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.
Indulge me a moment please. I hadn't seen the original posting of this message (quoted below). I asked for a copy of it after it had already been deleted. I believe the original posting had to do with understanding the AA side?? So, why am I posting this again? Well, I'll tell ya. I sat here and read this. And I wasn't seeing "sides", I was seeing how this disease can affect any of us. That fear of being the only one who feels this way. That fear of no one else ever being able to understand. That fear of being able to be open and honest about who we are, afraid of the rebuffs, etc. That fear of trust. That fear of being alone. We come into this program full of fears. We slowly learn to trust. We have found others who understand, who will listen non-judgmentally, who will share their fears with us...and their hopes...and how working this program has helped. We are told that what we share here is held in confidence. At my first ftf, we always read the Do's and Don'ts and the 3 Obstacles to Success in Al-Anon (1. Discussion of Religion, 2. Gossip, 3. Dominance). The whole concept of our program is working together as a "WE" to support and encourage each other in finding wellness for ourselves. The slogan "Let It Begin With Me"...by learning and sharing our ESH (experience, strength and hope), by showing compassion, by being non-judgmental, by keeping confidences and not gossiping about what others have said, by focusing on what we are doing and working the steps, by realizing we aren't a Guru who knows it all and can learn from old and new alike. I don't have to agree with the way you live your life - what I do need to do is practice the principles of Al-Anon. I don't want someone exchanging their possible codependence on their A to a codependence on me. I am not the one who can heal you. Only you can heal you. I am as sick as you. I too need to heal me. I may "love" you for your compassion and understanding, but I must be careful to realize that this compassion and understanding is that very hand of Al-Anon that we each reach out to give one another, it is that "special love" that we show for one another, that love spoken of in the phrase "we will love you until you can love yourself". The 3 C's....we didn't cause it, we can't control it, we can't cure it" - those apply to the A and to our fellow alanon members. The only person we can control/cure is ourself. If I am looking to another member to fix me, to make my life better - well I better start looking within myself otherwise I am going to carry that same issue of dependence on someone else to make me feel better about me into just another relationship. Yes, maybe I can "help" someone else by understanding and sharing my story, but again this goes back to "The whole concept of our program is working together as a "WE" to support and encourage each other in finding wellness for ourselves." Most of us come in so hurt, just wanting some love. We find that love here. Your love for me, your understanding and acceptance of me (whether you agree with me all the time or not) helps me in learning to feel that love myself for myself. It fills me up enough that I am able to focus on my own issues and look inside to see my part in this disease, and in my case, to be able to find the love I once had for my A hubby, and to begin to show that love to him again. I have been thru enough in my life that I can see, for me, if I am giving all my love away to others then I have nothing left for the one who I swore before HP to love. The face of fear....will he keep rejecting me? Well, I know he has that same fear. We had a big fight yesterday. Divorce was thrown around. I looked at him and said "in todays world divorce is so easy...what if it were like the old days when divorce was unheard of? what would you do then?" I have a husband who does not physically abuse me, who does not cheat on me (physically or emotionally - to me those are the same thing), who has an illness the same as me (I say "the same" because we both are affected by it tho for different reasons maybe). Our life did NOT become the way it is only because of his drinking. I played a part in it too. If I do not clean up my part, I will just carry those same issues with me wherever I go. And yesterday I had to admit that I AM STILL SICK. I am still angry. I am angry that he still drinks. It isn't about what the kids are or aren't doing...that is the surface stuff. My bottom issue is I am still allowing myself to react to his drinking. I have this huge resentment going. Boy, am I in trouble. Yesterday was one of them days when I was "hanging on by the skin of my teeth". Yesterday I was also shown a part of this man I am married to - his acceptance of parts of me which he wishes were different but which he accepts anyway. Parts of me which have hurt him but which he forgives and is willing to work with me in making our marriage work. Today we are okay once again. But I know I have a lot of work ahead of me. Some very deep soul searching to do. I've been "stuck" on step 4 a while now...I think a door opened yesterday...maybe just opened a tiny crack, but enough maybe to help me begin to move forward again. Below is the post that really got me thinking and writing all this. I see my A hubby in it, I see me in it. Do you see you or your A in it?
"Don't be fooled by me. Don't be fooled by the face I wear. For I wear a mask; I wear a thousand masks; masks that I am afraid to take off- and none of them are me.
Pretending is an art that's second nature to me. But don't be fooled. For God's sake don't be fooled.
I give you the impression that I am secure, that all is sunny and unruffled with me, within as well as without; that confidence is my name and coolness my game; that the water's calm and I'm in command and that I need no one. But don't believe me. Please. My surface is smooth, but my surface is my mask, my varying and ever concealing mask. Beneath lies no smugness, no complacence. Beneath it dwells the real me, in confusion and fear; in aloneness.
But I hide this. I don't want anybody to know it. That's why I frantically create a mask to hide behind; a nonchalant, sophisticated facade, to help me pretend, to shield me from the glance that knows.
