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 just spent the past week with a family member who was in town; she left this morning .. It's always good to see her and always painful to watch her leave .. regardless of the visit we have or don't have ..
for the first time in my life, I'm in a place where I "feel" alone .. and feeling like I am the only one in the world to feel this.
Growing up in an alcoholic thinking environment was never easy .. When it comes to alanon, there's a reading in Courage to Change that says alanon has given me a 2nd family whose love is not based on a point system .. In my past family, a point system was a given .. love needed to be earned .. primarily by how good and easy we could make things for the alcoholic .. I never earned much approval in that category ..
When I was young, my 4 oldest sisters moved out around the same time and there I was at home alone by the age of 6 .. my other 2 brothers were never home (working and with friends) I was the way youngest like two different families and the house got very quiet . everything (I) did became the center of attention and I felt the abandonment in the worst way .. Through the years, I learned to obssess on the alcoholics and primarily on those who moved out .. in an unknowing attempt to keep them with me ..
Anyway ... to make an even longer story shorter .. I grew up feeling helpless and much of my help I guess in the situation I was in was removed .. My brothers and sisters were never really helpful persay but they did help to take the focus off of me solely .. To this day, There is still that voice in me that says I need them to get better so " they can make me better." insanity (deep down i would much rather get me better first and sharing is the Only way I know how) .. but yet powerful over me .. I guess where I'm at is step 2 .. I'm back to believing I can't make a difference in my life .. that I can't Really change .. That everytime I was blamed for basically feeling anything and trying to express it, the alcoholics were right .. i was just being drama .. that I would never really become as independent or successful as they did, etc.. At the end of the day .. these are Still My voices .. (i know this today but didn't for a long time) but I can't seem to step out of this victim mode for whatever reason .. I know higher power wants to teach me something through all of this but this is and has always been one of my most painful areas to face .. My family didn't have all that much to give me by the time I came around .. The disease and dynamics had taken their toll .. My family are good people; if they could have done better they would have .. In the meantime .. talk about alcoholism being powerful .. all these years later and it still haunts and holds a grip on me ..
How do i start my life over in my 40's .. I am so lost .. with the alcohlic, I had completely isolated myself from so many .. (fear of another public humiliation? this was not a person who was drinking, using, etc., 24/7 and yet the embarrassment of his attitude, criticisms, etc.,) when I had kids, I did the same, etc.. Life basically started passing me by .. It's hard for me to share this but the True hard isn't so much facing others .. It's having to face Me .. My own personal past .. My own doing through my own reactions ..
I'm grieving just coming back from the airport and watching the plane leave .. Everytime she/they come in and leave to go home again, I feel like i'm 6 years old again and reliving continuously their first departure .. and the pain of abandonment in other ways in the fact that after all these years, I still try to make a better Past as if we're supposed to pick back up from when I was the ages of 6 ? 13? 14? 15? lol does what i'm saying in that last line make sense ?? .. It's as if I'm looking back to the days when we occasionally formed somewhat of a shallow, bond of some type .. Never really deep relations and never accepting of who I was.. (I never accepted me either .. I always thought I needed Their approval of me before I could have one .. it's Never truly came) Many times my brothers and sisters were closer to each other and I felt somewhat more of an obligational visit, etc.. not feeling sorry .. just expressing (My perception of things) ..
Some of this I know is sponsor share .. but at the moment, I don't have my sponsor with me and I am sitting in a lot of pain .. so for what it's worth, I'm throwing this out here and reminding myself whatever happens will Still be for my own personal recovery .. Until I get out of MY way .. higher power can't move in closer .. I know he's too good to knock me down and step over me .. =)
Anyway .. funny enough I feel the vulnerability even online just sharing this .. but I also feel the grattitude and relief of being allowed to just be here ..
Hugs and thank you for your share. I've ben dealing a lot with old tapes playing this week there really is something in the air. Like you also I'm in my 40's trying to figure out who am I. I have heard the statement since I was 9 about not giving away my power I just now like in the last 3 months have figured out what that meant. I feel a little duh lol.
When I stopped playing the victim, what that means to me is I stopped allowing my feelings to dictate and control my emotions things in my life started to click I stopped blaming and pointing the finger at everyone else and took responsibility for my part in my situation in my life.
I do not have it close to having it down. I've started to be a lot more gentle with myself. That action for me has lifted heavy things off my heart.
