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.
After all I've walked through, and with all that I'm learning, and with all that i still need to learn, I am not sure today that I will ever be able and feel secure if I would choose to live with an A. Sure we are all lovely people and need to be loved, A's, co-dep's we are all fighting an addiction. So I wonder today, if the most healthy choice wouldn't be to refrain from all the risky situations, that could possibly create more damage. But looking at today's world and at my surrounding, that is almost an impossible task. not so many people are 'getting' it, even me I'm struggling many days, when again don't want to get it. I know it's one day at the time, but sometimes I catch myself thinking about the future, and also about my relationship-future, about my needs and 'not-to-do's anymore. So many learned lessons, I know how I hurt myself.I am just afraid to make the same mistakes again, to put myself in a position I hurt again. I found myself dreaming reentry: what if alcohol or any other substance had never been found or invented? I know, my fairy tale wish thinking, isn't it cute and naive. I understand i need to accept life for what it is, people as all, and myself too.
I am making choice for my life, will also choose soon again where and what i want to live and work, it's inevitable in my circumstances. So I basically go through big questions of existence I just wonder, is there any hope, living the alcoholic drama, leaving it, and not falling back into it in some form with another person. It runs in my family, in my circle of friends, in many work areas. how to tackle these questions of the future with serenity and some hope??
Today I feel that yes, i announced war to the diseases, mine and the A's, for i recognized the damage it can do. But that means today, that I will always be fighting, running in a maze, meeting people, walking away from them.. today I see more alcohol than people. I'm scared I will run away from life, being scared all along. My father is an A too, I love him and learning to accept him, but I sure wish that my family life, if I will have be able to create one, will bee running differently. My mother didn't recognize it on time, she is spent, depressed, fighting in an aggressive way, for she doesn't understand what happened to her. But they live, they live together and have a life.
So does my A, I can't tell if he is happy, but he's fighting, and living a life. As of me, I'm running around, eyes so wide open, that I see disaster in every street, that I'm trying and working hard to eliminate the dirt in my street, that I'm now at a stand still , son't know in which direction to walk anymore. I feel overwhelmed and lost my purpose, for it feels a very lonely road.
I can relate to this very much. I have walked away from my AH, completely, no contact at all but addiction is still in my life, with myself as a codependant enabler, my son as a problem drinker. My whole family has been affected by alcoholism. I see symptoms everywhere too, in my workplace, with friends. There is no escape from addiction or behaviours associated with it. I think it must be part of life really.
'Walking away from people' is something I cant do. I walked away from my ex but hes still there really, we have 3 children so they talk about him and his isms seep out in everything he says. My eldest son, he is mostly isms, real deep issues like his Dad. I am surrounded and I imagine most people are. I think its about learning to live in the world just as it is really. There are obvious behaviours that cant be tolerated and then even the ones that can be tolerated can be too much after a while. Its walking away from the alcoholism, not really the person, although it is very difficult to seperate them.
You talk about 'living' and not being scared to live. When I lived with my ex, I was not living my own life, I was an extra in the P*** show, he was living, with complete disregard for any other human being on the planet really, like a toddler that bounds through life with a very narrow view of the world, not a thought for others, no empathy. I used to think well at least he is actually living, socialising, having experiences, happy, no fear etc. I believed the illusion that the alcoholic is living but it was dramatic and chaotic and I confused it with exciting. I compared how I felt and how I was living with him and his approach to life. Alcoholics don't live, they exist and they exist to block out, run away from themselves, like we did.
My eyes are open now too and I don't ever want to close them again. I am on my own and I will never, ever have an alcoholic partner again. I have promised myself. I do understand where you are coming from though because most people have been affected and its everywhere really so are we destined to live on our own for ever? I dont really fear this right now, maybe because I still have my sons at home. Thank you for your share, as always really thought provoking.x
((Tortuga)) Yes- I can relate. We don't know what we don't know. Uncertainty is very uncomfortable, and it's easier sometimes to want to shift back to older familiar ways. ... but, comes a point when I realize that I've outgrown what is old and familiar and it doesn't work for me.... it's ok- really it is. Now is an opportunity to explore and blossom to our potentials. One foot in front of the other, focus on the present, and keep doing the next right thing. My side of the street is more than enough; when i find I'm even looking on someone else's, I now know I've strayed too far. lol Be gentle with yourself in the process.
My thoughts of the disease have changed over the years. I did used to find it helpful to think of it as a war and sometimes still do. Lately, however, it's been more about my serenity and holding onto it at all costs. This is not so much about war, as it is about removing myself from harms way. If I have this self armor- then walking about in the fields of turmoil are less scary.
My Daily Reading had a great answer to the question
It is important for those of us who have been crushed by the disease of addiction to have faith that life will get better. We stopped "using" or being co-dependent because the behavior was destroying us. Our lives were disintegrating in negative behavior and attitudes. Now we have chosen a different way to live.
Today I seek to find God in my freedom of choice, my ability to change. I have faith in the daily belief that my life will get better so long as I avoid those things that hurt me. My faith enables me to change.
O God, my faith in me reflects my belief in You.
-- Edited by hotrod on Sunday 26th of January 2014 10:10:57 PM
I guess and I'm an odd duck .. it just is what it is .. I can see a lot more pain in the world .. I know this sounds weird .. I love the line in the Princess Bride and that whole movie follows a very Buddhist thought process .. which is .. life is pain .. anyone else who says differently is selling something. I completely subscribe to that line .. birth is painful, death is painful so why would anything in the middle be different?
I am powerless .. where I have power is I can choose to see the beauty through the rain, .. without rain there is no growth. I can choose what kind of day I have. I can pray for those who suffer in the pain and choose to remain there. I can give my will to the God of MY understanding and allow Him to fix what I am powerless over.
While I see more pain I also see daily miracles which we all are .. doing the best we can considering the vast circumstances we come from .. all different, and all the same in that moment. I truly feel sadness when I see the people who are so obviously struggling .. and then I see something else .. I wish I could verbalize it better .. the choice that I don't have to stay in that place of oh look at all the pain and can still find the beauty.
The last few months for me have brought some serious sense of what is and isn't mine to deal with .. I'm grateful for the lessons I don't have because I have a couple I'd like to give away! :) The important thing for me is to be the woman that the God of my understanding wants me to be and how so give to the world the world gives to me.
Staying in the Just for Today is pretty big and knowing I can see the glass half full, half empty or choose to be grateful I have a glass with something in it. I usually choose the third option these days .. I can get to caught up in the first two.
Hugs S :)
__________________
Faith minus vulnerability and mystery equals extremism. If you've got all the answers, then don't call what you do "faith". - Brene Brown
"Whatever truth you own doesn't own you" - Gary John Bishop
I know, my fairy tale wish thinking, isn't it cute and naive. I understand i need to accept life for what it is, people as all, and myself too.