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.
Do you ever get tired of fighting the shortcomings? Honestly, I'm sick and tired of recurring resentments that I seem to actively look for. Im sick of my negative thought processes still dominating at times. Ive made so much progress and Ive changed so much but I'm not sure if its the perfectionist in me or whether I'm becoming ready to remove more of my shortcomings and so this is part of the process.
I cant really deal with this intimate relationship I'm in. My expectations run riot and are ridiculous mostly, selfish mostly and then of course comes the resentments. I want more and more but I dont, if you know what I mean. I want my way but dont get it and go in a huff. Honestly, sometimes it feels like torture and I feel like I can compare it to the active drinker in that I get my fix, ie spend time with my bf then im okay for say three days then the doubts creep in, the expectations then I go cold and I have a full blown resentment. Im just like the drinker, the feelings of dis-ease and discomfort and discontentment. Whats the solution? do I end this relationship and get back on track working on me? do I appreciate this relationship as providing me with more self knowledge and work on it as it is? this is hard. I have a voice inside saying, relationships are no good for you, they become a compulsion and so let it go and be free and single.
Hugs ec .. I completely understand I have similar dialog. Relationships are really difficult for me. I think it's part of my fear of intimacy.. I even do this in friendships. Find ways to pull away. I'm just working on finding a balance of being a couple and being an individual. Single is easier on many regards .. No expectations.. I have whatever freedom I want and so on .. Plus I don't have to take any emotional risks. It would be the easier place for me to go. I'm finding that the closer I get to someone the more my issues flair and it gets overwhelming. It passes. I am doing more work and just being more mindful of where I'm at currently. Hugs.
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Faith minus vulnerability and mystery equals extremism. If you've got all the answers, then don't call what you do "faith". - Brene Brown
"Whatever truth you own doesn't own you" - Gary John Bishop
((LC) I look at every experience as a learning tool and believe that HP is placing me there so I can learn how to respond and not react. I needed tto accept the fact that I I am human. I too did not want to feel any negative feelings until my sponsor pointed out that feelings are simply feelings and not facts, and that it is what we do with them that counts
In the beginning of my relationship -being able to identiy and feel my feelings was a gift. Then i learned to share them with sponsor, trace them to my defects and ask HP to lift the defect .
Trust the process you have awareness and acceptance now the action Asking HP to lift them and show you how to respond helps. You deserve to be happy in a shared partnership so do not throw the "baby out with the bath water".
I hear you judging yourself harshly, I suggest you be gentle with yourself, pray ask HP for help and use principles above personalilties as your guide. Treat yourself and others with compassion.
Do you really have a lot of short comings (you know, more than the "average person")....or are you just awake enough to be able to see them in yourself and thus work on them? Sounds like an asset to me
I wonder if you regularly take any time to stop working on you and just smell the roses and be happy? "Cause if you aren't giving yourself the love and care and acceptance you need then maybe that fuels needing more and more from someone else. Just a thought, because that is often at the root of my more demanding side.
Like, remember we tell people all the time not to make big relationship decisions until they have had time to gain clarity about themselves (and the underlying truth is that often, with self focus the urgent need to make the relationship black or white fades away)....maybe treating yourself to some well earned "live in the moment" enjoyment and fun might resolve some of it for you.
Just a thought; it makes less sense as I write it than it does in my head lol. Sorry.
Hmmmm. LC....you know I could have written your post word for word, right?
But, here's what I'm finding. I ask myself these questions and answer to myself honestly:
1. Do I enjoy spending time with my bf (I remove sex from the equation, fyi)
2. Would my life truly be better without him in it?
3. AM I adding anything to his life and how does that make me feel?
4. Do we have a lot of contention or unhappiness?
5. If we were snowed in for a month together somewhere, would I want to escape and call in a helicopter rescue, or would I just enjoy his company and be at peace?
if the only thing I dread doing with him is going grocery shopping, I'll chalk that up to a good relationship, lol.
I take all the other ancillary stuff out of the equation: work stuff, kids, daily stressors, financial issues, etc. I focus on US. That tends to get me on track and I realize that I do want to be in this relationship with him and that I am here for a reason.
I also like what Betty shared as far as throwing the baby out with the bath water. I found a good man. He can be controlling (Hmmmm, I seem to be able to identify with this side of him quite well) but I'm seeing that as a similarity between us instead of something to fight about. He can be sarcastic. Oh, but wait, so can I?? Really? Me?? He can be picky about a lot things. ARGH...but so can I.
