Hi Gailey: I'm so sorry about your AS but I'm glad I found someone who can relate to me and me to them. I love my ftf meetings, but mostly it's dealing with alcoholic spouses. See, my son is different. I KNOW he would drink and drive with his kids. He's an addict who can't wait for his next fix. A little history...9 years ago his ex gave birth to a little girl. I went with him to court for supervised visitation and it was granted. For the next at least 7 years my life belonged to him and his ex. I became the mediator, the go-between. They were fighting with each other all the time and I always ended up in the middle trying to mediate. It took such a toll on my health and that's when I found Al-Anon and made him responsible to pick up his own child. By this time he had lost his license so I didn't have to worry that he'd drink and drive. He walked to get her and take her to his place but by this time he had met someone new and they had two children together. He never changed...not one single iota. She left him and took their two children. She tried very hard to make it work and then to make it work for him to see his children. He finally got himself in trouble with the law and is not allowed on her property...so now he needs someone to help him with access to his children. I swore for months that I would NEVER do this again! Ever! There's no da*& good reason for him to be in this situation again. But I did say a couple of days ago that IF he arranged it all, that once in a while
his ex could bring the kids here and he would be invited to visit with them. You see when I allowed him to visit his first daughter and have overnights in my home I thought I was doing the right thing. It was wrong. He didn't need to buy groceries, diapers, milk, food for his baby daughter. I was here buying it and he was just "visiting". All the more money to spend on his habits. So this time I gave it much thought. There's two small children involved and IF I say no that he can't visit them here, he's not going to change. And if I say yes he can visit them here once in a while he's still not going to change. Without expecting anything from him I will allow the children once in a while and will benefit by being able to see them myself. But I'll not be bound by schedules. I can live with this and I'm pretty sure I soon find out. Our program teaches me that I only need to do things I can live with and only for today. I apologize for the vent...but it felt good to get it off my shoulders......thank you all
Sonja