The material presented
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There was a time when I would have never imagined I would end up with someone as self destructive as me. I build these great castles only to tear them down. Just as he did. I never quite understood why. I have not only been resentful of him but jealous...
Here's a guy who by all accounts is the male version of me, minus the analytical reasoning, and has a clear as day problem, alcohol. This problem has a solution and is fairly easy to identify. The beautiful thing about addressing the alcohol is you get to address the rest of "human life" free of charge. And so you have. Then there is me. I don't abuse alcohol. I don't take pills. I don't gamble. I don't live for immediate rushes. I have built a life on sitting back and watching. When I get a chance to not sit back and watch I take over the stage. I have built a life on smiling when it hurts because if I just act happy maybe me emotional delay would catch up. Yet no identifiable problems to speak of. As in mental or addiction. Sooo no clear solution to speak of. It all sounds like life. So brushed it all off as life. Life with a common denomenator...me.
So one lonely day in my life God arranged our days so that we would crash into each other. We didn't notice the damage the crash cause. We didn't notice what we were missing big parts of ourselves. We didn't notice because for a while we were enough to sustain (only sustain) life and love. So for a month we stood at the crash site till he walked away. I stood there looking at the rubble. I examined it. I found hope. I found tears. I found stories never told. I found the greatness in a guy that when I showed others including you people laughed at. Only to respond...W you're crazy.
I found these pieces and come august/September when he came I wore these pieces like badges of honor. I wore them as armour. I wore them with as much pride as I had left. I wore them hoping that they would fill the voids that had developped into my heart and soul. Turns out I was crazy. I wanted to give the pieces back to him, but he didn't need them. He built himself better and stronger. While he did that I started searching for me, I found myself defending him to friends. I found myself defending me to him. I found myself defending a love that I knew was there. Until I finally lost site of me and my journey and focussed every ounce of my energy, which wasn't much into us. The day I decided to do that was the day I stopped being me. The me that he fell in love with. I did that and knew one thing...Why him:
Here's a guy who is unapologeticly himself. Who works hard for everything. Who loves his daughter. Who fights for the things he believes in. A guy who dances like no ones watching. It was the guy that I met in March of 2009. That guy that I met again on September 7, 2009 and then again for the first time when he stepped off a plane the day after thanksgiving. I knew then that it was him. The him people speak of when they speak of soulmates
Then panic hit. I looked in the mirror. I had nothing to offer. I had the year from hell in 2008 and still had not picked up the pieces. I had to be the best me, but how? So I decided to start looking for the answer. I couldn't let him know. If I did he would see just how fragile I was. So I thought he'll never know that you are doing this. His journey was awful on you. What if yours is just as bad? I went to an al-anon meeting here and heard something the in my crazy mind justified the secracy, "imagine how hard it is to change yourself, what makes you think you can change another." I totally twisted a very wise statement to justify my immediate need. I was/am crazy. So I went through emotions and faked it. I fought with him in frustration and fear just as he did with me once before. Until I started seeing the war lied within the walls I had built to protect me, it didn't lie with him so I gave up battles. By then I couldn't hide so I folded under pressure and took on business that wasn't mine. I saw things unclearly and acted on these unclear thoughts. Ultimately hurting him and us. I had finally answered the why him and destroyed it in two weeks.
So now as of last night the us that was him and I ended. He walked away very respectfully. He has to make the healthy decision for him. He never said never. It was very clear he loves me, I am just so deeply regretful. I know that if it is meant to be it will be when I get myself healthy again. I am just so regretful and ashamed of my actions that have lead me here. But I guess, "Here's to one day at a time."
Please don''t be ashamed of behavior u thought was right at the time , we all make misakes in relationships but the good new s is we can make amends and try again . I hope u are attending Al-Anon meetings for yourself if u hope to have a relationship with an A drinking or not u need support and as u have already discoverd the A is not the only person in a relationship that has to change . I was told that an A cannot go home to an old idea and stay sober , I was also told that I was the old idea . Al-Anon is where I have learned to be who I was meant to be flaws and all and I became willing to change the behaviors that were causing problems in my life . Al-Anon will show u how to do that . Your being very hard on yourself from this post , please stop your human we make mistakes and as someone told me When we know better WE do better. Find as many meetings as u can attend as often as time allows make new friends , read the literature daily and do what it suggests to the best of your ability and your life will get better . Your going to be just fine . Louise
What a deep look you are taking at yourself. Were you like this before you met him or did meeting him bring out the worst in you?! Not to blame him, but the craziness of addicts can take the most sane person and make them insane.
