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 know that the only way to achieve my goals is to work on myself, but I can't help but to be annoyed sometimes. I am annoyed with my AH because it's not fair. It's not fair that he so easy walks in and out of my life. How he can say things to me like he never loved me, or he needs no contact with me out of no where and shows no emotion. How he just goes on with his life every day and doesn't think for a moment about his feelings or how he makes me feel. How it's always ultimatduims with him. It really sucks because I can't just turn off the way I feel or how I hurt!
Parfait, I know how your feeling. It happens when they are lost to the disease of alcoholism.
We never know what they will say or do or if they will ever be brought back to being a human being again.
Maybe they will, maybe they wont, one thing for sure, it will take a long period of time if they ever want to.
We on the other hand have a choice. We can choose not to be hurt, we are so fortunate to have so many choices and Alanon too.
Alanon can really show you a new way of living, a new way to be creative with the life that has been given us.
We dont want to waste our days being hurt, angry, and devastated and having our emotions pulled around by a person that is really sick.
It really helps to understand the disease of alcoholism, its a powerful disease. Its not an easy task for us to undertake and I know I have asked
in the past , why me.?? Well life has its struggles, thats a fact we cant all escape.
Bring the focus back on your program, really understand that your AH is sick and you are powerless over that. Otherwise we continue to be hurt and miserable.
Keep coming back to your serenity Luv, Bettina
-- Edited by Bettina on Friday 4th of February 2011 01:52:42 PM
Parfait...you can change if you are willing and courageous as the Serenity Prayer suggest.
Somethings I learned? "No" is a complete sentence. "Stop" is something I can do to avoid a collision. "I'm done" means I need not and will not go any further.
I used "I'm done" this morning and I will "not" go any further with things the way that they are.
Hey there (((HUGS))) I have also learned that "OK" is a complete sentence, when someone says something that they are going to do, and I don't want to be involved, I can say "Ok" and walk away. I love that no is also a complete sentence or "Not right now" that gives me time and space. I can walk away from the abuse and go in another room or leave the house or whatever. I have learned that boundaries are for me... Take care of you!
__________________
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
Thank you....I am working at things for myself everyday. Alanon has helped very much. I would like to understand the diesese more and how it affects behaviors and patterns. I am a very analytical person, I like facts. I understand that there is nothing I can do to cure my AH and it may never work out. But getting the basics on the psycology of alcoholism I think will also be very good for me. I want to really get WHY I am powerless? What causes my AH to be sick and treat me with such disrespect. As for the rest of my life I am totally about doing me, traveling, work, school, finding a faith I can turn to.
why are you powerless ?? well first your trying to solve a problem that has nothing to do with you second your not the one with the drinking problem he is and last but not least sit down with a coffee and pen and paper write down everything you have tried to make him stop and see if any of them worked for more than a day . I got a long list when i did this and not one of them worked that is how i finally got it , I am powerless over people places and things , not helpless - powerless .. All alcoholics are diff just like we are , were all unique in our own way , you could study for the rest of your life and never truly understand his compulsion to drink anymore than he will truly understand how his behavior affected your life . Study why you do the things you do , why you allowed the things you did , its far more productive .. Louise
You're not powerless entirely - you're only powerless over other people. You can't make anyone else do anything else. That said, you have total power to make your own choices and decisions. That's what the program is about - putting all the energy we use in futile attempts to exert power over other people into taking our power back - our power over ourselves. Before the program, I gave complete power to the sickest person in the room...my exAH. That is insane. It is insane that I let a sick person dictate how I felt, what I did, walk all over me, hurt me, etc. In working my program, i've taken my power back. I realize now that others can only hurt me if I let them. They can only bring down my attitude if I let them. They can only walk all over me if I let them. I don't have the power to change how someone else acts, but I sure do have the power to decide whether I will take it.
I agree that it is more productive to put the energy I used to spend studying someone else's behavior (and their disease) into studying my own behavior (and my own disease, which was addiction to the A).
