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.
On Thursdays and Fridays I become very tired from all the work I am doing during the week. I am happy that I have been doing so well in my college courses. I am taking my college one day at a time, which has relieved a lot of the burden off of me. Since my mother passed away in June of '08, I know what grief is and I know what the loss of someone really close to you does. I have been holding on to this relationship with my AH because I hate going through grief. This has been probably since we got married. Which we got married for all the wrong reasons. I do not contact him, and he does not contact me. We have a daughter together. On days like today, I am full of guilt because I feel guilty that I am not making any efforts to let him see our baby. I am so angry today because he chooses that horrible lifestyle over his family. This is a cycle with me. It is getting better. I go for days when I don't feel this pain, and everytime something creeps up, I can surrender it. On days like today I have this constant grief. Could someone please help me understand how I could go about ending these feelings of guilt. It is eating me alive. It really bothers me when it is just me and our daughter. Instead of enjoying her, I feel guilty that he isn't getting to see her grow up. I get so focused on him that I even focus on his ex who is the mother of his kids. I realize just how very sick this is, and had no idea that I have been addicted to people for most of my adult life. Please help me with some ESH. Would greatly be appreciated. I just feel great despair because I never intended to become a single mother with three girls, and only one of my girls' fathers' has anything to do with her. My XAH never sees our daughter and now my AH. Just seeing the common denominator in this is me: I realize I have made big mistakes in choosing to marry these men and I am experiencing guilt to the point of thinking that my kids would be better off if I had given them up for adoption. I am just being honest of some of the thoughts that come into my head. Sometimes I just feel like no one truly cares about us, and I just wonder sometimes what it is about me that makes me so undesirable to my own freaking husband!!
((((KATH)))) I too feel similar things when I think about what I have done in my life. I have been married twice, one was a cheater, one was an abuser/control freak. I know too well the mommy guilt. I am new to alanon as well, so I don't have a ton of wise things to say... Guilt is a funny thing. When someone is behaving inappropriately, or steps over our boundries, we may try to get them to stop, and then they get defensive and we feel guilty. Its a crazy cycle. It is so hard to seperate our issues from theirs and we get dragged into stuff again and again. Breaking the cycle is hard, but you are doing it! You can show and bring up your girls to be strong independent women! Going to college and getting out of your situation can only help them :) This too shall pass...
Thank you. I really have always chosen men who were cheaters, abusing control freaks, or alch/addicts. I guess I just sometimes feel sad for myself because of all the craziness I went through during these relationships. I was running from an abusive situation at home and trying to find relief with the wrong crowd. Glad you are here. It really helps a lot to be able to type in my frustrations. I just read a daily reading that says: "Today I acknowledge that I have needs, and I will begin to get my needs met. I don't have to take care of people so that they will like me. Pleasing people for approval is exhausting, demeaning, and not worthy of my energy.
For so many years, I didn't admit that I had needs. It was as if I were an empty body walking around trying to grab leftovers from other people. In my mind, relationships and friendships were based solely on what I could do for others.
I declare aloud this day that I am likable and I am Lovable. All I have to do is believe in myself. This is my challenge. This is my goal, and I will achieve it."
Aloha Kath...great share and inventory...I went thru the same thing much the same way and it was temporary.
"I declare aloud this day that I am likable and I am Lovable. All I have to do is believe in myself. This is my challenge. This is my goal, and I will achieve it."
Doing self affirmation in thought and aloud works to build self esteem as long, for me I have arrive at the truth of myself. I can't overcome what needs to be changed just because I say it...know what I mean? I had to keep the stuff that was good in me and work on the improvements that needed to be made. I'm still working at some.
Is guilt the only feeling you choose to have? Yes feelings are choices and again for me those choices should be honest ones. I use to feel guilt because it came from my low self esteem and perceptions of self worth. Many times I "accepted" guilt as if someone was giving it to me or laying it on me and at other times it was the only feeling I came up with by default or habit. You can do an inventory on your feelings and how you arrive at them. You can also do an inventory at all of the feelings that are available to you for choice in any situation. Guilt for me today is not a primary choice. I will feel it if I intentionally do something that violates my value system. I don't let guilt tell me that I am a bad person...it may signify that I have done something wrong which can be corrected. Change the things that you can.
I did not realize that I could do an inventory on my feelings. I just did the one about resentments, of which I had plenty. I will do an inventory of my feelings. Thank you. I do accept and choose to feel guilt. It is habitual. It is also an affirmation from a very very negative place in me. I was told so many times that I was a terrible mother by the A in my life that I chose to believe it. I know its not true in my head, but my heart doesn't feel it yet because most of the time I feel like I am not a good mom. I feel "less than" a lot because this situation where my AH chooses drugs over us makes me feel like nothing. I know in my head, not in my heart yet. There are little glimpses of sanity that I catch, and I am just holding on to those, because I know someday it will be normal for me to just be okay no matter what.
