Originally Posted by
mentallyexh 
I am ALOT offended by the child protective services comment.....almost to tears....I assure you they have never been in harms way....I know they've heard arguing and seen some things they shouldn't...>I LOVE MY KIDS more than anything and want the best for them.
Please do not be offended. People are trying to help you see this situation from a better vantage point. It is sometimes very hard to do that when you are *in* the situation.. I wish I'd have found this group so much earlier then I did. I needed them, and perspective's like these, loooooong before I got them. I was so blinded by my picture of a perfect family and the need to give that to my kids that I would not let go of my husband. Over the years I became consumed by fear, anger, resentment, frustration, confusion. You put out into the world what consumes you in your inner world. So this is what my children got - fear/confusion/anger from one parent (me) and absent alcoholism and a bit of passive manipulation/emotional abuse from the other (him). How truly tragic. In your circumstance your husband rages but you are silent. How is there a happy ending in that? If only I would have sought out someone to help me refocus sooner......
I waited until I had hit *my* bottom....and my children paid the price. I love my children. There isn't a person that meets me that doesn't say that it is obvious I love my children. Loving them isn't enough.
Originally Posted by
LaTeeDa But there is also a much more harmful, insidious cycle going on. ...............you are predisposing them to repeating the cycle when they grow up. It's a very tragic legacy to leave them. Unless someone (you) breaks the cycle, it will continue.
In the end, in addition to my own inability to cope any longer...this is what brought me to taking action...and then finding SR. My parental marriage was different from mine but it was not a good example. My mother, whom I love with all my heart and have so many many good memories of, and so many reasons to be thankful to her, was a very unhappy woman. I learned some very dysfunctional things from her. Things that hurt my heart when I was a child and that still hurt my heart today. I was alarmed to realized that some of my basic ways of parenting are the same. We truly do become our parents. It is what we know.
We all get a map in life. It is legacy all children get from their parents. This map is the one they will follow and only with great difficulty will they be able to deviate from it. I am following the map my parents drew for me...and my xah was/is following his. I was alarmed when I saw the map we were drawing for our children - because it looked just like ours.
I am trying to re-write my map. It is hard because I don't have the skills for a new map. My skills are those of co-dependency and some other not nice things and they are suited for the map I have. Without even knowing it - I was following my childhood map, turn after turn. I want a new map, so have to learn new skills.
I am doing that so I can give my kids a better map, and the skills to use it. To me, that is loving them. It trumps my vision of the perfect family.
Thinking of you and wishing you strength and peace.