Signal30

Long time member of SR and one time avid poster. Although I do have a lot to be grateful for, there has been a lot of stress in my life (divorce).

So, my second divorce and this one was with kids. I love my kids dearly and they have played a big part in getting myself through this. But I can't help to think that I cannot have a significant other, due to the fear of losing everything again.

I know that most of the "everything" is just stuff, but I cannot express enough how horrible and exhausting it is to lose your house a second time. I'm 40 years old and will have to live like I'm 20 again.

I'm not one to play the blame game on the other half, because AA teaches us that we tend to be the root to most of our problems. I'm also not going to lie to you all and say that I'm not a bit resentful at someone who destroyed my credit and betrayed me.

That being said, I have a bad shortcoming of picking the wrong woman to try to spend the rest of my life with. Both marriages drastically set me back on financial hard times. After the first time I told myself that I'd never do that again, but here we are.

So yeah I actually have a bigger resentment towards myself for being a fool. Two great things came out of this last marriage, two wonderful kids.

So saying that, here's what this has to do with the topic of this thread. It's just too emotionally and financially risky to ever be in a relationship again. It's going to take at least 7 years (because I have to file Bankruptcy), to where I can actually afford a residence fit for my age and salary. Yeah I know it sounds selfish, but losing everything twice really sucks.

I'd love to have that woman to spend the rest of my life with, but it's just too risky. My physical sobriety is all I have left because my mental and spiritual sobriety has taken a pretty massive hit.

I just want my life to be secure. I comfortable place of my own that no one can take away from me. It's doesn't have to be extravagant, just one that I can call mine and home. But it seems like the only way to do this with any real security is too not have a significant other that may try to take it away someday.

Yes, it's a big trust issue for me now. It's not that I can't trust women, I can't trust anyone. Gender has nothing to do with it because men can be obviously just as untrustworthy.

Through the grace of God, I pray that I can make it through this second divorce. I can't ever go through this stress again. My first divorce I got very depressed and was the birth of my actual active alcoholism. Now going through my second divorce I am still sober (going on 9 years), so that along with great kids is plenty to be grateful for.


I just resent having the fear that in order to not have most of my life taken away from me, I have to be single.

Thanks for reading.

mfanch

Divorce is a unique kind of misery.

Fear/anger (which can be treated with the 12 steps) and self-pity (an ego trip) are both common in those getting a divorce. It sounds like you are where most people are in your situation. The tincture of time and the gift of forgiveness are also great tools that we have in our arsenal to regain the trust and serenity we once had. When we are ready for it.

All of my divorced friends SWORE that they would never do this and never do that again. Until next time. All but one are remarried. Many also had to build or rebuild credit...again.

My sponsor would say, "It is all a process and you are right where you are supposed to be. Just do today."

Glad you are here and thank you for sharing your story. It really helped me this morning.

DayTrader

HEH........well they say no matter how down we've gone we'll find how our experience can benefit others..... Suffice it to say I'm VERY familiar with your situation. I lost it ALL......house, marriage, money, retirement savings, cars, etc. Tons of stuff......and most of it I lost while IN recovery, supposedly practicing this wonderful spiritual way of life where I hear member after member in meetings talking about how "it gets better." Well, all the stuff I though that was important was NOT getting better. I was sober, yes.....but it seemed like my entire life was crumbling in front of me and nothing I could do seemed to stop it.

What helped me get free was a LOT of work with the steps but a handful of them I spent a LOT of time with. I'll try to briefly summarize those steps and how I "worked" with them below.

Step 1. I had to admit that my life was the way it was because I HAD designed it that way. I was the one who (maybe unconsciously) decided I needed her, the house, a bunch of cash, a big retirement account, the cars, a motorcycle, etc for me to be ok. I was deriving my self identity from the job I had, the money I earned, the toys I had, the savings I had, and so forth - all external things. I didn't know who "I" was as a person when those things started to go away. As that happened, I grew more and more afraid......terrified. As Mark Houston covers in "Theater of a Lie" in some of his retreat weekends, I had all these "characters" that I thought were me but they weren't me, not the real true me anyway. ..........so in other words my life, as I'd been living it even in sobriety/recovery, was completely unmanageable.

