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.
My stomach was in knots all day yesterday because I was so worried about telling my fiance that I was going to a meeting. He had already been drinking by the time I got home from work (as usual).
I asked him how he would feel about me going to an al anon meeting. He told me "Do what you have to do,. But I already know whats going to happen. You will listen to all these people and get ideas in your head and that's like a child protection worker that doesn't have children of their own telling someone how to raise their kids." What the hell does that even mean ? He never makes sense to me which is one of the reasons I am always so irritated.
The meeting was fine. It was for new comers. I'm very shy so I didn't really talk to anyone. One thing I have always had a hard time wrapping my head around is that alcoholism is a disease. Same with eating disorders. Seems like more of a theory to me.
When I got home he asked me a couple of times about the meeting before he passed out. I didn't say much. I wish he would stay passed out so I could sleep but he didn't. He kept me up with his angry drunk mumbling.
(((Irish))) The book Getting Them Sober helped me see so much what I can do with this disease. Its a disease of the mind, body and spirit and it is like no other disease out there. We have the same disease, we just use different things or people to keep us from feeling our own pain. This disease builds on it self and it gets progressively worse. It can make us crazier than them and can kill us too. When I first came to alanon I was told some wonderful words of wisdom that I didn't quite get at the time, but held onto because I figured these old timers knew better than me how to get serenity... and I so want serenity. I know where you are at with him keeping you up all night with the drunk craziness. I know that its hard to view it as a disease, but it is. The other literature that worked for me was Courage to Change, and The Language of Letting Go. Remembering to take it one day at at time, one minute at a time, is the simplicity of this program. It works when we work it. Don't take his drinking personally, I know its hard not to. I have been there, and have had those days. Right now, I am learning to work on me and focus on me and thats all I can do to feel better... Getting a sponsor helped me so much and surrendering as well... Take care of you!
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You yourself, as much as anybody in the entire universe, deserve your love and affection. -Buddha
The past has flown away. The coming month and year do not exsist. Ours only is the present's tiny point. -Mahmud Shabistanri
Soo glad you went to a meeting. Go to another today if you can. Ask yourself why you need his approval for... anything*. Aren't you an adult?
I don't mean to be harsh, I did the same thing, I actually made my husband my higher power. I needed his input on everything, of course, if I didn't ask, he'd give it anyway. I definitely helped create this toxic relationship in which he was superior, I was inferior. He was the plus, I was the big, fat minus. Over time, I became very, very depressed, anger turned inward because I couldn't live this way anymore... knowing that I was not invisible... my part in it.... I gave up my power. I gave it to him.
But we can always take our power back. Al-anon helps me to do that. I am a child of God. That's where my power comes from.
My suggestion.... get to as many face to face meetings as you can, in the beginning I went to one every day. The answers inside me came at a much quicker pace.
*Prayer: "God, please spare me from the desire for love, approval, or appreciation."
-- Edited by glad lee on Friday 4th of February 2011 10:44:09 AM
-- Edited by glad lee on Friday 4th of February 2011 10:47:13 AM
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The prayer isn't for Higher Power to change our lives, but rather to change us.
Good for you Irish...a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step. For now keep hope that your life will change whether he does or not as you learn how to do something different. Like the alcoholic nothing much we say here will cause a big change for you; your thinking, your feelings, your spirit and your physical condition. It's just too early and you are settled in the habits of doing what you have always done. Relax, be patient and follow the suggestion of "keep coming back". You won't learn it all in one day because it didn't take one day to get you here.
Hold the awareness and the expectation that he is and will not be available to and for you and that he will be defensive and offensive about your willingness to seek a better way of living. He is fearful and that is the reason he response the way he does. He is alcoholic. Alcoholics have a compulsion of the mind and an allergy of the body along with it everyone around them has an allergy to their drinking also. It is your allergy that brought you here. Keep coming back.
He isn't doing what he is doing so that you would be sick. He's doing it because he cannot not do it. He is addicted.
First the man takes a drink...then the drink takes a drink...then the drink takes the man. The alcoholic has three choices...sobriety, insanity or death.
