Hello, everyone. I've been clean and sober for 7 years. Made the huge mistake of becoming involved with someone in early recovery (a chronic relapser) a year ago, and now I've been to two Al-Anon meetings. I find myself feeling at peace with the situation sometimes, and other times very sad and angry and hurt.
I met this man in a treatment center where a sponsee of mine was. He got out of treatment, relapsed and had his extended revision revoked. I initially saw him at the jail at his request to give him my thoughts on his legal situation (I'm an attorney) and also for some AA words of wisdom. Fast forward to six months when we have genuinely fallen in love (I believe). We planned to live together (against my better judgment) when he was released until I told him if he drank he would have to move out. He was irate, said he didn't think he could meet my expectations and started seeing an ex-girlfriend after he was released to a halfway house. He continued to call me even after I asked him to leave me alone.
They rented an apartment together after he got out of the halfway house. He basically supports her and her two kids (she doesn't have job for some reason). He still kept calling me though! He finally called me drunk, saying he made a mistake, didn't love this woman but felt trapped (she's not pregnant so I don't know what that means), loved me, yadda yadda. I told him to stick with her and changed my phone number but then broke down and called him a month later because I missed him so much. (I guess I thought he if really loved me he'd leave her.) We kept in communication for a month at that point (talked several times a day) until I said we needed to ease up or I would get too attached. He didn't feel he could leave her for some reason. I stopped calling him but he called me once a week for a couple weeks after that. I called him the next week but got really angry with him for being insensitive about something. Neither of us called the next week, then he saw me out with a bunch of AA people at a restaurant. He called soon thereafter and said we shouldn't talk anymore, that he felt really guilty when he saw me at the restaurant, "You're awesome and beautiful, but I can't cheat on her." (All we were doing was talking anyway, no sex or anything) WTF?! How could he go from "I love you, want to be with you and not her" to "We better not talk anymore?" When I calmly said I understood even though I didn't, he changed his mind and said, "Well, we can still talk as friends."
After a month of neither of us calling, it hurt so much that I decided we better not talk at all, even as "friends," so I called him and told him. He calmly said okay, and that's where we're at now.
He volunteered that he hasn't had a drink in 4 months - - not sure if I believe him. I don't think the new gf cares if he drinks and has no concept of enabling, "loving too much," etc. Anyway, like I said, I'm either at peace or so, so sad, feeling rejected, unappreciated, used and unloved.
Lots of crying and obsessing/analyzing. How could things change so fast? There are only 2 Al-Anon meetings a week around here I can make it to, so I'm grateful for this site. I know I'm sick - - my next post won't be as long! Thx so much for "listening!"