But such a glance is precisely my salvation, my only salvation. And I know if it's followed by acceptance, if it's followed by love, it's the only thing that can liberate me from myself; from my own self-built prison walls, from the barriers that I so painstakingly erect. It's the only thing that will assure me of what I can't assure myself- that I am really worth something.
But I don't tell You this. I don't dare! I'm afraid to. I'm afraid that your glance will not be followed by love. I'm afraid that you'll think less of me, that you'll laugh. And your laugh would kill me. I'm afraid that deep down I am nothing, that I'm just no good and that you will see this and reject me.
So I play a game, with a facade of assurance without and a trembling child within. And so begins the parade of masks, the glittering but empty parade of masks. And my life becomes a front.
I idly chatter to you in suave tones of surface talk, I tell you everything that's really nothing and nothing of what's everything, of what's crying within me. So, when I'm going through my routine, please don't be fooled by what I am saying. Please listen carefully and try to hear what I am not saying, and what I'd like to be able to say; what, for survival I need to say, but what I can't say.
Honestly, I dislike the superficial game I'm playing, the superficial, phony game. I'd like to be genuine and spontaneous and me... but you've got to help me. You've got to hold out your hand, even when it's the last thing I seem to want or need. Maybe you can wipe away from my eyes the blank stare of the breathing dead. Maybe you can call me into aliveness. Each time you're kind and gentle and encouraging, each time you try and understand because you really care, my heart begins to grow wings-- very small wings, very feeble wings, but wings. With your sensitivity and your sympathy and your power of understanding, you can breathe life into me. I want you to know that! I want you to know how important you are to me, how you can be a creator of the person that is me if you choose. Please choose to. You can break down that wall behind which I tremble, you can remove my mask, you can release me from my shadow world of panic and uncertainty, from my lonely prison.
So don't pass me by. Please don't pass me by.
It will not be easy for you. A long conviction of worthlessness builds strong walls. The nearer you approach to me, the blinder I may strike back. It's irrational, but despite what the books may say about Man, I am irrational. I fight against the very thing I cry out for. But I'm told that caring is stronger that strong walls. In this lies my hope, my only hope. Please try to beat down these walls with firm hands, but with gentle hands, for the child in me is very fragile.
Much Love,"
__________________
Let your light shine in the darkness. "I can't just bring my mind to meetings...I must also bring my heart."
Awesome post, thank you so much for that. For me personally, i hide behind a mask just as that post. I hide from the pain i was given, i hide from the pain i created. I used others to make myself whole over and over again; I surrounded myself with business to keep me distracted. I bought the stuff, the truck the kids, the whole nine yards. I denied myself the knowledge of my assets and defects, and in doing so, i repeated my hurtful things over and over again. I simply was not capable of finding my own self worth, i found out after much self afflicted pain both inward and outward through my patterns. The bottom line is that I was asking others to give to me something that they could never have been able to give.
The defination of Insanity: Doing the same thing over and over again expecting different results.
I truely was insaine.
Thank God I found Alanon. In alanon i was gently guided through my steps, found my defects which help explain to me why i did what i did. I found my assets, and through doing so, am now able to give myself the self affrimation that i so desperately was trying to find in someone or something else.
The most important thing i have learned in alanon is WHY my actions were as they were so that i could stop my distructive pattern. Today i know that my HP is the only one that can help me. He is the only one that can fill that hole. No man or animal or truck or any other thing can or will ever fill that void.
Today, i dont listen to the commercials telling me I NEED this thing with out laughing, I dont expect my husband to give to me what he cant possible give, and i dont need the new stuff, a million friends or anything else outside to be happy. What a gift that is.
Your post says alot about your relationship with your A. And I do see myself and my A in it too. That divorce word gets tossed around too much. It is used to scare, manipulate, control, and manage our lives.
My husband's wall is sooo difficult to get through. It hope that I can hang on long enough to see through the mask. And thanks for letting me see my part in hurting him.
Many times I forget the truthfullness of that quote but I have seen it in action.
My husband, "Mr. Cool/Perfect/Brilliant/Doesn't need me/could live in a cave and be happy" is a different animal when we are separated...he falls apart...
It never ceases to amaze me, he acts like he does not care if I live or die when we are together, but when we apart he calls me three times a day and emails me another two times and wants to see me each day...
Last time I told him he did not need to bother with the "act" that I was not mad at him, and understood his reasons for leaving and would cooperate with the divorce that he wanted. He was speechless with pain and remorse. He spent hours and days trying to convince me that he was sincere, that he really needed me in his life and valued me and it was no "act". He said he was "sick" when he acted like he did not love me.
As bad as things have gotten I have tried to be more compassionate about his disease and remember the man I have gotten small peaks at. I try to be more accepting of him and his problem and also let him know I love him for the ways he CAN be a good husband, through his sickness.
I have been really mad at him lately, and angry again, so thanks for reminding me of how sick he is and how much he needs compassion, should I choose to give it and I do...right now...
