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.
I read this the other day and put myself as the frog.
It answered my question of: Im a smart, loving wife, mother, friend, daughter...Why didnt I see the destruction happening in my life, living with an alcoholic until I was cook to death??
When you put a frog into a hot boiling pan of water, the frog will jump out.
When you put a frog into a pan of cool water & slowly turn up the heat on the stove, the frog will not realize the heat of the water rising and the frog will soon cook to death.....
I have never felt like a frog i saw exactly what was going on. The only tools I had in my tool box to deal with the insanity of this disease was denial and pretend. I denied reality, pretended all was well and then tried to control everyone so my life would be successful
Hitting bottom and finding alanon was the greatest gift I have received in my lifetime. I now have such wonderful tools to live by .
I know how to focus on myself and have compassion for others.
Not so true with Al-Anon in the mix. I was a frog who was five years late finding a way to turn the heat down before I was cooked. Thank HP, this frog found the rooms of Al-Anon where he was given tools to turn the heat down before he was cooked.
That little story I heard yrs ago and it fit me to a tee , you ask why didnt you see it comming I doubt if any of us did , alcoholism is slow and steady gets worse every yr and we just keep adjusting and if were lucky we maladjust then thats when we find help .. I knew nothing about alcoholism or how it was affecting me and my family and for me its a matter of when we know better we do better , we all did the best we could at the time with the knowledge we had .. No I did not see it comming either . Louise
I am in that club too! Throw me in and I can see and run. Slow exposure I will still try to find ways to excuse others and accomodate myself to the situation. I do recognise this charateristic in myself and am able to catch it faster now but it is still a potential pitfall at times in all my relationships.
I don't think I felt so much like a frog, but like a person who'd essentially thrown in the towel - only I didn't realize I had until one day I realized it was gone. That's because I allowed, thread by thread, for it to be given away instead of just throwing the whole thing in at once.
Each thread could be representative of a boundary getting pushed back further and further. Where before, I might have said "I would NEVER put up with that!" something would go wrong, the A would apologize, and then I'd tell myself "well, okay, he's going to change. I guess I can put up with it just the one time." And then "it" (whatever "it" is... that thing I THOUGHT I had a firm boundary on) would happen again - the remorse from the A would arise again along with promises to change and that boundary would get pushed back again.
That's how I felt.
Slowly, with Al-Anon, I learned to start redefining my boundaries, and with more practice, I started to learn how to actually stick to them.
KIMMYJO: THIS MAY BE OFF THE WALL BUT I SAW SOMETHING THAT I THOUGHT I WOULD SHARE W/ YOU: FROG--FULLY RELY ON GOD! BUT THEN. I AM OFF THE WALL! KATHLEEN