You get where I'm going, I think. Honestly, I truly believe I'm in a relationship so that I can work out who I am, what I want, and how to be vulnerable again. I might have been able to do this as a single person eventually, but I get to see my own shortcomings in the way my own behavior is mirrored in his. Weird, I know, but true. As Serenity said above, it's about that fear of intimacy. If I'm even going to learn how to take down walls, this is definitely a great place to start especially since my bf isn't very verbal with me. But, when I do open up to him and when I let him see the deeper parts of me, I'm so grateful that I did. His response is always compassion, he always accepts me for who I am, never judges me as harshly as I judge myself, etc.
I still waffle just as you are. I daydream about being single and just holing up in a little apartment all my own, where I can do as I please, etc. But, my heart still says STAY. What makes it different than when I was with my XAH is that my STAY today is because of love, because of the answers I would have given to those questions I noted above. When I was married to my XAH, my STAY was because of guilt, because of unhealthy attachment, because of fear. So much fear.
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Never grow a wishbone where your backbone ought to be!
el-cee - I have realized I too have a pattern....of course, part of my pattern prior to this marriage was to meet, fall in lust, fall in love, 'couple' and then when it gets tough - FLEE. As I look back on my life, my first husband was truly a very good man, kind spirit, balanced person, etc. I was the issue. I literally ran away and got a divorce over decorating our new house....*sigh* - hard to admit but true - and the disease was alive and well in me at the time.
I clearly remember as I justified my choices telling myself I would be better off single. I had relationships before that and after that. And - very, very similar outcomes. When things got hard, difficult, stale - I ran. As far and as fast as I could. It took me years in recovery to realize I wasn't running from them, I was running from me. I tend to freak out/panic when things don't go well. Before Al-Anon, I took this 'always' as a bad sign. I was in a bubble with my processing, and had this interesting outlook that others had it 'great' and I couldn't do it right.
I do believe that if I outlive my AH and we remain married, I will not ever marry again. I have no fear of living alone, or leaving this earth alone. I have tons of friends, guys and gals and have watched my aunts go through their senior years having a blast after loosing their husbands. I am finally at a place where I know that where ever I go, there I am and it's OK. I accept I am imperfect and I just don't do relationships well.
So - whatever you decide - it's all good. I have decided that societal norms may fit others really well but not everyone. Accepting me as I am first and then life on life's terms really helps me be OK with whatever happens because anytime I think I know what's coming, I am proven wrong over and over. Many times, it's way better than I hoped and other times, not so much.
Living is about learning for me. I figure if I am truly a work in progress, I'm not done until I'm 6 feet under....(((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
IAH .. LOL ... please do not throw the M word around .. after how long it took me to get out of the last one .. I'm soooooooo good on never getting married again .. LOL .. that's me and that's part of MY fear. I'm a two time looser in that realm and I truly feel good right where I'm at married, not married .. it ain't easy being human. :)
Marriage is a great institution .. I'm not ready for an institution. Mae West .. my hero .. LOL!
-- Edited by Iamhere on Sunday 31st of January 2021 01:10:56 PM
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Faith minus vulnerability and mystery equals extremism. If you've got all the answers, then don't call what you do "faith". - Brene Brown
"Whatever truth you own doesn't own you" - Gary John Bishop
Iamhere and others on here.....
Speaking of being alone in your older years......
I just wanted to share. My mom (late 60s) and my grandmother (who is 90) went skydiving earlier this week. They did tandem jumps at 13000 FT in FL. My grandfather has been gone for close to 3 years now and my grandmother immediately threw herself into hospice work and she took on her own cases and helped people in their end months of life because she felt that hospice was so valuable to her when my grandfather was dying.
She then went hang gliding for her 88th birthday!
She doesn't have a lot of friends left but she has always lived life for HER. She doted on my grandfather and was his devoted wife for over 60 years. She mourned and she still keeps enjoying life. Honestly, when I put up the pics on FB people thought she was in her early to mid 70s. The woman is amazing! Oh, and so is my mom, lol. Don't want to leave her out, you know!
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Never grow a wishbone where your backbone ought to be!
((el-cee)) I can so relate to repetitive dialogue running through my head. The voice analysis, complains, doubts, judges and worries, worries, worries. What's the solution? Al-Anon teaches us prayer and meditation and to trust HP. When we surrender and hand our problems over, the voice loses its momentum, and we make room for HP to guide us. Thoughts are not truths, we can detach and not let them control us. We can stop living in the past and future and take it one day at a time and feel peace and serenity within knowing we are exactly where we're supposed to be.
