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hi everyone i just wanted to ask how some of you deal with things without over reacting or stopping yourself from overreacting. how do you get out of the moment to stop and think before you do something too rash. this is something i'd like to fix about myself. i have a problem with forcing my a out of the house if he relapses or slips on his program. first i know i need to leave his program to him. none of my business and focus on mine. second i have to stop and relax so i quit doing this. this is insanity. i know i choose to do this in the heat of the moment and want to stop. any suggestions would be greatly appreciated. thank you
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stay in the now...dont look forward, dont look back....your life is what you make of it
In the heat of the moment my "A" walks away. He leaves the house and comes abck when He has clamed down. I then pop on here or call somone.
I have noticed that I do the same thing at work. We gt two 15 minute smoke breaks and I don't smoke so I don't take them, I have noticed latley that I just remove myself from the situation and calm down.
Hope that helps.
Yours in Recovery,
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"Today's problems can not be solved if we still think the way we did when we created them" -Albert Einstein
I am far better at this than I was having this room as an outlet certainly helps. I also think taking time to reflect helps. Self care if a huge buffer to over reacting. If I am really in tune with myself, taking care of me getting enough rest (thank you Debilyn for stressing that so much when I was here at the beginning), getting time to work on my issues, I don't over react as much. There are times I do still though. They creep up on me generally. I think having very very few expectations of the A helps. This last holiday I had none. He gave nothing. I was not disappointed. Disappointment is very hard for me. I set myself up with that one.
I am so happy for you that you are working on this. I think over reacting leads to exhaustion and exhaustion leads to lots of other things.
That is a tough one, I still find myself at times over reacting...it took us awhile to get here and I'm sure it will take some time to stop.
I just try and walk away a minute, come in the chat room....call a friend...anything to get away from him for awhile....I have locked myself in the bathroom to get away from everything....lol...funny but true....
This is a big struggle for me as well. I have not completely changed this behavior but feel I'm getting better. For me it depends on what's going on. If its a relapse I'm not sure how I'll respond if this happens again. In the past I've been silently angry then I explode with anger and rage towards the A. Don't want to that anymore either. I agree with maresie taking better care of myself has helped me to seek HP first before I respond or when I do respond I make sure I'm responding with honest feelings and attempt to say it with respect. Keep up the good work and thanks for the post, it helps me think about areas in my life as well.
Hugs,
Twinmom~
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"The people who don't mind matter and the people who mind, don't matter". (Dr. Seuss)
it's so hard when the active A is right in your face. walking away helps, detaching with love. i used to picture the word "sick" on my A's forehead, so that i could have more compassion. taking good care of myself helped too and being around people that were in recovery. I try not to make decisions anymore when i'm in a high emotional state, b/c i usually go back on them very quickly.
i also allowed myself to feel my feelings, which was usually anger and disappointment, hurt, sadness, etc. this too shall pass, then i'd have to decipher what is mine and what is theirs and try to keep my side of the street as clean as possible, believe me i mess my side up a lot!
After many years of hysterics, I heard here once that if I am hysterical; it will be historical. Some of my 4th step included my, myself and I reactions to situations which were worse behaved that the drunk. And those derned drunks get off scott free and I was sitting there looking like the village idiot.
That's what guides me before I overreact "if it's hysterical; it will be historical" and I made a decision to turn my will and life over to the care of God as I understand him. I am not 100% but I am now 99.9% and that's some progress for me.
Hope this helps, Maria123
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If I am not for me, who will be? If I am only for myself, then who am I? If not now, when?
I think for one thing I know I'm reactive when I haven't done a morning program. When I take 20/30 minutes and pray, clear my head and sort through any emotional garbage, I feel alot more balenced and my recovery thinking has a chance to get to my moulth first rather than my reactive thinking.
The other thing that occurs to me is that I make it a point to surround myself with recovery people. I make it a point to hang around with people who walk what they believe. Michael Cervantes (Man of La Mancha) said "Show me who your friends are and I will show you your true character" and I believe it. I believe that by surrounding myself with people who are living the golden rule (they may not be Al Anon/AA), walking the honest path (or they may be Al Anon/AA), these are people that I can embrace and say honestly, "Hey, this is where I'm at, this is what I need, et cetera."
The last thing I think of when it comes to over reactions is something an oldtimer said to me once: for him he said that it is absolutely paramount before he gets emotional, gets involved whatever to make sure he has all the facts. Alot of times whenever I get upset, it's because someone *forgot* to tell me some really important piece of information. Some critical detail that really changes how I percieve the situation. And I try to remember that my thinking is generally good--I'm prone to fear, resentment, grief, shame and anger. But if I use my recovery thinking, then I can set boundries, say no, all that good stuff.
