The material presented
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information, ideas, feelings, problems and solutions on a personal
level.
Next week is my wedding anniversary, my sixteenth. For all of the first fifteen years we were married, my husband was a horribly hard drinking serious A. I am not talking weekend binges, I am talking daily drunkenness to the point of blackout and some regular drunk driving. I sometimes don't know how he survived it all!
Of course you can imagine what married life was like. It was pretty much non existant. We lived in the same home, but each went our separate ways, we lived more like college roomates, HIS choice. He somehow managed to keep a job all of those years, although he got fired from quite a few, he always managed to find a better one and come out on top. A's seem to be able to be "Mr. Personality" to EVERYONE but their families.
Each year our anniversary was a source of sadness and misery. I tried the first few years to having something happy in our lives and I would plan a party, bake a cake, and save up for a nice gift for him. He laughed at the decorations, calling them silly and "lame", refused to eat the cake, got NOTHING for me, not even a card, SAID nothing, and then made fun of my efforts. Needless to say, efforts were not made for very many years, and gifts ceased to be bought after he either took back or threw away all gifts I gave him.
Eventually we separated, and when we got back together there was a small effort at a celebration, he gave me a card and bought me some roses, although I had to tell him to try and make amends by doing SOMETHING. That didn't last long, the next year when I asked him what we were going to do for our anniversary he said "Whats to celebrate?! Only another year of MISERY stuck with YOU!".
Around that time I found alanon and stopped going to the hardware store for bread. I began saving up and buying MYSELF a nice gift and taking myself out to dinner, although I usually ended up in tears at the restaurant and getting it to go.
Well, this is the first year that my A is SOBER!!! I dared to hope things MIGHT be different for the first time. Hope is only building yourself up for a letdown I think. This year is the worst ever.
My A now has made me the scapegoat for all that has gone wrong in his life while he was a horrid drunk. He gives me no credit for keeping our family going while he "checked out" on life and our family EVERY SINGLE DAY! He is no longer talking divorce, but now is threatening to just "disappear" and just "leave". He is back to "What's to celebrate? I have NO MONEY (total lie) thanks to you, and I refuse to celebrate being stuck in misery.".
Why does it hurt so much this year? This is nothing new, I have heard the same for our entire marriage. I guess I just kept holding out hope that if he stopped drinking things could be normal. Now no more hope.
I guess it just hurts SO much to be so disrespected and disregarded. Even his family who also blame me and hate me admit I am a good wife to him. I took care of him all of those years, looked out for him, stayed up nights to make sure he did not fall down the stairs when drunk, etc. No lectures about "enabling" that was BEFORE alanon. I never cheated on him, never took anything from him, and cooked nutritious food for him when he was too drunk to want to eat.
I keep crying everytime I think about December 10, I feel like throwing up now thinking about how much this hurts.
Sometimes I almost wish I would have left him for someone else, then I would be treated nicely and not with so much indifference. Anything would be nice, a card, a flower, it doesn't have to be a diamond or car.
I don't know how I am going to get through the day, I really don't, I am in tears now as it is. I don't know what this is about, but I really need help with this.
Please say a prayer for me to be able to handle this much hurt and get through this week and that day.
Mary Poppins? I will keep you in my prayers today. I only know that everything happens for a reason. One of first lessons Ive learned in Alanon is we don't have to accept unacceptable behavior, you are worth more than crumbs in a relationship. When you are spent from crying try praying. Talking to God and listening for the answers requires time and quiet. Writing is a tool I have always used to get in touch with whatever messages are swirling in my mind. Keep posting. If noone has told you today they love you. I do.
Aloha MaryP...What you are going thru is not good...normal for an alcoholic relationship but still not good. Ouch!! I was soooo good at teaching them that I would willingly be the bottom of the trash can and then not understanding or feeling hurt when I was taken up on it. I was sooo easy to blame because I thought I was strong enough and could take it. I forgot or denied I was human and then came to learn that humans don't do alcoholism well at all.
Give yourself a gift...do 90 Al-Anon Meetings in 90 days if you have the facility to do that. If there is a meeting everyday get to it and leave the wreckage to lay on the floor behind you until you get that done. I suggest it because it is what was suggested to me and what I did that worked. There are other suggestions however they may all add up to getting into Al-Anon and letting the fellowship love you until you learn to love your self. Some alcoholics take years of program before having a real Aha moment that includes how they affected the family and others. Ego and Self Will run riot are only two of many character descriptions of the alcoholic. Learning that I learned to get out from under her shadow and go step into the light of the Family Groups and get my own.
You don't have to continue to feel this way and shed tears over it. You can stop it anytime you desire and come find another way of living and loving. There is no written law that you have to be the victim any longer or at all and continue to cry while everyone else seems to be having a gay ole time. There isn't unless you have allowed it. If you are not attending meetings at this time...I suggest it as it works when you work it and there is no law that says you cannot participate and be truely happy.
hmm, ok no lectures about enalbing, ur not new to program, so u know the drill ~ as long as u focus on HIM u are feeding the disease. Im terribly sorry ur going through this and that ur anniversaries are so painful.
As long as u focus on him, ur not focusing on YOU. What can u do to empower yourself today?
I understand what the grieving is about, I would wager a guess that ur grieving the life that thought u were going to have. Ur grieving and mad at yourself for what ur going through & what u have tolerated. Forgive yourself and love you first and foremost.