Aloha W....you couldn't have been led to a better place than the face to face meetings of the Al-Anon Family Groups and the members who come in and out of the doors of MIP. We will love you until you learn to love yourself honestly and so will the rooms. This is not a life sentence for screwing up this is an opportunity to change how you're living your life and find one beyond your wildest dreams. Am I boasting or trying to sell something? Not even. I am telling you what has happened to me from when I got here and then decided to take the stuggest to stay here and learn what others received from the same suggestion. I was born and raised under the cloak of alcoholism. It was natural for me until I learned that there was another way to live and breathe at the same time.
I can only suggest what worked for me. Do as many meetings as you can over the next 90 days and get and read as much literature about alcoholism and alcoholism and you as you can...must of it is without cost within the meetings. Learn the steps and traditions and learn what it means to have a power greater than yourself other than an alcoholic or your own self will. Memorize the Serenity Prayer (it's easy) and keep doing that same thing for the next 90 days. After that period of time assesswhat you have found and how it has affected your mind, body, spirit and emotions and then make the decision to keep your seat or retrieve your miseries and try something else. I hope you forget where you left your miseries. I did. Keep coming back to MIP because there are more suggestions and miracles to come.
I guess you could say that I never really realized how "sick" I was until he came along. He has definitely played a huge roll in our downfall for sure. I think I am just dissappointed in myself for letting him get to me the way he did. I am dissappointed in my actions. I guess for a while I white knuckled it through life. I just got by and hid how broken I was from years that came before. I do want to be a "new idea" for myself and for him and I. He and I are destiny. I believe that. I have to get to the point where I am okay if I am wrong though...oh tough one.
Just like you I was sick before I met my ABF I just did not realsie it. Before my A I was married to a complusive gambler for 17 years. Even in childhood I knowcked about with kids I thought i could help , fix.
I do not know why I am like this all i know is my disease has progressed just like the drinkers or gamblers. I started of by interfering in friends lives. The by trying to fix my husband and finally when I lost him I met the A fresh out of prison and me just out of 17 year marriage , studing my degree decided I could help fix him. Well today i believe HP brought My A (soulmate) into my life to bring me to my knee to learn me I can control change no one but me. I once heard soul mate defined as not how long a relationship last but a relationship which makes you pick up the mirror and look at your self. From your post sounds like your friend has helped you to do this, mine has to. Once we do this we can begin to recover and move forward. I too tend to beat myself up but also realsie we all need a pat on the back for looking at ourselves and wanting to change.
Do not be too hard on yourself this will achieve nothing in fact it will keep you down and prevent you from doing the work you need to do. Good luck on your road of recovery hope all your dreams come true along the way
I don't know that God brought the ex A into my life. Certainly I had many many choices when I met him. I had a good job, money, choices. Eventually I got totally paralyzed and self hating. I've had poor choices since I was a child. I'm not sure I am a advocate of certain things in life being set up by the HP but I can understand the issue of wanting to make sense of things that don't make sense. Eventually I did choose to leave the ex A. That choice hurt deeply staying hurt deeply. Either way it hurt. As I learned to use the tools of al anon things got better. The changes were not magical over night or ending in a magical ending with some Prince. The changes were hard fought, deeply felt and understood. I have limits these days. I am aware of them. I have my eyes open. I believe I had them shut before and lived ate and slept in denial (that was the only tool I had).
There are many of us who stayed and some who left. Either way its not an easy understanding. I am not sure I would actually describe what I had with the ex A as love anymore. Dependency yes, fantasy yes, but not a mature love by any means. Mature love does not hurt, manipulate, try to control, undermine, lie, cause chaos and be irresponsible. I'm not saying I was mature either but the ex A may have professed a lot of things but his actions spoke something else.
