Hooks... - Al-Anon Family Group

farmgirlmay · Member

Hooks...

Mandy123 · ~*Service Worker*~

Farmgirl,
I just see the hooks for what they are....hooks and another part of his disease. I see them and I ignore them. Some days it is easier than others to ignore them. The less I take the bait the less he tries to fish.

Keep doing what you need to do to take care of you. He will do his thing wether you are taking care of you or not, but you will be able to handle what he is doing better if you are practicing good self care.

Yours in recovery,
Mandy

kitty · ~*Service Worker*~

I would say what has helped me the most, when I'm obsessing on their flowery words and promises and apologies is this: Listen with your eyes. Behavior is the truth, so if u watch that and dont listen to the lies, empty promises - the truth will become clear.

Ppl say, ur ex is an ex for a reason. That helps me too.

Set some boundaries to protect you regarding ur STB(ex)AH and know that they are Master Manipulators that will work hardest to get us back, when we are leaving. Stick to ur boundaries and put YOUrself first as ur own first priority. Take care of YOU, whatver that looks like.

RLC · ~*Service Worker*~

Tracy,

This isn't very Al-Anon-ish so I'll take off my Al-Anon shoes for a moment, but is it possible he could reel in something other than a fish ? A shark comes to mind !!

HUGS,
RLC

Jerry F · ~*Service Worker*~

Aloha Farmgirl....Very good post and responses and you reached out for feedback.
That is how my program grows and so will yours. Sometimes when I see
my hook dangling in the water and I watch closely...Many of the fish are
eating the bait off of it and not impaling themselves of the non digestible
part which verifies one of our meeting slogans....Lol "Take what you like
and leave the rest." It's okay to do and often times though it is hard to
believe especially in the early stages of recovery the alcoholic is meaning
well and doing the best they can with what they have and its me in my funk
that is defensing it. Also I learn that the shortest route to a good detachment
from "hooking" is saying "thank you" before saying "goodbye". Saying any
thing other than a courteous "goodbye" line "I'll talk to you later" or "See you
later" is climbing up on the hook and setting the barb firmly.

Keep it simple. Listen and learn. Practice, practice, parctice. (((((hugs))))) smile

-- Edited by Jerry F on Thursday 1st of April 2010 04:36:28 AM

Debilyn · ~*Service Worker*~

throwing off my al anon t shirt...whoo hoo!

What happened to child support? hugs, deb

ythannah · Senior Member

Jerry F wrote:

Also I learn that the shortest route to a good detachment
from "hooking" is saying "thank you" before saying "goodbye". Saying any
thing other than a courteous "goodbye" line "I'll talk to you later" or "See you
later" is climbing up on the hook and setting the barb firmly.

I love it!! Another nugget of wisdom to file away for future reference!

Whenever I've had to maintain cordial relations, but want to discourage unnecessary contact (especially mass email forwards!), I keep a canned response handy : "Thank you for your kind thoughts. Take care".

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.