Step 2 - I had a tough time coming to believe that an alternate life was possible. I was mostly positive there was no way I could fix my life by myself.......no amount of therapy, study, learning........no way I could change the way I see, internalize, and approach every aspect of my life. Well, maybe i could but it would take forever and I'd probably have to wait decades to get somewhere comfortable/content. I didn't really doubt God could......but I sure as hell didn't think God would......not for me anyway, and even if He did......I figured He'd drag His feet. Looking at the second step proposition that we're supposed to face feerlessly - whether God is everything or He's nothing - it became apparent that I had chosen somewhere along the way that God was nothing. Hell, I'd chosen I was God, I was in control, I was able to recreate my own life, run it, and do it all on my own successfully.....and along the way I'd try to hang with God and get his advice on what/how I was supposed to do to get these things I just knew I needed. Was it possible I was wrong? Was it possible I didn't really know what I needed but only what I wanted? Was it possible I didn't need ANY of those things (woman, money, toys)? I took that last one further to every area of my life - was it possible I didn't "need" other things like respect from peers, a job I though was worthy of me, respect from my peers, love, attention from others, respect in AA.... Heck, I'd tried to get all those things and wasn't doing so well. Getting honest, I had made the acquisition of those things my "god." Those were the things I worshiped, those were the things that dominated my thinking, those were the things I'd built my life around. Was it possible that my entire operations manual for life, even in sobriety/recovery, was faulty and not working? Was it possible I needed to actually start living my life like I relied upon and trusted God? And if I did that........would God actually lead me or would He leave me hanging? For me, those were very tough questions to ponder and I didn't like many of my answers because it started becoming obvious that my misery was directly created out of me running the show with God way out of the way. As far as step 2 specifically, I wasn't really able (and this was with more than a couple years of sobriety and active AA participation under my belt) to believe......but I was willing to believe it was possible. A pretty weak step 2 in my opinion, but it was the best I could do at the time. At least it was honest......so I went to 3.

Step 3 - LOTS of time with 3. Lots of time reviewing the story about the actor running the show. Lots of time re-looking at my new/current steps 1 and 2......and I kept coming up with this: I only said I believed and trusted in God but my actions were more in line with someone who acted like there was no God other than my own intellect. It became overwhelmingly apparent that I had.......HAD........to make a decision to quit playing God because it was wwwwwwwwwway obvious that it wasn't working. And yeah, it meant I was going to have to cast a whole bunch of liiiiiife-lonnnnnng thought patterns out the window. I was scared as hell and felt like I was stripping down naked in front of all of humanity........scared and lost - big time! But hell, I had no other choice because continuing on as I had been was going to mean a missssssserable life. So, my third step "decision" wasn't really so much of a decision as it was "the only choice I had."

Step 6 was another one I had to look at in depth. Was I.......entirely ready......to have God remove......? My honest initial answers were all no. ugh. That one took some time and contemplation to get past.

I can tell you that it was one of the most challenging times of my life...... letting go of just about everything that I thought I was - not just the material things but also letting go of thought patterns, techniques to create a self identity from, of reliance upon self, learning how to act like someone who actually trusted God, etc. I can also tell you it took a lot of practice. I certainly didn't get much right, right away. I had to learn to be ok with doing something poorly......doing things I didn't like doing........doing things I wasn't comfortable doing. Probably a whole lot more "acting as if" than actual action out of faith, trust and/or belief.

Some AA speakers like Mark Houston, Joe Hawk, Don Pritz, Bob D from Vegas, Bob B. from St Paul, and the Raymer brothers helped a lot (lots of their talks on XAspeakers). I also did a lot of reading and implementing of the principles in Emmet Fox's book "Sermon on the Mount", as well as some phenomenal books by John Powell (in recovery) and one other author who's name escapes me right now (he's also in recovery). If youre interested, shoot me a pm and I'll check when I get home. It also was extremely helpful to find some folks in recovery who had similar experiences and had grown through/past them. It meant I needed to change home groups, find a new sponsor, and really change up my recovery lifestyle because the brand or version of AA I'd been working was no longer sufficient.

I don't know that any of that will help but your post brought back a lot of feelings and emotions from that time in my life. Certainly, if you'd like do discuss further, I'm open to that whether it's here, pm or however you'd like. It was difficult for me to admit things were as bad as they were.....and it was equally tough to admit I needed additional help. Once I opened myself up to the process though, things started getting better and it's pretty rare that any of those old issues have ever popped back up with any force.

thanks for your post.......I know talking about that stuff isn't always easy.

Boleo

God must love you a lot Mike;

If God likes you - he gives you stuff.
If God loves you - he gives you Pu.

The Chinese word "Pu" is often translated as "the uncarved block," and refers to a state of pure potential which is the primordial condition of the mind before the arising of experience. The Taoist concept of Pu points to perception without prejudice, i.e. beyond dualistic distinctions such as right/wrong, good/bad, black/white, beautiful/ugly. It is a state of mental unity which places the Taoist practitioner into alignment with the Tao

http://taoism.about.com/od/glossaryo...terms/g/Pu.htm

keithj

That's some fantastic stuff, Mike.

DayTrader

Lol.....at the time I would have told you I wasn't even IN recovery, was doing horrible, and to just leave me alone. Certainly, I thought, it was the low point of my life. My heart absolutely goes out to anyone who finds themselves going through a similar trial by fire.......or test of faith.......or, to use our vernacular, BEING REBORN.

As beneficial as it proved to be, I'm in no hurry for round 2 though I've got little doubt it's coming sooner or later. ugh...... that both excites and petrifies me. lol

DayTrader

Cool concept....... perhaps I'll get to that point (but of course, I'm already at that point and I just don't realize it -- lol). Realistically I only let go of what I got forced to. For me, it seemed like a ton of stuff but I have no doubt there's a whole lot more to jettison when I get to a point where I'm ready. And I also have no doubt it'll also seem like I'm letting go of evvverything.

