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Post Info TOPIC: Enabling


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Enabling


I believe my partner enables her daughter.  I haven't actually seen a lot of the stuff.  The daughter parrots things she thinks my partner wants to hear.  I went to the zoo, alone, and said how I thought they were building a place where you go to feed the giraffes.  The daughter "went" to the zoo and saw a place to feed giraffes..  Repeating what  I had said.    I recently went to the zoo, and this place doesn't exist.  My partner had bought her family a season pass to the zoo.  Daughter says she needs vodka to clean the couch.  When I said I don't believe this, my partner says, well how do you know she didn't use it for that.  My partner is angry that I don't believe her daughter, how all I do is criticize the daughter.  I have seen the daughter sit and drink a glass of wine, when she is still breastfeeding the baby.  What do I tell my partner?  I'm trying to live and let live, let go and let God, but I just can't believe half the crap the daughter says.  My partner believes 100%, I might believe 5%. We boarded the dogs for several days.  When we came back, my dogs now walk well on a leash.  I said how they would stop when I stopped.  MY partner told the daughter, and now the daughter insists she trained them, even though in all the other times she watched them, they didn't learn anything.  Or when we went on a little trip over the 4th of July and asked daughter to watch the animals.  The neighbor calls her if they make too much noise.  I was afraid with all the fireworks.  My partner tried to call her on the 5th, and her phone was turned off.  I'm going to meetings(a 90 minute one today), reading alanon materials, (I love discovering choices), but I feel so much resentment.  I just can't believe the daughter.  Once I confronted the daughter on something she said, and she stood her ground, even though I knew it wasn't possible.  I've read on self-righteousness, resentment, and now starting humility.  Any other suggestions? TIA



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~*Service Worker*~

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Expectations? Silence? Step 1?

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"Darkness is full of possibility." Leunig



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Posts: 9
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Thanks grateful. I always seem to find at least part of an answer after posting, reading approved literature. I started to read on humility. People wrote, how in various circumstances, they had to let go and let God. So, I started to read on letting go. Just for today, I will work on let go and let God. And repeating step 1 over and over.

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Right now the thing that is bugging me the most is how my partner expects me to believe everything the daughter says. I just can't believe A stepdaughter and don't know what to tell my partner. Letting go and letting God is very hard to do.

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~*Service Worker*~

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Suggested statement: I understand that you'd like me to believe everything that your daughter says and some things she says just don't add up to me. Maybe you know more about it than I do. So, I'm certainly willing to keep an open mind.  If I've been wrong, I'll admit it.



-- Edited by grateful2be on Monday 28th of July 2014 04:42:59 PM

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"Darkness is full of possibility." Leunig



~*Service Worker*~

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All I can say is I understand the difficult dynamics of blended families. I understand how a partner can favor his daughter over anyone else. I've lived with it. I had no power over what was going on. His "daughter", who really isn't his biological child, was favored over my biological children from my first husband. It's messy. I've tried to control many things in my family, hoping it would all change and become "normal." It never did. Step 1 for me includes being powerless over people too. I am learning to set boundaries and TRY to stick to them.

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Living life one step at a time



~*Service Worker*~

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I would use. How important is it? Giraffes in the zoo. Does it really matter? Lying is part and parcel of alcholism. I would only raise issues that are important. Recovery is about you. Looking at your own distorted thinking. Working on yourself. Your wife's enabling is hers. All you can do is have boundaries that improve your life. It may set your wife an example that she will want to follow.x

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~*Service Worker*~

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Many people have different belief systems than their partners.  A husband could have one religion, the wife a different religion.  Maybe the husband believes in the transubstantiation of the Eucharist because he is a devout Catholic, and the wife believes in a future Messiah because she is devoutly Jewish.  Some couples have conflict over these things, but some couples just agree that each has their own faith and that's fine.  I think in this case, similarly, your partner believes what her daughter tells her, and you don't believe it.  You can agree to disagree.  "I know [Daughter] says this, but I'm not sure it adds up to me.  But oh well, not my business."  Or just "Oh, okay."  You don't have to point out every conflict in the story or whatever. 

I know it may be hard to see your partner taken in by stories that are apparently nonsensical.  But we all have our blind spots, and we hope our friends and loved ones overlook ours, and in turn we overlook theirs.  Neither of you has to convince the other.  I hope you can proceed peaceably.



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