this is a great thread.
i want so badly to surrender, to admit my powerlessness.
you know, the things i have done to actually control people's lives i have been proud of?! maybe it's a dramatic streak in me, but when people would just say "let it go" regarding my RABF, i was always the one to say "NO, WE HAVE TO STOP HIM. . . and this is how we can do it!" i was driving back and forth between our 2 states, calling his friends, getting everyone to "see" the problem. i devoted literally 6 months to this endeavor. and i was rather proud of my work. and somewhere deep inside, i know i still i am. i still hold onto this idea that I helped change things for him.
i have spoken about this before. . . how he, my RABF, helped me through a difficult period of my life. perhaps i gave him too much credit. because, in the end, he wasn't the one who got me to stop failing out of school and start living my life. . . it was ME.
i had such a hard time in college. i was miserable. i was partying. i looked good, but i felt terrible and the fact that i couldn't get to classes, that i didn't really use my mind and my talents until my senior (and 5th) year in school. . . i was simply filled with angst, with pain, i felt the world was against me, i felt no one liked me, i was directionless and terribly depressed. this was the first time i was out in the world, away from my abusive family of origin, and nothing was getting better. so i thought the problem must be me. that i was screwed, and that's just the way it was.
so my RABF sticking by me through all this-- through all the paranoia and fear and all the enemies (not imagined) that i did actually make, all the mess i made of my dreams. . . well, it obviously meant a lot to me then and still means a lot to me now. it's one of the reasons i told myself i had to do WHATEVER IT TOOK to save him.
and whatever it took made my life unmanageable. that's what finally got me to al-anon. i couldn't do it anymore. i really did give up in that moment when i walked in those doors.
but for me, it's more like trying to learn to use a different muscle. the muscle that believes i can fix it all and wants to control it is VERY strong. the muscles that don't believe that and dont' want to control are kinda weak. so i have to keep relaxing that strong muscle and try to grow the weaker one. it takes a lot of attention, and it sometimes seems hopeless.
my mother -- who i am trying to not talk to about anything too deep these days-- has often said to me, "you are an aggressive, persuasive person. . and those can be good qualities. stop trying to change yourself and capitalize on what you have."
but to do that i think it would be some kind of emotional death for me. i don't LIKE using those things, but it's all i feel i've ever felt comfortable or been told.
hope this isn't too much verbal vomit. i'm just trying to get my thoughts out.