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.
We are planning to separate at the end of the month. It is taking us that long to get other arrangements in place for childcare and living.
He is going to check out a treatment center today and will most likely move in there. It's like a rehab and sober living facility rolled into one. I am happy that he will finally get treatment. I have offered to drop him off there later this month.
I still feel a lot of fear about the future, especially financially. We are locked into a 12 month lease in a house that is not going to work for me once we are separated. I am going to my family for a month after he leaves and then I will have to answer these questions and take my next steps forward.
I am also excited to start something new and to get out of the horrible status quo.
I have not moved forward with getting a divorce, I have been encouraged to separate with a view to reconciliation after treatment. However, I do not feel much hope surrounding this.
I do not know if I can trust him, even if he comes out of treatment saying all the right things and acting in all the right ways. Unfortunately our trust has erroded in many ways. Perhaps counselling would help, but I do not feel much openness towards this prospect at the moment. I do not know if I can trust him again or if this relationship is one that supports me and gives me joy.
I am actually kinda excited about being on my own.
Annie - sending you positive thoughts and prayers. The good news - you don't have to do or decide anything today or until you feel ready to do so. Lean into your program and trust it and the process. (((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
Your feelings and trepidations make sense to me. I think you are doing the right thing by holding off. My therapist just said this to me, "Don't make a life changing decision while you are in a painful or dark place." She's right. Divorce options never go away, so it's not something you have to rush into. Good luck.
((Anniefenk321)) I too am sending prayers your way. One thing Alanon has taught me is to have a plan B and each day to do something toward making that plan possible because its suggested to live one day at a time. This concept has simplified my life and made decision making more manageable. I really had dug myself into a financial hell and it took me embracing my program, listening and learning at meetings and talking it over with my sponsor, to come up with a plan B that would fit my budget. Thank you for sharing and Im glad that youre here :)
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- Carrie
Stress is caused by being 'here' but wanting to be 'there'. Eckhart Tolle
Maybe you can make.some.fail safe plans around the lease. There are really big consequences to breaking a lease. Depending on.where you live it is Some times possible to get someone to take over the lease.
For me leaving the ex A.was.a.financial.quagmire. It took me years to dig.myselx out. One.idea in.al.anon.is.if you are.contemplating leaving make a plan.b. Look.at all the things you need. For me finances were a.big issue. That issue stayed with me.for a.long time
I agree about checking finances and just making sure that your ducks are in a row. Only rarely do we have to respond immediately to a situation. I would re-read Maresieâs post. Sending you positive thoughts and energy. Maybe if you spoke with the landlord, and just was honest and upfront with them, maybe they would allow you to get out of the lease under special circumstances like this. Take care
((((AnnieF)))) Sending you support over cyber-space!
My ESH (take what you want and discard the rest) on your post about separating. My first experience with addiction - kicked my spouse out, both families had an intervention, he went to 90 day treatment. He was awesome when he got out! Almost the man I married! He wanted to come back to the home and marriage ASAP, but I had so much fear that I said no. After 30 days I relented and allowed him to come back even though I was not ready. My reasoning was that my then 10 year old son needed a present father figure. Within 6 months he stopped going to meetings, then talking to his sponsor, and then the behaviors came back although the drug use did not. I was fearful of relapse every day for the next 7 years! Within that time he began drinking and for many years I didn't know. But as we all know alcoholism is a progressive disease and progress it did!!! Both my son and I suffered. I still have guilt for staying "for my kid."
Currently I am waiting for him to sign the divorce papers. He left me with 0 savings, and tons of debt. But I am free of the chaos of living with an addict!
If you do want to work on the marriage after he is released from rehab, do NOT do what I did... I slowly gave up my Al-Anon support thinking he was "past this." Now that I know better, he couldn't ever be "past it" and needed to work his program every day not to get sucked back in. And you know what? I DID TOO! I allowed him to walk all over my boundaries and I got sucked back into his madness due to financial dependence, fear and ME NOT WORKING MY PROGRAM. If I had to repeat exactly those circumstances now, I would've worked on getting myself financially independent, a full-time job, my own health insurance etc, so that IF things went south, I had the means to get myself and my son free!
A cautionary tale.
Please understand that this is ONLY my experience... your's may be different... and I hope to HP that it is!
Find a meeting (or a few), get a sponsor, work on knowing YOU (what you can and can't live with) and taking care of YOU!
Wishing you peace and light!
