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.
Briefly... my ah is a member of a church band. Needless to say lying and bs are common while he is among these folks. during a very stressful month about 6 mos ago, I e-mailed the church and fessed up to the real guy they were dealing with. They jumped on the bandwagon and were insisting I come in and they would have an intervention with him. I panicked and refused as I knew he would kll me if he knew I had let them know how he really is at home. So, they did back off and said they would try to see if they saw signs on their own and try to befreind him more. Meanwhile they say nothign to me nor do I get any "checking on me" e-mails. The last few weeks I saw him e-mailing the music director obsessively and curiousity got the best of me this a.m. Basically what I found out is that he has been cutting practice and making up excuses. he didn't show up for band one w/e with no notice and was telling them by e-mail he had to go out of town for his best freinds funeral. The friend had shot himslef.. alot of detail and remorse.. This is all crap. He is here and ignores the phone, lets the answering machine pick up, etc. Now, what do I do with this info?? REam myslef out for snooping in the first place? Why does it anger me so taht they are beleiving this crap??
I am really glad that the church backed off and agreed to look for signs on their own. It appears that the signs that they are looking for have surfaced. You did not have to do anything!!!
Alanon taught me to not do anything to avoid a crisis or do anything to create one.
The reason for this is so that whatever happens as a result of the problem "The Alcoholic is solely responsible and cannot point fingers and switch blame."
I was also given the other tools " Mind My Own Business" and "Let Go and Let God."
Focus on yourself, say the serenity prayer and try to increase meetings. This is not easy!!!
The temptation to MAKE SOMETHING HAPPEN is so overwhelming sometimes. I still do this. I put myself in a corner and there's no coming out of it without a fight. Sometimes I wonder if this is the chaos junkie in me trying to stir things up subconsciously. I know your motivation, you think if other people are on to him maybe it will force a change on his part. You are just trying to speed up that process right? LOL I know I have done that. Problem is everything happens on a schedule that is different from mine. Patience is a huge problem for me and I am constantly working on accepting that I can't MAKE things happen and I just have to wait and see. I hate the unknown, I hate having to wait, I hate when things don't go the way I PLANNED for them to go!!! I am learning though that everything has its season. When it's time for him to come around he will have no other choice and it wont be because of anything you did or didn't do.
This reminds me of something I told my daughter the other day. She is very angry with my ex AH because he is the one who revealed the info to me about her and the older boy which led to my decision to force them into marriage. Hasty, yes. I felt at the time it was the best solution, now I am not sure and just have to wait and see. I know my reasons for doing what I did. The ex AH got on her computer and snooped the info out and sent it to me. She will probably never forgive him and wanted to "ruin his life". I told her don't you know you don't have to do anything? Some people do it to themselves, all you have to do is sit back and do nothing. Sure enough, last night I get an IM from him saying his new girlfriend (he's been staying with her for about 3 weeks) is kicking him out tomorrow. Why? He snooped her email and confronted her about something he found. The irony does not escape me here. So my point in all this is you don't need to do anything, A's are perfectly capable of messing up their own lives and telling on themselves. In time everything comes full circle.
One of the more difficult lessons I have had in al-anon is that I am only responsible for my own behavior - not that of the alcoholic. There was a period where my alcoholic was lying to our neighbors, telling them he had cancer as a way of explaining his reliance on alcohol. I was stunned.
I thought long and hard what to do about it. Should I go to each neighbor and tell them he is lying - be his "mom" and correct his errors? I decided that I was assuming his responsibilities if I did that. Should I tell him I know he lied and "make him" correct it? I decided that I am not his mom. The last thought I wondered was - what if someone asks me how his cancer is going? I decided that I would feel most comfortable saying that I don't know, but maybe they should talk to him about it. That's the best I could do.
I believe that we should be as honest as possible, but we should also not take that on for others.
What do u do with this information ? nothing ! His lies will catch up with him eventually , its not your job to fix this . leave it where it belongs with h im . If anyone asks u where he is or was on any specific occasion simply say I am not sure u will have to ask him next time u see him . the conversation is over . we are enablers and until we stop interfering nothing will change nor will he become responsible for his own mess . a practicing alcoholic has no anonymity but it is not up to me to add to his misery by telling other people about his problem . I hope u are attending Al-Anon meetings for yorself . Louise
Briefly... my ah is a member of a church band. Needless to say lying and bs are common while he is among these folks.
You did not have to do anything!!! 