I know what it is like to be chewed up by this disease, I really truly do. Put ur blinders on, get focused on YOU, empower yourself. As long as u focus on him, you are losing yourself. Ihad to quit telling the A's in my life about my feelings, they only used them against me and they feed off of us ~ protect yourself with some boundaries and follow through on them. Detach from the hateful things he says. Maybe u would want to check ur motives for staying in such an abusive marriage ~ you are worth so much more than this ~ it all comes down to you and I know you can change if you want to.
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Light, Love, Peace, Blessings & Healing to Us All. God's Will Be Done. Amen.
I spent a long time (not as long as you) with an alcoholic/addict. I live around addicts and alcoholics at the moment (they are my neighbors) they do scapegoat tremendously. I used to take it tremendously personally. Now I am able to step back and not view it as a representation of myself.
The ex A I was with did a lot of threatening. He left, moved, came back. moved again, had catastrophes. He always came trotting back with his blame game.
I no longer take the blame for everything that is wrong in the world. I also don't suffer an alcoholic any longer. I certainly do have to deal with alcoholics as I live next to them but their opinion no longer counts for me. I detach by the hour at some times. I used to really put my whole self worth into what they thought or how they were. Now I know that they need to operate on an excuse for not taking responsibility for anything.
I am sorry you have had to put up with so much. I know I did. Eventually I stopped, regrouped and started taking care of me. This could be the anniversary for your taking care of you, putting you first, knowing what to do with your time rather than wait for the A to recover.
We have similar stories sorta. My 35th wedding anniversary is Dec 24. He left almost five years ago. I don't love you; never did. I just rolled over, you made all the decisions, I wasn't happy because of you, and so on. You probably have heard these too. He has been sober for over 20 years. For most of our marriage he threatened to leave and threatened divorce. I kept trying especially after we had kids. It is sad and it is painful. After all this time, I still cry. As Jerry said this is life with an alcoholic not good but true. i know it is the disease doing all the talking. Doesn't make it easier to hear it.
So my esh. I take care of myself. I celebrate my marriage (the good parts). I go to dinner. I buy a gift. I have three great sons from this marraige. He AHsober was/is a great man when he isn't into his disease. I go to meetings AA and Alanon. I look for support in other places. i look to my HP for strength. Do you? You are worth it.
After being in a relationship with an A..it occured to me that I had become like a starving person looking for a crumb...........it took me a long time to feel i desrved more.....Mary focus on you.......u deserve it........:)
I remember many times of feeling totally like you describe- going to as many face to face meetings as you can make will definitly help....even if you have to drag yourself there, may take a bit, talk to those there if you don't click with some reach out to others, pray to higher power to take over the entire situation and give you peace direction etc. And the one thing that saved my heart.. make a gratitude list... a list of all the things in your life you are grateful for.
So many here know how you feel and I for one wish I could hold you and tell you you are loved by us and so much more by your higher power he will help you, you ARE going to be okay, I promise
My A's excuses for ignoring my birthday's. aniversarys, etc have been varried from : Nothing would be enough for you to : I just don't like being controlled and being told I have to do something. To I forgot or I was too tired or my family needed me and I will never put you before them ( his mom has way of always having a clogged sink or something that needs him right away, it's become comical now)
Someone told me to avoid expectations because they are advance hurts with alcoholics well I still can't get my head around that whole idea but it helps sometimes.
Someone on here said "hurting people will hurt people" the A hurts all the time for some reason or else they wouldn't always try to medicate and ignore their feelings.
I think I'm gonna read the post I just saw about why do we stay with alcoholics, at the moment I am wondering.
Kinda confused as to why I've stayed 5 years +??
I think my excuse may be I am afraid I wouldn't do a good enough job in a relationship with someone healthy, in other words maybe I think I don't deserve or couldn't be good enough for a healthy relationship- 5 years with an A would certainly increase any feelings like these and five years of not focusing on mysefl and responding to the disease could make it unlikely that I would be healthy enough for a healthy realationship with the current A or with someone new, I'm sick and need to focus on getting me well first before I can do anything else to make my life better. whooo did I just answer my own question?
One more thing: the times I have been able to focus on me and detach from him and his feelings he does somewhat of a turn around once he notices I'm different- key to that is remaining detached and focused on me once he gives an inch I get all happy and tell him how wonderful he is just for behaving like a normal person so this needs some work in my life but detaching helps so much. Someone sent me a worksheet on detachment I'll see if I can get it to you or not.
send me a PM if you don't get it here and I'll send it to you. It really helped me
I remember many times of feeling totally like you describe- as many face to face meetings as you can make will definitly help.... may take a bit, talk to those there if you don't click with some reach out to others, pray to higher power to take over the entire situation and give you peace direction etc. And the one thing that saved my heart.. make a gratitude list... a list of all the things in your life you are grateful for so many here know how you feel and I for one wish I could hold you and tell you you are loved by us and so much more by your higher power he will help you, you ARE going to be okay, I promise
-- Edited by glad on Friday 4th of December 2009 10:21:06 AM
-- Edited by canadianguy on Friday 4th of December 2009 02:51:17 PM
There is something in Alanon we call the HE HE's and the SHE SHE"S. Ever heard of it? It means we focus on the As instead of on us.
If you can get to 90 meetings in 90 days as Jerry mentioned, I believe you will find a lot of help and gain recovery and your heavy burden will be lessened.
