Accepting the facts of the disease of alcoholism (lying and denial to protect the disease, being a huge symptom as well as ,drinking secretly, promises to stop etc)   helped me to no longer think or feel that I had any control over the person. Not participating in conversations that I knew the answer to was also a great gift.  I found that not attempting to control another restored my focus to myself so I could own my feelings and respond in a healthy fashion to life on life's terms.

Program is  a process and works when we work it 

-- Edited by hotrod on Tuesday 8th of March 2016 07:49:39 PM

Hugs Fooled,

I think as a codie I have to really manage my expectations of what I think my XAH should or shouldn't be doing because if he was ok. Honestly, he wouldn't be doing the things he was doing and if I was ok (100%) of the time I wouldn't be expecting him to be someone he's not.

As I look back on my XAH in his completely crazy active days, my part in the craziness of it all was my own behavior, this was expectations, anger (completely justified because it IS an unreasonable situation), fear, anxiety and so on. I was my own worst enemy. I get that as a newcomer it is hard to hear from people who have been there that meetings, slogans, lit, sponsorship and so on are the ways to find serenity and hope. It's not so much hope for the A .. it's hope to live again regardless if the A is drinking or not (whatever the addiction is fill in the blank).

As a human being I seriously had to come to terms with the fact that I was powerless against alcoholism, the effects of it as well as my X's drinking. I wanted to know the right words to say to fix him. I wanted to know the right things to do to fix him. I'm pretty dang hard headed and part of my journey was allowing it to be ok that I did not have a say in his recovery. Where my power is .. what am I going to do regardless if he's drinking or not drinking. That's a REALLY hard statement to swallow even now with people I actually like and love. Honestly I have no love loss at this point for my XAH because it went down such a bad path. That is part of my journey as well, coming to terms with that, I have yet to regret anything outside of the pain my kids have gone through, so not my intension.

It took me 3x going into Alanon before I got it better than the first two tries .. LOL. After all it's 12 Steps seriously, how stupid are people in the program they can't master 12 simple steps? One a week, 12 weeks I should be a brand new person and my XAH should be cured of his drinking issues because after all I came to Alanon to fix him. I can paint it any color I want to paint it however a multicolored horse is a multicolored horse .. my true objective if I get rigorously honest was someone tell me how to fix this poor idiot because look how he is victimizing me and the kids. What I have learned is .. it's a very simple program .. I'm complicated as hell. So I have to unravel myself as the God of my understanding sees fit and just take my own healing as it comes.

I desperately wanted my XAH to be someone he's not. So therefore after years of deception when he said he was going to get help .. I believed him .. it wasn't because his ass was on fire and he was looking for the softer easier way out. So what did he show me .. he wasn't finished with his journey. I learned how to believe who people are by their actions and not their words. It's really no different than an abusive relationship one partner will beat on the other partner while screaming how much they love them. Guess what .. that's not how someone shows you they love you or themselves. Blaming someone else for their screw ups or famous "you are abandoning me when I need you most" statements, .. that's not love for you or themselves. That is the dysfunctional disease that has twisted what love is.

It is real for me that I can love someone to death .. and I do mean that literally out of fear, shame, guilt and so on. I just do it in a slower manner than the average murderer .. I do it in the name of love and that is not what love is either.

I truly encourage you to find an alanon meeting, get a sponsor and work the steps .. as you do you may find very different answers for yourself because just like a pebble in a still pond .. when it drops in the outward changes that happen .. they change everyone else around them too.

Big hugs and DO keep coming back, this is something no one needs to do alone and you are so not alone in this journey.

S :)

Fooled,

Its more about loving yourself unconditionally and not putting yourself thru the lies and manipulations that alcoholism brings into our lives.

Its all about self protection and self care ..Until the alcoholic really changes and enters recovery , there will be lies and cover ups and denial. It is the nature of the beast.

Meanwhile, keep coming back and practice practice...
Hugs, Bettina

To make matters worse....tonight when I was cleaning up from dinner, I saw his work phone. It was taunting me. I caved . He's texting those women again. I thought my heart had broken. I did it all wrong. I just didn't react. I REACTED I lost my s**. I don't care whether there was no physical...its cheating. He shared intimate moments with them. He knew before he went to rehab that this was my boundary. This is what is unforgiveable and unacceptable to me. He crossed it. According to him he did this time because I was detached after beating me up for weeks about "sweating" him and his recovery. I told him that he might as well be drinking as he is doing the same stuff as before sobriety, but blamed it on the drinking. The lying, the cheating. Unfortunately we cant wipe it away and blame it on the alcohol this time. I thought a lot about what you said SerenityRUs I too am codependent. I so much wanted my qualifier to be sober because that would prove how worthy I am, how good I am, lovable So now I have a dry drunk. (Im not even sure if he's dry) I am so tired of this roller coaster and chaos. Hes not working the steps, hes not meeting with his sponsor, when I got done and was so emotionally spent, instead of calling his sponsor, or going to a meeting, he drew me a bath "to be kind and courteous" at this point, I don't care. It was patronizing, it was pathetic...and I don't know how this is going to end, but nothing is going to change if nothing changes.

-- Edited by hotrod on Wednesday 9th of March 2016 06:38:31 AM

((((((Hugs)))))) Fooled,

I am so sorry that you are in this situation, I remember how consuming it could be.
I find it easier to see my boundaries when I take alcohol out of the equation since I tended to use alcohol as an excuse for my husband's unacceptable behaviour.

Dear Fooled, I do hear you and can so identify.