One thing I should have added was my experience with "alone." I know it's a WE program and I know I even talked about seeking out ppl who'd gone through what I was trying to get through but make no mistake......it was all $hit I had to do on my own. I had to go through it, I had to let go, I had to get willing, I had to DO the legwork, yanno?

Historically for me, "we" tended to get turned into "I'll get you to do it for me" in my head. And, as any good manipulator would find, it worked quite often for me. When it came time to get involved in recovery though, there was just a lot of stuff I (and all of us) had to do on my own. The feeling was that I was alone, because there wasn't someone right there next to me doing my work for me.

In my mind, I need to remember that there will be times when I'm feeling alone....not that I AM alone necessarily, but that I feel that way. And for me, that's part of the program.....doing some things I don't want to do and doing them alone. Eckart Tolle helped me big time in this area...... learning how to be present. Learning how to experience the current moment with no (ok, with as little as possible) resistance to what IS rather than keeping a death-grasp onto what I hope the future will be.

Just a powerless not drinking program? ha....... not for me.

NYCDoglvr

My heart goes out to you, I know how painful it is.

In two decades of sobriety I've seen that, overall, alcoholics (including those of us in recovery) are pretty bad at relationships, as Bill W. points out in the Big Book. In my case, it's also picking the wrong person and despite work on the steps and in therapy I still see enough typical alcoholic character defects (self-centered, selfish, self-will) to see why. Granted, these are vastly improved since I came in, but there are limits to how much change is possible. I've become very happy giving up on relationships.

Boleo

"For God will never disappoint those who truly abandon worldly concerns to dedicate themselves to him. You can be certain of this: He will provide one of two things for his friends. Either they will receive an abundance of all they need or he will give them the physical stamina and a patient heart to endure want."
(Cloud of Unknowing)

tomsteve

We reviewed our fears thoroughly. We put them on paper, even though we had no resentment in connection with them. We asked ourselves why we had them. Wasn't it because self-reliance failed us? Self-reliance was good as far as it went, but it didn't go far enough. Some of us once had great self-confidence, but it didn't fully solve the fear problem, or any other. When it made us cocky, it was worse.

Perhaps there is a better way - we think so. For we are now on a different basis; the basis of trusting and relying upon God. We trust infinite God rather than our finite selves. We are in the world to play the role He assigns. Just to the extent that we do as we think He would have us, and humbly rely on Him, does He enable us to match calamity with serenity.


Anytime I count on people,places, or things to make me happy,peaceful, and serene, I screwed.


Signal,yer going through a time requiring trudging. It happens. Not everyone in the rooms of AA has had a simple happy journey in recovery. Quite a few that had to trudge, me included.
If I stay wallowing in self pity, I stay wallowing in self pity...by myself.
If I keep blaming others for my actions, I will stay in resentment.
If I let fear control my life I get paralyzed by it.
But today I have choices.

I can decide Im tired of the self centeredness,self pity, self justification, rationalization, and all the others defects controlling me or I can say f that crap, get into action With the steps, and get back to serenity and peace while trudging.

Or I can drink. Because that's where all that crap will lead me.


You've gotta choice today, signal.
Balls in your court.

Signal30

This is the first time in my life where I have doubts that everything will be okay. I feel as if the walls are closing in around me. Too many things going on a once it's completely overwhelming and am on the verge of a nervous breakdown.

Again, the only speck of good news is, is that I don't have the urge to drink.

The only two reasons I haven't taken any drastic measured are my kids. They are the reason I'm still around. The thought of suicide is constant but again, my kids keep me alive. I'm not one to throw the word suicide lightly.

Regardless, it's too much at once. I have no problem taking blame for how my life is, but needless to say I need help and I feel that no help in the world is going to help me.

tomsteve

Good to read from ya,signal!
Pretty wild how them big elephant poops don't seem to bother us. Seems to be the mouse poops that screw us up.
I'd suggest not believing your feelings.
I also suggest gettin with your sponsor and starting back at step one.
And where's yer higher power in all this?

Signal30

God looks like he looks to be to overwhelmed by my problems.

tomsteve

Then it might be time to find another God- one that won't be overwhelmed.
Use mine. He's got big shoulders, all power, and has helped me with everything I have faced in recovery.
I hope ya get into step work. I think it would help you tremendously.

DayTrader

On the bright side, that looks like the basis for one helluva sincere first step.


To me, that's the same agnosticism I had. Little to no doubt there IS a God somewhere (couldn't get with the whole "God is in me.....God IS me deal for a while) but almost equally convinced that this God didn't/couldn't/wouldn't care too much about me or my problems. TomSteve hit the nail on the head though........ why not create your own God who can help, who is able to help, and WILL help.......and see what happens? Like I said above, I had to change a whoooole lot of my preconceptions about who/what I thought about God too.

Even with that scenario though.....I couldn't really cross over into faith. Not yet anyway. I had to put this God I created to some tests...but then I remembered God doesn't like to be tested.......so I also made my God a willing participant in any tests I felt I needed to take to enable me to start building that missing trust.