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- Carrie
Stress is caused by being 'here' but wanting to be 'there'. Eckhart Tolle
What are you doing for fun el-cee? Sometimes a good honest laugh switches the mindset, just a bit of mindless happy fun. I get my laugh kicks from reading Marian Keyes. She's pretty witty. And friends in program with both humour and health. I love your process and your progress is a privilege to share on the journey.
I think I understand what you are possibly describing, for me there was a period of feeling it was getting WORSE and not better. which was an awful feeling but it was only temporary. some could relate to it at meetings and some could not and I felt so shamed when they said, "it works if you work it."
Little did they know, I was working it and grateful to find resources that validated the experience. I couldn't sweep it under the rug or minimize it because it was way too late for denial at that point, after all the "excavation work" I had done.
In the end, I found recovery was no longer a superficial matter and I simply had to detach from my own fear and stay the course with perseverance. I just kept taking the steps to a deeper level.
As for the relationship, I waffled in the beginning too and my sponsor suggested I take time off to work on myself because the relationship was stirring up so much insecurity in me.
At the same time, my old sponsor from the former state I moved from suggested that I couldn't shut myself off in a cave, I was meant to live these spiritual ideas by putting them into "practice."
so I stayed in it. Gratefully so because today is wonderful, I have never been in a happier, easier relationship. We gave it time to get past the initial discomfort of clearing away the wreckage of the past. Despite being triggered within the relationship, it had nothing to do with HIM and everything to do with me, my own sense of self, my own insecurities and a lot of dragging my old painful memories into the new relationship. we were not young kids getting into a relationship but I kept thinking in those terms and how it should be "easier" than it was. We were middle-age people who had histories.. and we both needed time to make peace with the past.
So for me, the relationship is an "opportunity" and my boyfriend an "instrument" that God uses to get me to change. of course, the basics for a great relationship are there, we did our research on all that too... that is what experience teaches.
-- Edited by 2HP on Sunday 30th of April 2017 02:36:41 PM
Thank you everyone. I appreciate everything you have said. I decided to get myself a plan of action. I've came to see that my disease manifests in negative thinking closely linked with my fears and I got a bit lost in there for a while, it felt like a never ending drumming banging away in my ears. Until I surrendered, ie stopped looking desperately for the short quick fix and trying to find it in my program. So my unrealistic expectations goes in to my program also. Alanon should help me and now!!!
I feel much better - I decided to write out the faulty beliefs each and every one in relation to my bf and then I wrote out the truth of it in terms of the spiritual truth I think. I let it go and the action came. It is back to basics writing out gratitude and assets list each day along with the faulty thought processes. I like to see them, I'm getting better at not beating myself up about them. My sponsor told me to remember I'm in recovery for the a deadly disease that has damaged me and my thinking. This helps me go much easier on myself and even give myself a wee bit of tenderness, that is amazing progress for me.
2hp - I just had to say, thanks. I can relate to everything you said here. I think growth is uncomfortable and I was feeling like I was getting worse but someone told me before that growth isnt pretty, its the shedding of skin isnt it.? I tried to remember this during this period and it helped me from throwing in the towel. For some reason the steps are still on my list of procrastination. I cant get into the books like 'Paths to Recovery' the questions are overwhelming. I quite like the AA book on steps and traditions, its simpler for me for some reason.
Anyway, Im so glad your relationships is wonderful. I get the feeling its not my relationship thats the problem, its me and my unrealistic expectations, trying to bend the world to look like I want and driven by my fears and I know my hp gave me this man for a good reason. So Im working it and not throwing it away. Its the whole acceptance thing again and trusting im right where I should be. Wow, I love love love this program and all the people in it.x
I have shortcomings and that is too control....be in charge ALL of the time. I hate it but have learn to just step back and not engage. I just don't think about what is going on in my head at the time and it does go away and I get better in time. I let it go for ME. Resentments are a hard nut to crack I'm sure. I don't resent if it doesn't go my way....my deal is to continue to control it LOL.
Now that I'm sitting here writing about it I might have had some with my X partner but I got so tired of HIM not doing for me I let it go and left. I am so much happier now you can't believe it. I can't and never will make my X do what I expect and with the help of Al-anon and MIP I was freed to live my life without unrealistic expectations.
I think I'm rambling but you get the drift.
((( hugs )))
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Lord, put your arm around my shoulder and your hand over my mouth
Speak only when you feel that your words are better than your silence.
. Then i learned to share them with sponsor, trace them to my defects and ask HP to lift the defect . 