Aloha d53....

My experience?  I came into the Family Group with a huge black hole (spiritual emptiness) where my heart, lungs, and stomach once was.  I had no motivation to continue living the way I was with the consequences and expectations I tried to live with.  I fence sat fearing a decision to either side would result in me being "wrong again" and "abused more."  I fence sat because there was more fear than faith and I didn't 'know what to have faith in.  When I called out is there anyone out there to save my butt the only one that answered was a Al-Anon hotline volunteer that my Higher Power (unseen and unfelt) put in my way and I got to a meeting in that condition.

I too accept responsibility for my thoughts and actions and the truth that those thoughts were without reality and from reaction and self-centeredness.  I accept responsibility for the consequences of those choices and the motivation and lack of awareness and reality I made them with.  I accept that it took no courage at all to react and that it takes all the courage in the world to practice and use this spiritual program in my daily life (defering to God as I understand God and the spiritual 12 step program of the Al-Anon Family Groups with all the E S H it has brought into my life.) without first reacting, out of fear, to life on life's terms.

I found that my hole was a "God" shaped hole, not a me or she or they or them shaped hole.  Al-Anon led me first back to a power greater than Jerry F when I didn't even understand that I was the one trying to control life and then ranting, raving, fighting and depressed against it.   W O W!!

When I accepted a power greater than myself and then continued to work on understanding the who, what, when and why of that Higher Power the hole started to fill not with darkness but light. And I continue to learn to this day.  

As my Higher Power filled the hole I also found that greater understanding of my Higher Power resulted in my Higher Power overcoming the inside and outside of myself.  Was this Higher Higher Power?  I don't think so and I don't try to confine my understanding to what it was like yesterday.  There is more to learn.

I use to submit my life and it's expectations and outcomes to a relationship with my alcoholic.  Attempting to need normalcy and get normalcy from surrendering to disease and abnormalcy expecting my dreams to come true is insanity.  Step two was a major light, wake-up call along the path to change as was every other suggestion given to me in the past 27 years of recovery.

The definition of Humility I learned in the Family Groups was, "...being teachable." 

The hole is gone...the soul is back!!

 

Yours in love and recovery: 

Hi, d53,
Thank you so much for being here. We all come to Alanon with lots of questions, and we also doubt ourselves so much. That's part of the disease.
The best thing I can think to say to you is to find a good face to face meeting, find a sponsor, and start to work the steps. The Steps, through the intervention of the HP, work miracles in our lives!
It takes work, and it may take a long time for your questions to be answered, but it is work that is worth it - you'll get your life and yourself back!
Blessings to you in recovery,
mebjk

The garden prep?  Twern't no garden I was in.  Hell has no garden and I wouldn't have recognized one or held any value into gardening.  Course today is a different thing and I work in my recovery garden 24/7. 

1st step.  Stopping everything I was doing including my thinking (very little of that I discovered).  Coming to the reality that I was not insane, angry, frustrated, lonely, confused, needy etc etc., because of anyone else but myself.  Coming to the reality that I needed help and was absolutely powerless to save myself.  Coming to the reality that if I didn't find the courage to reach out to others (in my case complete strangers.  I got in recovery in central Cal. I was born and raised on Oahu, a small island in the Pacific in a non-white culture.) I would cross that thin line between physical life and death.  I didn't care much at that time.  I just didn't want to die as spiritually and emotionally sick as I was then.  HP got me to the doors of the Family Groups and handed me a chair to sit down on and rest in the sun.  From what I heard at those first meetings along with finding my head nodding up and down when others were expressing their discovery of powerlessness, a seed was planted in me that opened up the door of understanding.  I accepted the 2nd part of the 1st step cause I knew hands down that this was what my life was...all of it.  I didn't know for certain about alcoholism but under the surface there was some self resentment and remorse that I had chosen to marry her at the same time I was really wanting to get away from her.  I was making a bad choice of partners and knew what the outcome would be and still followed thru on it.  I expected doom but thought we would escape.  I got doom.  I was expecting a different result from my choice when I knew that the choice would create the "hole".  (I had been engaged to another alcoholic 6 months before and left her because of the bad choice.) 

"Insanity" AFG sometimes definition = Doing the same thing over and over again expecting a different result.  True for me.

Second step. Came to believe - that a power greater than Jerry F- could lead me to SANITY. 

"Sanity"  AFG sometimes definition = A continuous and orderly process of thought.  (never had it, never did it until I got into the groups)  (OCD Obsessive, compulsive disorder, Its not about thinking and has nothing to do with sanity.)

So I was getting help.  Others were tilling my garden as I sat and listened.  They were planting seeds and showing me how to use the hoe.  (Weeding came in step 4).

The hole, the emptiness came and was because the alcoholic and alcoholism is a taker, not a giver.  I am a giver and didn't give to myself.  I became empty. I became empty also because neither the alcoholic or myself was a higher power and I had nowhere to go from hell until I could come to believe that there was something hugher more gigantic that my ego that I could trust and call on. 

My seeds grew slowly.  Some people get it faster than others.  I went to meetings and didn't give up the idea that I could successful get around the disease of alcoholism while hundreds of Family group member had surrendered completely and had filled their dark holes.  It took me about 5 to 7 years to finally "Let go and let God".  When I did that God came back home in me and filled the hole. 

I am responsible for the hole.  I am responsible for closing it in the right way with the right thing.

Was that shorter than the last one? 

Get to as many face to face meetings as you can in the next 90 days.  Remove yourself as possible from the influence of the alcoholic.  Listen openmindedly to the experiences of others and look for similarities.  Ask for help (get a sponsor who's recovery you a drawn to...at least ask.) Learn about alcoholism and you.  Read the literature, as much as you possibly can.  Practice the first three steps over and over and over.  Don't make any major decisions about the alcoholic until after the 90days and then only with first seeking help.     

(That was the short version.  The other was my enabling.)

((((((((hugs))))))))