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'm trying to get myself out of tough moments like missing what seemed like a time of hope for my marriage/family, feeling lonely, or just sadness connected to the deep dark loss I feel, etc, by turning the focus on me. When I do it registers in my head as giving something to myself by focusing on me and taking care of my own needs, but instead of feeling better, it makes me feel worse. I just think about how I've let so much happen to me, put up with so much, contributed by sharing with someone my feelings, my life who doesn't care, made the mistake of expecting him to care. Other times I turn it to myself and am able to build myself up. This time it's like I can't shed this heavy gray cloud over me. I just feel more and more like a failure. Just over a week ago when he was gone I felt like I had peace and I felt joy. After this last round with him coming back, playing games, hurting me so with the way he behaved, I feel like the boxer that finally can't get back up. I can usually spin a good side onto the most ridiculous of bad situations. This isn't like me. Does anyone know what I mean?
I can relate to your share. It sounds to me like the denial is lifting, the pretence we live in so long, brushing it all under the carpet and when we finally allow a chink of the real world in, it can hurt.
You said ' I just think about how I've let so much happen to me, put up with so much, contributed by sharing with someone my feelings, my life who doesn't care, made the mistake of expecting him to care.'
I remember feeling this way and it felt sad and I got angry with others and with me for allowing myself to be treated so badly, then I learned through going to Alanon meetings and working on my own shortcomings and motives that there was part of me that willingly took on the role of the victim, the poor mes were enjoyable in a way. Thinking of myself as a passive victim of others and events meant that I had no responsibility for it, it was someone else fault so no change needed here! To discover that I was a willing participator in it all, every single bit was a surprise to me and I was quite shocked to learn of the roles I played, I played them well, fully committed to my role of victim and martyr.
Then a brilliant thing happened from that awareness, I got strength from it. To see myself as not a victim of someone else took all the power out of others hands and put my happiness my life in the hands of the rightful owner and that was me all along. Amazing. The drinker in my life was never the one with all the power of my life, never!! He was a sick person behaving like a sick person and I had put him up in a pedestal like a baddie in a movie, you know, he was all powerful and I was fearful of him, his behaviour, his drinking, all of it because I had told myself the lie that he had the power to make or break me!!! Such a huge lie, so deeply embedded in me until Alanon. I am free of this. I make all the choices in my life, if it goes wrong its my own lesson, mine, if it goes right its mine too.
The only problem is to reach the point when you can see yourself and life and the reality that frees you often a bottom has to be reached. You have to get sick of being sick, sick of the way your brain decides to process the facts, sick of the conditioning, because its based on lies. In my own experience of here and meetings and just life in general, there doesnt seem to be many people who are willing to explore this, willing to go to the meetings and do the work, Im not sure why. Its like telling people there is medicine for your pain, heres the prescription and they just dont do it. I hope you get what im saying. Good luck.
A face to face al anon meeting could really help. I can relate to how you feel and if you haven't spent much time focusing on yourself and your needs it's going to take practice. You're not alone. We all know what it's like to feel beaten down and hopeless from the disease of alcoholism.
One thing suggested to me when I was feeling like I had been treated badly by someone was to treat myself really well like I would treat a friend going through a similar situation. When I have days like that I give myself a break. I don't beat myself up more. I do something nice for myself and I give myself time to breathe.
I am a positive person too but it was also contributing to my denial because it allowed me to ignore so much pain until I couldn't keep ignoring it any longer. I have had to learn to recognize my true feelings allow for bad days and give the negative feelings some space to be heard instead of running from them.
This program has helped me immensely and things are so much better for me.
Seek out some help through a face to face meeting.
Al-anon heals all aspects of our lives -- at a certain point in recovery, many of us become grateful for the chaos and the qualifiers that brought us here because without it, we would have just kept going along with the same unhealthy behaviors and attitudes.
If you can look back on times when you've come through adversity in the past (which if you've loved alcoholics, has probably happened), you can often get a glimmer of hope that you'll come through again. What would you say to someone else in your situation?
I had great, rock-solid recovery in al-anon for several years; then I stopped attending meetings and stopped practicing the program for several other years and then -- surprise -- wound up in a relationship with a new abf and made myself crazy (and sad and low and all bad things and I felt really disappointed in myself). I went back to al-anon, worked the program, broke up with the abf, and am getting my serenity and sanity back (one day at a time). My own craziness is evident in all aspects of my life and the tools for living that I've gained in al-anon work in all aspects of my life.
F2F meetings are the key for me, but the daily readers, the other literature (pamphlets, books, worksheets), this board, talking to members, and having a sponsor are all part of it. Hope you can find some meetings to try and hope they'll work for you in the way that they've worked for many of us in this fellowship.
What you are going through - I can relate....It was during my awareness and denial-lifting stage where my sponsor kept reminding me that we are sick too. I had to learn how to be gentle with me, not beat myself up and to accept that was then and this is now. With recovery and all the tools we get in Al-Anon, I was able to use the past to know what I did not want to be like any more. I identified the areas that caused me grief, shame, etc. and took them to my sponsor and we worked together to re-tool me/those.
Be gentle with yourself. Your heart was then and is now in the right place. We are generally big-hearted, kind-souled people. We believe in the goodness of others and we want everyone happy. What we forget so often with our kind-hearted ways is to put us on top of that list. I recall countless times in my life that I heard, you gotta love yourself before you can truly love another person. I always thought, yeah...yeah...I get it. Now I feel it and it's opened my eyes, mind and heart in completely different ways.
You're growing and that's a good thing! Even if it brings about discomfort, this too shall pass! (((Hugs)))
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Practice the PAUSE...Pause before judging. Pause before assuming. Pause before accusing. Pause whenever you are about to react harshly and you will avoid doing and saying things you will later regret. ~~~~ Lori Deschene
I so relate to your question because it sure FEELS like something is "wrong" when I feel bad. I had the false belief that if I'm doing recovery "right," it'll feel like rainbows and butterflies. This is not true.
What I'm reading is (because it sounds so much like MY story)... you may have hit YOUR bottom. Coming out of denial does NOT feel good. It's like I've been sleepwalking my whole life and now I'm waking up and what I'm seeing does NOT look good because it's so painful that I don't know if I can do it like this anymore... so I go in and out of my denial. Denial feels safe again, I close my eyes a little bit longer. Until the pattern circles around again and unmanageability strikes again... riding the merry go round until I am forced to get honest with myself.
With step one, I initially didn't understand the "powerlessness," but I sure as heck knew that my life felt unmanageable. Step one for me is about admitting reality... getting honest with myself about my feelings. Often, it came with grief. Sometimes... like you've experienced, I feel the acceptance and I find some joy. And then without notice, I was on the floor in fetal position sobbing and sobbing. Waking up to Reality meant that I had to let go of my "old ideas" ... my dreams for the future were probably NOT going to happen the way I expected it would. that is sad.
Until we develop TRUST in the guidance of a Higher Power but...... First things first. BE where you are, feeling all of your feelings, just let them wash over you. It is going to feel bad for while, expect that. But be sure that you are NOT doing anything wrong, you are just passing through a storm. This too, shall pass.