PNP
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"The wolf that thrives, is the one you feed." - Cherokee legend
"Hello, sun in my face. Hello you who made the morning and spread it over the fields... Watch, now, how I start the day in happiness, in kindness." Mary Oliver
I was waiting to see other responses and PNP really hit me, if my XAH had found sobriety and we both worked programs of recovery in our own hula hoops and AFTER he had some time behind him and me behind me .. I don't advocate jumping back into a relationship quickly. There is a break that is needed and that is totally my opinion. Old habits and behaviors are hard to break. Newly found physical sobriety is not the same as emotional sobriety, two totally different end games that have a similar beginning point. Trust needs to be rebuilt and learning to rely on myself, my higher power, my intuition and knowing what was right for me was key.
I certainly wish you all the best and hope that it all works out the way your HP has planned. It's not an easy road. I don't know anyone's path that has gotten on the road to recovery to be a straight line and I include myself in that statement.
Hugs S :)
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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
Rehab is a difficult thing for the spouse to navigate. Your husband gets all the support a d there is a lot of pressure for you to go.along with the program. Whatever your husband is yet to g in terms of support you need that level of care too. Obviously you are not going to get it from the rehab.
While it's a great idea for you to tak e a break and re evaluate have g an o going support system is key. When the now ex A was in rehab all anyone talked about was #him# his needs his plans and his concerns. My accessbto the now ex A was extremely limited ). Some thought are that the break is necessary to focus on sobriety. On another level what do you do simply wait in hold get it all ready for him to come back?
This group is a great resource because you have people who know whatb they are talking about
Firstly thank you to everyone for their helpful and thoughtful replies. It has given me a lot to think about.
Posies and Puppies - thank you so much for sharing your story honestly. It really has given me a lot to think about - I appreciate you sharing it with me.
Maresie - yeah, you're right. I hope that going back to my family for a month will give me a kick start in getting the support I need. I don't think the rehab has any support programs for spouses like you said. I even said to someone I wish my son and I could go to rehab for spouses and get warm meals and a loving environment as well!
I have been trying to journal to get in touch wiht my intuition. I heard someone say in a meeting on MOnday night that they feel like their whole life their intuition worked great but they weren't listening.
I feel exactly the same way. I even had strong intuition not to marry my husband and I talked myself into it. Towards the wedding I talked myself into it more .
So far, my cursory attempts to be in touch with my own voice are saying that we have come to the conclusion of this relationship. I feel that we have reached a point where I am not going to be ready to rebuild trust. I am not saying that it cannot happen, just that I feel that I am unwilling.
I also feel that I am unwilling to live with anger in my home. I am a cheerful person and I love to go on adventures and experience fun in my life. My husband's volatility and anger is a trigger to me. It triggers a lot of fear in me. I have become frightened to have fun, frightened to say what I want to say and frightened to go places and do things. We spend our time in the house because on trips out things go wrong and he often rages. He has thrown things, sworn and kicked buses in public and I am now realising that my responses to that have been to withdraw and stop suggesting trips or doing things together.
My father was abusive and violent to me as a child. I was also afraid of his volatile temper. I now realise alcohol was a part of his volatility. I see now that both my husband and my father were dependent on something outside themselves for happiness and that as a little girl and now as a wife, I tried to play that role. "making them happy."
In this next chapter I want my actions and thoughts to be focused on my own happiness not my husband's/father's/everyone else in the room's
Something else I realised today while journalling is that I am powerless to change myself. I think I came into recovery thinking that this would help me fix myself. But I now think that this might be more diseased thinking. I can't fix myself. I am powerless over my insanity as well. I have to come to believe that a POWER GREATER THAN MYSELF will restore me to sanity, not that I can learn cool tools and recovery tricks for RESTORING MYSELF to sanity.
Well that turned into a whole other discussion - thanks for listening!
What a great share, Annie! It shows that you are really looking into YOU. I am glad you will be getting support from your family... it truly helps, believe me! Fantastic that you found a F2F meeting... those there have all "been there" and they can support you in ways that sometimes your family cannot... not that they don't want to, just that they don't understand this disease. FYI, I too, have often felt over the past two months that I wish that I was without any cares except working on myself, with hot meals made for me, health care, counseling and other therapies to heal my mind and body. But then I remind myself what got my STBXRAH where he is at, and I wouldn't want to dance with addiction for anything in the world!
IMHO, you and your child deserve a life without the rages. It sounds like you understand that and are becoming so aware. Most of my behavior I have begun to uncover, is because of fear. So I identified with your post above.
Stay strong! I am sending you light, love and support!
-- Edited by PosiesandPuppies on Wednesday 20th of December 2017 12:36:00 PM
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"The wolf that thrives, is the one you feed." - Cherokee legend
"Hello, sun in my face. Hello you who made the morning and spread it over the fields... Watch, now, how I start the day in happiness, in kindness." Mary Oliver
