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 A has two sides: a grotesque, huge, monster-like personna that puts addiction first and is willing to destroy herself and our marriage. Then there is a caring, helpful, and can-count-on-person who always comes through in an emergency. At times in the past, the monster was as big as godzilla, and that's all I could see. With alanon, and learning to take care of me, I can see both sides of my spouse. She really is a split-person. I am trying to become whole. She could too but does not see the value in herself. I understand better why I stay and I guess with giving up my expectations for her, I manage much better. Maybe I am getting the detaching with love thing. I have nothing but gratitude for my alanon family. Thank you so much, Lyne
I know where your coming from. My partner is not a A but has some serious issues too. He's one day as nice as can be and the next telling me to get out (terrible terrible words) and he hates me, my son and every I have even done during our 22 years together. I also over time have the same responses towards him. We just tolerate each other I'm guessing over the last 8 years.
So like you I'm trying to become whole again so I can have the strength and courage to make my final change in life. I will leave, I will let go I will become whole again.
I can take advice from you. I thought I was doing good but like you I have to give up ALL expectations so I can manage and make plans for me and only me.
Thank you Lynn...your post gave me something to strive for.
((( hugs )))
__________________
Lord, put your arm around my shoulder and your hand over my mouth
Speak only when you feel that your words are better than your silence.
Me too PP. I also do not believe in the "split personality" definition that I hear so many folks talk about in alanon. I get that when the person is drunk or using, it's like night and day in the way they behave versus when they are sober or even semi-sober. I also understand the need to detach from the disease. BUT - the "real" them is the same. SICK. The person remains emotionally stunted and incapable of meeting a healthy person's needs in general. They are sick 100 percent of the time. They are underdeveloped 100 percent of the time. They are emotionally childish 100 percent of the time. Believing otherwise is like opening yourself up to riding a rollercoaster, tiptoeing on egg shells and all of that.
I know I was not a bad person when I was in my active addiction, but I was not an evil drunk at one time and a caring person another. I was a sick person 100 percent of the time that was never an uncaring or evil person...just a sick addicted one. I helped people all day long working as a counselor and then drank and was a tornado of destruction the second I got off work. I actually thought all my "good work" was an excuse for drinking. I never realized that was just my job and it was the last thing remaining that I was doing semi-normally. It didn't make me a saint by day and evil by night. It made me clinging to normalcy by a thread in the day and a disaster by night and on weekends but sick all the time.
I have so much empathy for that experience. If that is your perception of the situation, then it is real for you and I need to accept that those feelings are very real. I found that when I actually found people who had experienced it like I did then I had the strength to validate myself and move on. It is not about being "right". It is about having someone tell you that your emotional experience is real and sadly the "A" is so wrapped up in proving that they are "not a bad guy" that they cannot even begin to empathize at that level.
Glad that your using the tools of alanon and are able to detach from this disease.
When I was married to the A(who passed away last July) I always knew when he was drinking vodka, it made him grotesque, when drinking beer he was much
more mellow, he never had days of abstinence.
I don't believe that Alcholics have split personalities, I really think there is no such thing. They are either drunk or sober. Drinking alters the brain, that is what you are
experiencing, its not fun, it can be pretty horrible to be around, but thanks to Alanon we can use the tools to detach, or remove ourselves from the situation. It doesn't help to judge
or berate the addicted person, for I'm sure they are suffering more than we know. We are always changing , everything passes with time.
Keep working it, because it works if you work it.
Bettina
PC: I didn't think you sounded preachy. I think you sounded like somebody who has been there by experience. I appreciate your honesty because I truly do not know what it is like to be an untreated alcoholic on an experiential level and I want to know. All I know is what it is like to be a person who was also caught up in the manifestations of the disease trying to make sense of it all and failing. Each honest share that you offer helps me better empathize without judging, labeling or pitying a person with this disease. Thank you.
I also appreciate your honest share, Lyne, because I no longer live with an A - recovering or otherwise - and it helps me better empathize with folks who do. Thank you.
Yeah...but the big book also spends large portions of it discussing the need for overall spiritual growth, faith, and a program of action. To me, the split personality thing implies that the only broken part is when the alcoholic drinks and if you take that away - they are an angel. Alcoholism is encompassing and due to a multitude of character defects and coping deficits that exist when they are drunk AND sober. Drinking is a symptom of a larger spiritual, physical, and psychological sickness that is there all the times for the alcoholic.
That has been my experience, too, when relating to folks who cannot stop drinking on their own. Even when the drugs are removed, there are still a lot of issues that cause them distress until they are able to find relief in ways that work for them. Until the drugs are removed, it has been my experience that no method of treatment helps because the underlying issues can't be addressed. Not unlike my own issues - until I stopped being almost entirely focused on my As, I couldn't see my own underlying issues or address them in ways that worked for me. I guess in this way we are very much alike? The A and the non-A?
Is it possible that both of you are correct? I may be wrong but I hear "how the non-alcoholic experiences it" and "how the alcoholic experiences it." Both perceptions seem to be valid to come to a point of understanding.
I think that was grateful's point. Also my view is not "how the alcoholic experiences" it in this regard. It may be how one sober alcoholic views things. Most active drunks or dry drunks think they have no problems with the way they act or that the problem is the qualifier.
Yes, it was my point. I appreciate PC's view on it and have found his view to be similar to my own experience with untreated As - not just my loved ones but the people I meet in the course of my work. Thanks for the clarification, PC, on your share not really being about how an alcoholic experiences things but more as your view of things. I've also realized in working the Al-Anon program that until my focus on my untreated As could be withdrawn because I was more focused on me - I truly couldn't see my own issues and character defects. It was if only my As existed and I was just the person witnessing the behaviors or trying to protect myself from them. I didn't see me most of the time. I just saw them, thought about them, experienced them, worried and obsessed about them and relaxed only when they did what I considered to be normal behavior as if my being so focused on them was normal behavior. I didn't see that I had a problem - only that they had a problem - or more true - my x had a problem. Once I separated from him and later divorced myself from him - there was enough physical space between us that I recognized I needed help and got it.
When I hear the "split personality" or Jekyll/Hyde, I think of the cycle of emotional abuse. Before I had the knowledge to describe the cycle, that is how I would describe it.
I can so relate to that, Truth. Al-Anon is such a blessing with helping some of us even identify that cycle and move through it, too. What a lifesaver!
My ex did have a "mean switch" when he drank....to that end, it was like unleashing a monster. I was this clumsy stumbling crying messy drunk...also a monster. Looking back, while the monsters we became drunk were bad, we both had bad judgment and bad decision making all the time. So I get both sides of this whole thing.
I can see within me, when I am not engaged in recovery conversation, my thinking becomes distorted and I begin to believe that ALL of my feelings are truth and I can create some fabulously destructive stories. I recognize my thinking as being off and I quickly get back on track with the tools I have when I reach. I cannot imagine what it would be like to have the influences of drugs or alcohol in the mix....wow. I appreciate hearing from those that have had the experiences of substances, it really helps me to understand as best as I can without the actual experience.
My son is PC.....a clumsy stumbling crying messy drunk....never really hurt anyone or abused but himself. Whenever he did get mad it didn't last long because he would fall over and pass out before he did too much damage. Any real damage was to his face.
__________________
Lord, put your arm around my shoulder and your hand over my mouth
Speak only when you feel that your words are better than your silence.
