body,it's slow.I am still discovering what I like to do,what I like in decorating my space,clothes I like or don't like.I have financial goals for myself.So I say,why not do these things here in my house? he pays half the house payment and household bills.I could never afford a house by myself.I have helped him when he had to take off work for surgery and once when he broke his arm.I helped with buying food and taking him to the doctor but he always managed to keep his bills paid.( he gets social security retirement)I figure he would do the same for me if I needed it........he says he would,but I gotta admit knowing his self centeredness I know it will not be the same care I gave him.Still it would be better than living alone and having no one there to help. Sometimes he can be an a**.He will get mad at something stupid I do or say.He can push my buttons and sometimes I react then I wish I hadn't.I am working on walking away and saying nothing when he does that.It's maybe once or twice a month.If he gets enough meetings he is actually ok to be around but I crave alone time and love it when he is at work and I am home. So how weird and bizarre is living like this this? I have spoken to a few people at work,people I thought would be trustworthy ( I regret that now,and I highly recommend not doing it) These are 'earth' people who do not understand relationships with A's and the twisted lives we live sometimes.I have decided to tell them we are staying together and leave it at that.Then they will stop asking how it's going and I won't feel the need to explain.When this first happened I was desparate to find a man,thinking I had to have one,I have never lived as a single woman.Also reeling from the rejection I was desparate for validation,needy to know that I was still desirable.The only men I was attarcted to were married and I am not going to go there! Still I have flirted and they have flirted and I am confident I could find someone and that I am desirable.That desparation is gone.The lonliness is still there tho. I want to put my priorities in order.My finances,my future,my health (body),my relationships,my job,and mostly my HP.The loneliness gets bigger than those sometimes.I want finding a man to be low on the priority list.Life is more than that.Still I have what I guess is the childish desire to have a good man in my life.I have an idea of what a good marrige is like but from what I have seen out there in the real world I'm starting to think it will always be just a dream.Maybe I should let it go. So the reason for this post...sorry it is loooooong.....is just this......is it my disease that is keeping me here in the house with him?...is there something I am not seeing?....or does it really make sense to go on and live this way? Every time I think I really want to sell ( if we can in this economy) and move on I get this nagging thought that I can move on and stay here....is that crazy?
That was a very sensitive share for this old timer. It's heroic how some of the membership survives this disease and arrives at acceptance of the things they cannot change. I read hope and expectations in it and also questions about the security of it. It seems that you have arrived at friendship. Sometimes that is the most secure of places to be. A relationship with your HP is of greater importance I have come to believe. Expecting what I could never hope to get from the alcoholic was a spirit killer for me also. I could leave and never seem to be missed. Amazing how learning to take over the responsibility for loving your self really works.
I'm glad to see and read your input again. Keep coming back. (((((hugs)))))
The ex A was always off with one of his friends. He didn't cheat on me as such but his buddies came first. He proved that over and over. I was absolutely devastated, obsessed and extremely jealous. I eventually came to a point of resignation about it. I don't think that was healthy either.
No one here can tell you what to do I think its far from crazy. I know full well how dependent I was on the alcoholic emotionally. Detaching did not come easily to me but I worked on it day and night. I got better.
Leaving and staying are both very difficult options. No one says its easy. I am over 2 years out and just beginning to regroup.
I hope you will choose to lean on this group. I have enormous boundaries about who I share my life with these days. Gone are the days when I would discuss it with someone at work. I have very very few confidants. The irony is that I have less drama in my life now.
I hope you will allow us to get to know you. I know this board can help you a lot with your loneliness. I certainly rely on it.
So glad to know you're back and doing ok. You know our stories are parallel in some ways. I think we are all lonely in one way or another. I have been alone for 4 years now. With the exception of my son coming home in the summer, I live alone. Never wanted that for myself (unless I was a widow) especially after 30 years of marriage and 3 sons. However, I do what I have to do. I don't know which would be worse - living with him right next to you and ignoring you and living without him and being ignored. I am the same way - obsessed with my AHsober looking to him for my happiness, making him my HP. But like you say with your AHsober, mine pursued me, told me the things that I needed to hear. Debilyn has help me give myself permission to love him, hate the disease. I am still married, my AHsober has divorced me in his mind. We use to do things together with/for the kids. Now, it is next to nil and so uncomfortable because he doesn't want it. I can understand the house/home part and wanted to stay there.
So is it still painful for me? Yes. Do I still love my AHsober? Yes. How will this turn out? Dunno. I just work, work, work, my program. I listen and read and talk to my sponsor and start it all over. I do get (surprisingly enough) alot of experience, strength and hope from the AA meetings that I attend. i wish for my spiritual awakening. And for you too. I see alot of growth in your post. Keep coming back.
People tell me to leave him, divorce him, move on. I can't do it for whatever reason, my love addiction, fear, who knows. I trust that my HP will show me the way.
One of the first things I learnt in Al anon is if in doubt do nowt You dont have to make your decision today, the time will come when you will find your own answers. I have also never lived alone so understand your fears of loneliness. However I really do believe that i could do it now as al non has given me a inner strenght and I have my HP. Working your programme will give you the strenght to make the right choice for you Keep coming back hope this helps take what you like and leave the rest
