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.
Tonight is the night for my first F2F meeting. While I'm nervous and unsure I'm also ready. I got the book Getting Them Sober by Toby Rice Drews from the library yesterday, I'm a little over half way through. I'm so glad y'all recommended it. While reading I can see where I've already taken proper steps. I've already quit engaging in "discussions" if he has been drinking. I've already set the boundary for how I will be spoken to. I've already reached out to close friends for support and been very honest with everything that has happened.
I have only been married since June and realized in July that my husband is an alcoholic so the years of living with alcohol talked about in the book don't apply to this particular situation. However something I realized, this isn't the first alcoholic in my life, this is the one I married.
Driving to work this morning I was thinking back over my dating past. There was the one I dated who was addicted to drugs. There was the one I dated who was an alcoholic, highly successfull and very intelligent and we went on a weekend trip to the beach. Where I had to find my own way home because while out he became so verbally abusive that I told him I was going to the ladies room and walked out the door of the restaurant, took a cab, had security escort me to the room, got my stuff, got a new room, and a friend had friends who lived there who met her halfway and she picked me up. That guy realized I was gone about 30 minutes later, missed check out the next day because he was passed out. I should have found Al-Anon then but I didn't realize it. After him, I took a little break, that trip happened in September, I didn't date again until November, and then thru an online dating site (same one I met the other guy) I met this amazing guy, who turned out to really like cocaine... It took me a long time to finally cut ties with that one.
My AH isn't the first alcoholic in my life he's the first one I married. In another post there has been something said that is so true. I have to change ME. I've spent years breaking up with guys only to date the next one, only to realize that all this time I was the one who needed to figure out myself. I actually had taken time off last summer, and had I not done that I would not be where I am today. Obviously I didn't figure it all out because I married my AH but in reading and learning I'm so incredibly thankful that I'm now in a place where I can't run away, I have to stand and learn and grow.
I'm not stuck, I have choices and I am choosing to stay. I am choosing to work on me. I am choosing to do whatever I can to help my AH. Not by enabling, not by making excuses, not by accepting unacceptable behavior, but by loving him enough to learn to love myself. I'm loving him by not giving up, by not walking out, by researching and studying and acknowleding that this is a baffling, cunning and horrible disease. His daughter deserves to know how wonderful her Daddy is, I deserve to have the marriage that HP intended. I believe that all this is possible, and it all starts with me working on me.
I'll be at that meeting tonight, as scary as it is. I'll be reading, both literature and on here. Life often doesn't work the way that we thought it should but sometimes that makes it even better!!!
I am so glad you are making it to your first meeting. You know for me I discovered in the relationships I have had before this one, the common denominator was me. There is a reading in our literature that says "when you do what you've always done, youre going to get what youve always got" That spoke volumes to me. I have found a greater sense of self, peace, and serenity when I concentrate not on what can be changed in others, but what can be changed in me and my attitude. When I practiced the alanon slogan, "Let it Begin with Me" my whole world shifted.
I hope you find the love, understanding, peace and comfort in your face to face meeting tonight. Arrive a bit early and introduce yourself to the group by letting them know you are a newcomer. Reaching out and asking for help is the first step in greater awareness and understadning.
Hi Jackie! It sounds to me like you are doing all the right things to move toward a better place for yourself. You seem to have a very good awareness of yourself and a clear idea as to what direction you want your life to take. I'm SO glad you are going to a F2F meeting. My own experience with that was not so great, but I know many people who have benefitted so much by the meetings. I have found a group about an hour from where I live that is a great 'fit' for me, and I attend that one when I can. I hope your meeting is a good one, please post and let us know how it went. Congratulations to you on all the positive steps you've taken for yourself so far. That in itself is a great accomplishment.
Best of luck,
Denise
"The secret of life is enjoying the passage of time."
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"The secret of life is enjoying the passage of time."
It will get better and my experience has been no one can go to 6 meetings and not be changed in some way or form in a positive way. It's the first step in a really great journey. Good for you on being scared and doing it anyway, feelings they are neither right or wrong they just are.
Hugs 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
Jackie, when I began to use the new tools of spirituality that I was being taught, I stopped talking all the time about what my loved one was doing and had done and started figuring out what I was doing and what I had done. That has made all the difference. When I focus on me, I get better... HUGS! Glad you are here!
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-youfoundme
Let go and let God...Let it be... let it begin with me...
I went to the meeting. I'm so glad that I did! It's hard when my schedule during the week is so non-stop but I realized that it was necessary and I still got a run in and had dinner with my husband before the meeting at 8 so it was a very productive evening.
The group was small, but wonderful. I had attended an NA meeting with an ex-boyfriend a few years ago so I had an idea of what a meeting might be like. It kind of was but mostly wasn't but I'm certainly glad I was there.
Soooo glad you went and so glad it was a positive experience for you. The nice things about meetings is if one doesn't fit (which it sounds like this one did) there are others and every meeting offers a different flavor of people and how they choose to do things. Two parts that are always the same are the openings and closings of the meetings. Congratulations for taking the risk and going. :)
Hugs 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
Next week I have a concert to go to on Tuesday night. I found a lunch time meeting that's about 5 minutes from my office and I cleared it with my boss to go and make up whatever time I need to. It's going to be interesting to see the difference between meetings!
Thank you all for the support!!!