Acceptance of the reality of this dreadful disease was very difficult for me and I fought" accepting " the truth of alcoholism. I mistakenly believed , that like Don Quixote, I could go out and fight the " windmills" of this disease with my sword of righteousness and win. Not so--
I finally had to accept that there are conditions in life that I could not change and that accepting the facts of a situation was not surrender but wisdom.

Alanon support and tools helped me to regain my self esteem , stop being the alcohol monitor , and focus on my own life and well being. You are worth it

There was a buzz word for me that made me shiver every time I heard it and that is the word "surrender" and very honestly it's a wonderful word, however for me especially in the pre beginning days of Alanon it meant giving up. I was just giving up and loosing. Ironically loosing a battle I was never going to win with my XAH and his will and his life path. I mean I know soooo much better than the God of my understanding the plan for everyone else. Ask me what my HP's plan is for me? I can't string a sentence together. So you can probably gather it wasn't working for me so much and it was doing nothing except sucking the life out of me. Again .. so not working for me. As I journey in this program and come to terms with the difference between powerlessness and helplessness, the word surrender still grates on me from time to time .. not like it used to make me bristle. That's part of my own healing and I'm ok with that big time.

Betty touched on something that I truly love because my XAH actually DID chase windmills and that's another story .. I used to say I wasn't his Sancho Panza .. I'm starting to think I had the roles wrong. Maybe I was Don Quixote and my XAH was Sancho Panza .. what a very different spin that puts on my story.

Hugs S :)

PS - I'm sooo sorry that you experienced that kind of betrayal especially during the "sober" moments. I'm going to give you something else to chew on .. someone may be physically sober however the whole emotional/mental sobriety comes later in recovery. If he's still actively drinking or slipping whatever you need to insert to digest this part .. he's not sober. Depending on the person and the drinking physical sobriety comes first however emotional/mental sobriety? That's an active sobriety in terms of program work and delving deeper beyond the tip of the iceberg. The act of drinking is merely the tip of what is really going on and honestly I know how big my own iceberg is .. I wouldn't want to deal with an A's iceberg, number 1 it's not my job .. number 2 I can't imagine the guilt, shame and self loathing attached to it. My XAH actually verbalized something that is probably far more the truth of it all than anything else he said to me and when I found out about his physical affair/s. He could get his "feel goods" from these other women and I'm not going to say right or wrong (no I'm going to say it .. that was THE deal breaker for me .. lol). He couldn't find that with me and the kids because of that bottom half of the iceberg. That is on HIM, disease or no disease .. he found his esteem in screwing around, NOT on me. Whatever part I played the other party always has the right to be a grown up and end things before moving on in a healthy relationship OR they own what they did and accept the fact they weren't riding a bicycle, have an accident and fall into other woman's vjay-jay. I'm just saying it out loud so there are no misconceptions of excuses of oh poor guy he is sick and doesn't know any better. He is still responsible for his consequences. I DO encourage you to give yourself time and make your own timetable and decisions about what you want to do. Sometimes people can move past that kind of thing .. for me and the depths of the deception it was not something I could do.

Anyway, .. find a constructive way to deal with your anger/pain/shame/guilt (I'm putting out there what I felt at the betrayal) ..

Hugs again ..

Fooled wrote:

---

To I told him that he might as well be drinking as he is doing the same stuff as before sobriety, but blamed it on the drinking. The lying, the cheating. Unfortunately we cant wipe it away and blame it on the alcohol this time. I thought a lot about what you said SerenityRUs I too am codependent. I so much wanted my qualifier to be sober because that would prove how worthy I am, how good I am, lovable So now I have a dry drunk. (Im not even sure if he's dry) I am so tired of this roller coaster and chaos. Hes not working the steps, hes not meeting with his sponsor, when I got done and was so emotionally spent, instead of calling his sponsor, or going to a meeting, he drew me a bath "to be kind and courteous" at this point, I don't care. It was patronizing, it was pathetic...and I don't know how this is going to end, but nothing is going to change if nothing changes.

-- Edited by hotrod on Wednesday 9th of March 2016 06:38:31 AM

---

 It's funny, you started out posting a few days ago, "I can't", "I'm not strong enough", etc.  As an alcoholic myself, who also has untreated codependent spouse, I can see you learning and growing from here, just by reading what you're posting.  I know it's not easy, BELIEVE me I know (my wife is dating a coworker and blaming me for it, telling me how I was never there for her, didn't treat her right, didn't love her enough, etc).  It's all BS.  She doesn't want to be accountable for her actions/decisions.  It's easier to blame me.  You're husband is sick.  Just like I am, just like my wife is.  I know it's difficult to let go, give it to your Higher Power, and trust everything will be OK, but when you do, you'll find the peace you're looking for, no matter how this turns out or what he does.

We are alcoholics.  You cannot fix us.  IIt's not your job to fix us.

Michael--thank you for pointing that out. I so needed to hear an objective opinion. In the midst of the chaos its hard to see anything clearly, let alone the steps Ive made. I am able to see the forward backward frustrating process, but the actual growth is obscured due to my own guilt/shame. Iamhere you are right, my need to have proof for what I already know in my heart, is insane and directly related to my own insecurities. The back and forth of accepting my powerlessness of his choice, while facing the fear that my detachment and boundaries may ultimately result in my walking my walk alone is painful. When I am able to give this over to my HP I hope that it will start to make some sense.

Unfortunately alcoholics tend to lie a lot. One thing I did was to get a separate checking account. We never shared credit cards either.