You are not alone. You are not crazy. You are not defective in any way shape or form.
What you are is a person who has been damaged by the past and figuring out who you are. You are doing right in your own time and your own way. As you continue to move forward you are going to find out so much about who you are. You have to get in the car to start the journey. You've done that by doing the work on yourself.
keep up the good work because you are worth it. You deserve it. Thanks again for the share and it's what we are here for.
hugs and support p:)
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Stepping onto a brand-new path is difficult, but not more difficult than remaining in a situation, which is not nurturing to the whole woman.- Maya Angelo
Metwo2, HUGS! You are not alone, many of us come from painful childhood's and have nothing to get back to because we have had such trauma and abandonment and hardships our whole lives. Its great to share here, and when you can call your sponsor (if you have one) do that too.
I too have never felt good inside, but alanon is helping me to gain that feeling that I never had. There is a spark in all of us, that life that is so very very precious... I too was abandoned, it was by my biological father. I don't know him. It hurts to feel that. It hurts to feel the trauma that happened to me. It hurts but sometimes life does hurt. Learning to feel it and heal from it is what alanon is for. We feel it, and then we learn to deal with that pain which helps us to heal from it. If we never do those things we stay in pain.
You are not alone, keep coming, it works when we work it and you are worth it as my home group says :) Take care of you!
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-youfoundme
Let go and let God...Let it be... let it begin with me...
I have huge abandonment issues, it may be a common theme with us acoa's and alanons. I was the youngest in my family so I was kind of an only child by the time I was 7. Adored my brother and sister ( who beacme alcholics/addicts) but had more in common with my first niece who was closer in age to me than my siblings ( she also grew up to be an A). I didn't so i really didn't belong to the club so to speak. I married a wonderful guy ( not an A ) had 2 beautiful children and our son despite our best efforts to break the cycle is also an addict. While my son was sinking into addiction I was suffering from severe depression and anxiety, lost my job etc my whole life fell apart in my 40's till I found alanon. My daughter doesn't want anything to do with a mother she didn't know anymore and blames for her brothers addiction...wow talk about abandonment. I pushed my daughter away couldn't have been more ashamed, then with son as an addict he may be present physically but emotionally no way the disease doesnt allow for that. Thankfully I had my husband by my side. But fear of abandonment is always in the back of my mind. My brother who was a heroin addict most of his life found recovery the last 13 yrs of his life. But he contracted HepC from a dirty needle and was diagnosed 2 years into his recovery. He kept his recovery and sobriety going God Bless him. When he got very sick even though he lived 700 miles away he made me his medical power of atty. I spent months going back and forth working with his medical team who all thought he still had time on his hands, enough time to get on a transplant list. When i last left him he was in the hospital, in good spirits, hopeful etc but he told me things would be different once I left. His wife had no interest in seeing him recover, she had relapsed long ago andshe was ready to move on. But I was confident everything I had done, put in place would keep him going. Wrong he decompensated within days of my leaving and dead within 2 weeks. The ultimate abandonment in my eyes. I was mad at the world after that, seriously let my prgram slide as I could not get over my anger and resentment. Took me a good while to get back on track cause i know that, that is where my brother would want me. So yea I would say many of us share abandonment issues.... thankfully we also have recovery and program to see us through Blessings
I also have abandonment issues....but with the help of the program, they are much less. I learned that I would be okay no matter what anyone else did, or didn't. One thing that helped me put the past behind was when someone said, "Even God can't change the past." It is what it is.
One thing I hear all through your post is putting yourself down. If you can honestly say that your family is good people and they did as good as they could.....then why can't you say that about yourself? You are the most important person in your life.
I'm so sorry for your loss Xeno .. and at the same time so grateful we have All found eachother .. It's amazing how we find so much unity in alanon and wisdom .. Even over the Net .. What a Beautiful Gift ..
Maryjane .. I Actually heard that tonight .. Thank You .. I don't know why i have never said that about myself .. Funny that it just jumped out at me .. Somewhere in there I think I was reminded of the day I shared on people pleasing and it hit me that in all my years of people pleasing, both positive or negative, if I was truly a people pleaser why didn't I ever please myself .. I mean .. wasn't I a people ?? I think the word "honest in honestly" jumped out at me too ..
Sooo much collective wisdom on these boards .. thanks again
good morning ..