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.
I remember some guy asked me in a chat session a while back how I could not know what I want. I said I didn't know if I was done or not with the A. And he said "well do you want more of the same?". That has stuck with me even now. No, I don't want more of the same and I have been thru this enough times to see that if I choose to take him back I choose more of the same. Why would I ruin my perfectly good happiness and worry free freedom? So the question is
when i asked myself that very same question.. i said NO. i needed to escape the madness, the chaos, the unhealthy relationship that was making me ill.
i escaped it for a year.. then he came trying to worm his way back in again..with emotional balckmail, manipulation, using the same "poor me" i need ur help" phrases that had always drawn me back b4... except now... the differance was... i was stronger... and ys i was hurt again emotionally (read my new yrs eve post) but i stopped being a victim.
i said NO. i CHOOSE TO NOT LIVE THAT LIFE ANYMORE> im WORTH MORE THAN THAT!
have a look at my progress report... its like "life after my "A" " it was posted yesterday.
i hope u sort what u have to in ur life to be happy... with or without him in ur life.
I have been in the situation of not knowing what I want for many years, regarding a relationship. I don't want more of what I had before. I won't tolerate the bad side of it, and I'd be suspicious of the good side. But I have nothing else to compare to. I see apparently happy couples here and there, but I know about comparing my insides to their outsides. I can't say I want what they have, no matter how good it may look to me, because there's no way for me to know what it is that they have.
I truly don't know what I want. I suspect it may be nothing.
But, in this world you don't get what you want anyway. You don't get what you need. You get what you get.
It's not that I want more of the same. No way, no how.
The reality is that, as I break away from my former life, people who were an active part of it are making their feelings very clear and doing everything they can to enforce their feeligns upon me. Like a child that goes screaming after mama when she leaves for market, the people who were so active in my life previous are trying to be active in my current life. But there's a catch: in light of the fact that they want to be active, they want to be active in my life on their terms. When they find out how this fails them, they find out how I've changed. And the crying and hurt and resentment starts again. It's easier, however, to blame the person doing the changing: me.
Blame the messenger, Caeser, not the one sending the message.
I change, not the alcholics. Not the alcholism.
Am I ready, then, for the fall out of not wanting more of the same?
That's a great question to ask ourselves, and one that I truly struggled with for a long, long time with my A. Of course I didn't want the pain and insanity, yet I always had a case of the "yeah buts" going on..... you know the drill....
yeah but, when she is sober, we actually get along okay
yeah but, if she can just find sobriety, life will be wonderful
yeah but, before this disease took over her, she was a good and decent person
Then I got to thinking..... first about the famous old saying "If if's and buts were candies and nuts, every day would be Christmas!"....
And then I got my sponsor's message, literally implanted into my brain, as he had to tell me, over and over..... to "focus on what IS, not on what you want things to be like".
I think when I finally chose to get better, and to love myself more, was when I was sick and tired of all the bad stuff.... I also was able to realize that at some point, I lost the "right" to whine about the crappy state of my marriage, etc, as I was choosing to remain in it. At some point, we have to take back responsibility for the actions within our control and influence, and many times, in the depth and junk associated with this disease, that fact is hard for us to comprehend and accept.
Thanks for posting that.....
Tom
__________________
"He is either gonna drink, or he won't.... what are YOU gonna do?"
"What you think of me is none of my business"
"If you knew the answer to what you are worrying about, would it REALLY change anything?"
