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I am going through a divorce. He has cheated multiple times on me throughout our marriage. Now that we are separated he accuses me of cheating anytime I leave comments on a facebook page of the opposite sex. How can I stop reacting to his actions. I say rotten things that I normally would not say when I lash out in anger. I do not know how to deal with what is going on around me. I am not ready to let go yet but am not willing to beg him to love me anymore either. How do I start over? How do I deescalate the situation?
just hurt, brightmommy
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"if you can't say nothing nice, don't say nothing at all!!"
You know its all bs so why bother responding to his crap ?? Your divorcing so what u do is none of his business , he has made up his mind that what he is saying is true there is no reasoning with someone l ike that so ignore it , anyone who knows u knows its bull and thats all that matters . He does it mainly to get u upset and it works , stop reacting and he will soon become bored with the game .
What helped me with this, was logic... I understood that the A wanted me to react bc they feed off of our energy. They like it when we get all emotionally flooded and then lose control and act crazy - bc then they can say 'see u are the crazy one' justifying their own behavior to themselves and giving them excuses/reasons to drink/drug or simply continue to act the way they are acting. Change the dynamic. It takes 2 to fight. He will look very silly (& feel silly) when he is just yelling at no one - dont take the bait.
When I began to walk away, I got a sense of power back, like they werent going to goat me into losing emotional control and then I began to experience more self control in the process. Walking away is totally worth it. I had no self respect when I got into the stupid arguments anyway.
An acronym helped me very much too - JADE - it means dont justify, argue, defend or explain. It gave me permission to keep quiet and not have to argue my point/side anymore. If others didnt understand, then I accepted that and continued what I was doing. I dont have to tell everyone the why's behind my actions - it empowered me very much.
In learning to walk away, I also can now - sit and feel my emotions, ewven though they are welling up and very intense, I dont have to do anything, I can sit and feel them, experience them -fully- without acting per se and then the intensity goes down and I'm already half way through the bulk of it. I am calm, feeling the feeling and then maybe I think of more choices for my actions, then I would have, if I jumped right up and acted as soon as I felt the presence of a strong emotion. I like waiting to act bc I feel I get more choices. I may even pray about it too, while I am feeling it at first & I will get some divine guidance b4 I act. It has also given me some objectivity with regard to my feelings.
So how to not react to an A - if u react and focus on what they are saying, you are feeeding the disease. If u keep focus on you and detach from what they are doing - u are feeding yourself and not the disease.
I now base my choices on how I will feel - in the end - that also makes it easier to walk away, bc I have more self respect in the end.
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Light, Love, Peace, Blessings & Healing to Us All. God's Will Be Done. Amen.
You can also go under your Facebook settings (under Privacy, I think) and set it so that your husband has limited access to your page. You can set it to where he can see your status updates and nothing else.
That would be my solution, if it were me.
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"It's a job that's never started that takes the longest to finish."
~ J. R. R. Tolkien
there is an exercise I've done about being in a hole and only having a shovel to get out of it. Clearly at the end of the exercise you have to let go of the shovel.
Sometimes we have to find new skills to deal with an ex A. Who wants to get them, certainly not me. Eventually the pain got so great I was willing to learn them. Until then I kept railing on at why did he behave as he did.
(((((Hugs))))) to you - so sorry you're in the pain you're in.
I'm very new here - but one of the first things I tried/am trying is my reactions. I've got an aH and an aSon in my home and at times, the dynamics are so absolutely beyond crazy - I felt like a smashed ping pong ball trying to pop back up to be volleyed back and forth.
And - neither of them make sense in discussions as the thinking process and in-depth behaviors are so entrenched. I'm a yakker and I have always tried to reason (pointless with active folks). What I'm seeing is if I say nothing, or just give one word responses, it's been much different - mostly good, but not always.
I can't say I've mastered detachment - practicing, but got lots to learn. I feel blessed at times to have exposure to the 12 steps, so do deploy the 'When in doubt, don't' often.
For me, I'm also realizing that even though I've conditioned my boys and my aH that I'm always available (mobile phone on 24 x 7, always answer, always share when I leave and where I'll be), I still have a choice to answer or not. I made a choice that when I go to meetings, the phone stays in the car. This caused me great stress for the first 2 meetings, as I've never done that since my boys were born.
So, in my little piece of the world, in my own little way, I'm doing little things different to allow me a bit of peace/quiet. This allows me to do a bit more prayer and meditation and self-work, which then allows me to bite my tongue - at times when before ... I would either come unglued or attempt to please everyone.
Take what you like and leave the rest!
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Practice the PAUSE...Pause before judging. Pause before assuming. Pause before accusing. Pause whenever you are about to react harshly and you will avoid doing and saying things you will later regret. ~~~~ Lori Deschene
I have been doing the no contact thing. Therefore I blocked her and her new boyfriend on facebook. Now I can't snoop then and vice versa. I wish it were easy. I'm so wrapped up in her. I'm trying to picture her like a tumor or an open sore. Not the girl I used to love. I'm so resentful at the world for ending up like this. The only real reason is some crappy disease.
Brightmommy - your post makes me so thankful that I never accepted the "friend request" from my ABF!! It drives him crazy, but I don't like the thoughts I get into my head looking at a myspace or facebook page of someone I am dating. So I put up that boundary for my own sanity and it had nothing to do with the alcohol.
One of your options is to put more of a boundary around your FB page and other social networking. That is supposed to be fun so why torture yourself with it?!? And do you REALLY want to be keeping tabs on him anyway? When the focus should be on you?
but that of course doesn't solve the reacting - it just takes away one of the reasons for reacting... I am no poster child for not reacting, but walking away is helping me (or putting away the phone to not react to texts, or shutting down the computer to get away from other messages). Then I try to to turn it all around into something positive (how, you may ask?!?) - I find when I start to question myself about the ABF ("I am being too hard on him", "Maybe he isn't an A", and so on...) I look at some of his messages that would have otherwise upset me and it really reassures me and validates the situation. And sometimes I even find humor in it - to someone close to me who understands ("can you even BELIEVE he said THAT!?!? LOL").
Good luck, its hard to change my behavior but I keep focusing on the silver lining - a happier me!
For me, I know I must end a relationship and detach at all costs when I realize that having contact with the person is making me become someone I do not want to become. Just for today, this is what I must do to take care of myself. Now that I am in recovery, I am responsible for my behavior. And when I am triggered by someone and it causes separation from me and my HP, it is unacceptable.
Problem is, I tend to stay in these relationships waaaay too long, long after the relationship is hurting me. That is my disease, and why I need to keep coming back.
-- Edited by glad lee on Tuesday 2nd of February 2010 02:27:00 PM
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The prayer isn't for Higher Power to change our lives, but rather to change us.
