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.
What do you do when calm down for a while. Now, after crisis after crisis all year. AH is not getting help, and probably won't, he has had a "fling" and swears that she is a friend now. My heart has just broken after all of this.... we still live together, he is acting now like everything can go back the way it was.
He has not drank in a couple of days, has a permanent job. He is being really loving, has said he is sorry about everything. I feel dead inside. I feel like I have been through the wringer, I don't want to be at home at all with him. I feel like I have been pummeled over and over again and I can't open my heart again to him. It is hard to be loving after feeling so betrayed. I know it is the disease but he won't talk about it, even while sober.
I am going to meetings, and talking to people, but it is so awkward at home. I am in limbo, more of me wants to end this madness and just tell him I want to sell the house, I am through, but I'm not quite ready either to make such a big decision.
I pray and pray and pray. What do you do, it is such a waiting game? Someone told me lastnight when you don't know what to do, do nothing.
I am pretty famous for taking rash actions so I think the do nothing advice is pretty good. Of course in al-anon there is never really nothing to do. Detachment is after all not nothing. Detachment for me is about the focus on me. I have to haul back all the focus on the A and put it on me. What do I need? How can I take care of me? What am I doing for me.
Of course you are hurt and upset about the A's actions. What are you doing to take care of you. If you can't be around the A don't be. I try pretty hard these days not to be around the A. It helps, it certainly helps I have to say that much. There are certain things I no longer discuss with him (like my truck) does that mean I don't have feelings about them. No but I choose not to just stay stuck in trying to get him to see how hurt and angry I am.
I think for many of us taking care of ourselves is last on the list. For me I felt I did not exist without the relationship that if certain things happened I would never recover. Many of my worst nightmares have come true in this relationship I am still here. I am taking care of me.
I was not destroyed by it. When this relationship I am in ends, is not that important to me right at the moment, I am sick, I need to take first things first. First I have to take care of my illness then work on the next step. If you feel bad, what can you do to take care of you that doesn't involve him?
So sorry for your pain....Everyone here has felt this. Keep going to meetings to learn how to take care of you...I've been attending since May and visit this site often...It helps to read and see you are not the only one...
My spouse cheated on me during the latter half of our marriage, however - I didn't know about it until the point when she was leaving me - for yet someone else. I was very naive I guess and I never even suspected. I don't know how I would have reacted had I known at any time before we broke up. I was deeply into blaming myself for everything wrong with the marriage at that time, and perhaps that blinded me to the truth. Had I known she was having a fling, I may have even found a way to blame myself for that. To this day, she doesn't believe her affair was a cause of our problems, but just a "symptom". Perhaps in the beginning, but when you're supposed to be working on a relationship, and one of the partners is not in good faith, all bets are off.
Not long before we split up, we had obtained our "dream house". With the kids growing up, moving out, etc. I had this fantasy of being settled in for the long haul. Then suddenly, she's gone, kids are gone. I kept the house and lived there for quite a few years. I felt I had paid for it, paid the dues, and I clung onto this empty dream house. Circumstances finally forced me to let go of it, and I now have my own place that is truly my own. It gave me a new sense of freedom - when I look back on the years spent in the old house, alone, it seems stiffling. I was in constant fear of losing that house, yet when I finally did lose it, _I_ got better.
First let me say, I am sorry you are going through all of this. I have found that by not making a decision on an impulse, I tend to make more thought out, better planned decisions. Please know I am not saying this is the solution for you. I also have come to the realization that I tend to create urgencies... like I have to make a decision NOW. Well, 1. when I create urgencies, I tend to operate irrationally and 2. often times there is not a need for the urgency, I am safe, I have been in this situation for x amount of time; why do I have to decide in 1 - 2 days? Just some things I have found helpful to recognize about myself.
Keep working the program, and challenge yourself to put yourself and your needs first. It is not wrong and you deserve it.
Good luck with your decisions and please do come back, we are here for you .. whatever you decide.
Well honey... when you figure it out, let me know... LOL
I really do know how hard this is. I can feel your pain. I am looking to the skys to help me figure out the roadmap for this and I believe it will become clear at some point. 'Til then I am just going to keep trying to figure out how I tick.
Take care and know we are here for you!
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"Good judgement comes from experience... experience comes from bad judgement" - unknown
Newbie, I think your reply was intended for Hersh, but yes it could apply to me as well. I have made a lot of impulsive decisions in my life. Seems like I have invested a lot of time (and money) sometimes taking years to un-do something done on the spur of the moment. Like my marriage LOL! Not the relationship, or the actual legal marriage, but the decision we made to move in together, and financially commit. That decision seems like it was made in the blink of an eye, and when I think back to it, seems like just an eyeblink ago... not half a life ago.
I have now been sober longer than I drank... I've been single longer than I was married. Heck, I've been a grandfather longer than I was married. My granddaughter has no memory of her grandmother and me ever being a couple. The marriage just seems like a youthful experiment that produced... uh... interesting results. Like all experiments, it helps to love the process, and always learn.
Answers come when are trully ready to receive them. You'll now when the time is right to make the call. For now, cling to your program. Realize that feelings of being in limbo will pass. Do things for yourself now. Maybe get out a little more, take an art class, anything no matter how small that brings you pleasure and serenity.
Love and blessings to you and your family.
Live strong,
Karilynn & Pipers Kitty
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It's your life. Take no prisoners. You will have it your way.