(((((Parfait))))) in the analytical sense we are or were similar. You can do what I did 5 years after I sat in meeting after meeting in Al-Anon just not accepting a whole lot. I needed to have more so....I went to college on it and studied the disease of alcoholism and substance addiction. When I graduated I stood on the front steps of the college I had attended and said...I coulda saved the money. Most of what I learned had already been talked about inside the meetings and in the meetings after the meetings. Duh...I needed more. I did get something from it...a certificate to fix professionally and get paid for doing it. My sponsor warned me..."Jerry F, just remember you cannot sell a 12th step."
The psycology of alcoholism...picture this, a brain with out mind altering chemicals then being flooded with mind altering chemicals. The way it works and then tries to work are very different. Alcohol and mind altering chemical alters the mind and it becomes broke...not able to work the way it does without mind altering chemicals and the person who owns the mind "isn't all there". They think and behave abnormally or different than normal. There is alot of study about abnormal whatitz in college, psycology, physiology, behaviors, etc and to understand it all you have to do is add alcohol or...drugs. Plainly the person becomes very different and the people around them become abnormal also as they try to maintain some sense of balance and equilibrium while in the process. Alcohol is a very very powerful chemical and can get to the brain without going thru the stomach. It goes from the tip of the tongue right to the central nervous system thru the blood brain barrier. It is a super chemical and has been around for 3000 or more years before the life of Christ.
Alcohol behaviors...what affects the mind affects everything attached to the brain. If the drinker cannot see and perceive correctly they will respond or react in an unusual (un-normal) manner. Alcohol exascerbates emotions so if you have an alcoholic with a bad temper you'll get a Simon Legree. If you have an alcoholic who is assertive either seriously or happily you'll get an act out who becomes the scene. Alcohol will knock down barriers and a drinker will do what they normally will not do if not under the influence. Gordon good dad will drink and go home to the bar maid or someone else (whatever gender) rather than make it home to wife and family if that still does exists. Alcoholism is progressive...never gets better always gets worse. The alcoholic ceases to grow or keep up with the rest of society around them once the drinking becomes the axis or focal point of their lives. Their addiction, compulsion, obsession will be for alcohol and alcohol events and social groups and life. When they are not drinking they will be thinking of it and planning it.
Alcoholics will understand and become aware of their addiction, obsession and their compulsion at sometime during the drinking continuum...they will also become aware that to drink will cause more pain then it ever had before, mind, body, spirit and emotions and they will be overcome with pain if they attempt to stop drinking. Damned if you do...Damned if you don't. When it gets out of control they will lie, cheat and steal to keep the obsession justified to themselves. They lie because they are affraid of exposing the truth as they now know it...They don't control the alcohol it controls them. They are affraid of their friends, associates and families judgments of them and how it is affecting these loved ones. They conceal so that they can drink with out loosing even when they know they are loosing -everything-. They cheat as a survival tool even when they know they are not surviving. They steal in all manner of ways; money, the truth, others emotions especially love and time...mostly time. They rob themselves of good years and others also.
Alcohol isn't a food source. It isn't a health support and is a health destroyer. It is classically called a solvent which can dissolve whatever it comes in contact with... marriages, other relationships, families, jobs, houses, finances, spiritual conditions everything. It is sooooo annoying and much more.
Thank you for letting me share some of my education and of course experiences.
(((((hugs)))))
-- Edited by Jerry F on Sunday 6th of February 2011 12:57:50 AM
JERRY YOU ARE AWESOME!!! See this is is exactly what I needed to read. I totally have two and two put together about my AHboyfriend now. I know when it all started and what may have made him turn to it. You see I have known my AHBF since we were 14, we even went to the same high school and were friends for much longer then we dated. I seen it all. So knowing that basically he is brain damaged in a way that his brain is sick and can't work right now because of the damage that was caused. That is what I needed the science of things. What I am curious about is the whole dry drunk issue. So I understand with drugs and alcohol while a person is trying to quit they go through detox. Eventually the body can begin to funcion with out the substance. So is there wonder something in particular in the way alcohol damages our brain to act is if we are still using years after detoxing?
