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 ask this question , as this an Alanon program it is about ourselves. If we understand where we need the most help in healing , perhaps we can also understand that there are choices and solutions that we can make. We who are affected by anothers alcoholism/drugs usually feel we are to blame somehow and our self esteem diminishes. I felt neglected for years with my husband, as he always chose to go and drink with his so called friends. Now I know they were his enablers. I felt unlovable, as his attentions were now being directed elsewhere. My faith in myself as a woman became less and less, I felt ugly, I felt not good enough in anything I did. I was lost in the haze of his alcoholism, and became so weak I coulnd't take care of myself as ALL my focus was on him, what he was doing or not doing. I was so weak I didnt know that my mental state and my physical state started to deteriorate. Where did I feel neglected,weak or unlovable,,,,,,,,my answer at that time was everywhere with everybody. My healing began first going to my doctor, he gave me mild antidepressants, finding a job, getting out and going out with friends again, enjoying my family, and last but mostly finding Alanon which I would have to say was my saving grace. Walking in those rooms a suicidal/homicidal shell of a broken woman, I now know this program works! I am here and I am "OK"! That saying " It works if you work because YOU are worth it" applys to each and everyone of us, use the tools of alanon and begin to heal!:
gardengal wrote: I ask this question , as this an Alanon program it is about ourselves. If we understand where we need the most help in healing , perhaps we can also understand that there are choices and solutions that we can make. We who are affected by anothers alcoholism/drugs usually feel we are to blame somehow and our self esteem diminishes. I felt neglected for years with my husband, as he always chose to go and drink with his so called friends. Now I know they were his enablers. I felt unlovable, as his attentions were now being directed elsewhere. My faith in myself as a woman became less and less, I felt ugly, I felt not good enough in anything I did. I was lost in the haze of his alcoholism, and became so weak I coulnd't take care of myself as ALL my focus was on him, what he was doing or not doing. I was so weak I didnt know that my mental state and my physical state started to deteriorate. Where did I feel neglected,weak or unlovable,,,,,,,,my answer at that time was everywhere with everybody. My healing began first going to my doctor, he gave me mild antidepressants, finding a job, getting out and going out with friends again, enjoying my family, and last but mostly finding Alanon which I would have to say was my saving grace. Walking in those rooms a suicidal/homicidal shell of a broken woman, I now know this program works! I am here and I am "OK"! That saying " It works if you work because YOU are worth it" applys to each and everyone of us, use the tools of alanon and begin to heal!:
This is a good question for me right now. I havent posted here for quite awhile, but I read all the time. I have been living with my alcholic boyfriend again for several months now, after a year living apart from him. The entire relationship spans 6 years now. I have 5 children. 4 from previous, and the youngest with him. Anyway, here goes. I feel neglected all the time, by him and myself. I feel both of us neglect my human needs for love, affection, enough sleep, enough relaxing time, and enough social interaction. I am just as guilty of depriving myself of these things as he is of withholding them from me, or preventing me from getting them. I don't know why I punish myself.......it doesn't make him feel sorry for me, which is probably what I am going for there. I feel weak because I was doing so well when he was gone, and I let him back in. Because I believed him again. Weak because I know I can be just fine on my own, but am terrified of never having another chance to spend my life with someone I love. Weak for loving him in the first place. Weak for not putting myself and my children first. Weak because I thought I was so strong, and I was just kidding myself again. I feel unlovable because I'm 41 years old, and no relationship I have ever been in with a man has really been because they love me. I don't even love me, so how could someone else? I know my children love me now, but will they hate me later when they realize what I subjected them to, for the sake of ME trying and failing over and over to find love for myself? This is what I feel like today, and I am so tired of me right now.
My ah has been sober for about 6 months and I still feel neglected, weak, and unlovable a good part of the time. I was thinking about this the other day--not exactly in these terms, but basically the same idea.--He is doing good, I am going to Al-anon, I am trying to do some things for myself, why am I still feeling blah and weak, and scared, and not loved, etc.
I think for me I never thought I caused him to drink or drug. I knew he had had a problem before I was in the picture, but I thought that was in the past. But I still never thought It was my fault that he spiraled down again. I did feel weak b/c I felt like I couldn't help him "fix" it. I still feel "weak" when I think I ought to be able to handle something and can't--i.e. right now it's more with my children, I just feel like I am not a good mother.
I feel neglected when he is gone all the times to meetings or spends all evening after he gets home on the phone with his sponsor or others from AA. Why? Probably b/c I am focused on the fact that he isn't trying to engage me in conversation, or I am feeling left out of his life, and I am not doing something to keep myself busy and focused on "My" life.
I feel unlovable when I focus on the fact that other things come before me. When in my romantic drama queen mind things aren't going the way I think they should go--like yesterday-our anniversary--I got a nice bouquet of flowers from the grocery store and a card. Well the card was unsigned and it was a card you would give a some other couple on their anniversary-not one to your wife, or said "our" anniversary--it said to you on "your" anniversary. I laughed at first, but then my head started to make a big deal out of it-like if he really loved you and thought you were special he would have at least signed the card, he didn't even read the card to make sure it made sense so he doesn't really care. Well in the perfect little idealistic world and maybe "normal" world, my husband would remember to do things like that, but I am married to an alcoholic/addict the fact that he even stopped to pick something up is tremendous and this will make for a funny story when my girls call me up after their husbands or boyfriends have forgotten to do something special for them. I also feel unlovable when he doesn't seem to appreciate me or what I have done to help him. I feel like I don't matter. the truth is I am so insecure that I want constant recognition and validation and I just need to get over that. Really I am very capable--I was fine before I met him and he can't take that away from me. I have done a lot to take care of this family and I am lovable. Now to just get out of my pitty pot and move on! He and I can have a great life together if I just let go.
"I coulnd't take care of myself as ALL my focus was on him"
This is really one reason why I came into Al -anon. I have not really been able to get to that was where I was until I was here for a year. Self care is still a huge issue for me. I think it always has been. There is nevertheless no question that for me, that by the time I got here I blamed it all on the A. I was toxic with resentment and it took me a long long time to get less toxic.
Now I am less toxic, self care and reasonable goals is one thing that I am working on. I am trying to plan and part of the plan is a plan b. I don't have a sense of when specifically other than within 6 months to a year if that I will be able to get to the goal of leaving the A at the moment. I executed one part of the plan on time now I have another part with several obstacles in the way.
Personally I feel like vagueness means that I need to be very very specific about what the goals are.
Another area for me is social skills. The A has far better social skills than I do. I find it hard to make small talk and to be personable. I know some of that was from fear and rage for a while. Now I have moved through a lot of the rage I want to be better able to be in the world.
I posed this question for you all to think and realize why we feel the way we do. I know for years I was feeling this way, but could not figure out why? I held on to a dream which "I" believed in and in my twisted way of thinking and wishing I thought it would come to be. It was not. The A (husband) had to drink that was first and foremost to anything including me, his kids, his friends and his family, period. Years of mental abuse and letting myself go, feeling worthless drove me into deep dispair. The 3 "C's of Alanon come rebounding back time and time again.......and so does the words of others reminding me that I have choices........ I know now why I felt the way I did, and I hope you too will figure out for yourself and perhaps find solutions, and begin to heal.
