1st Al Anon Meeting - What's Happening to Me?
Very nice people - all mostly older folks and many what I'm guessing, 'seasoned' veterans. In a church. Very low key - pretty quiet. Go through the ritual of each person reading from the book. Group leader reads from his script. Serenity prayer. Speaker who tells her story (speaker - once a month and happened to be yesterday). I see some of myself in her story. Closing Al Anon and Lord's prayer. No one talks much about anything personal.
Afterwards, some people stand around and talk in small groups, since they seem to know one another quite well. I make a connection with a woman who has been involved with some of area shelters and she gives me a number where I can contact someone to arrange a meeting to talk to someone about my abusive situation.
I leave, thinking well that was kinda boring and impersonal. Not what I expected. No real sense of connection - yet nothing negative.
I come home and talk to the A. I feel more patient, listening to him. I haven't spoken with him for 2 days, since trying to plan my exit. I look at him differently, almost like I can suddenly separate myself from the disease. I feel different and more relaxed.
Wake up this morning and nothing feels the same. What's happening to me? I didn't do anything except recite some of the 'passages' and say the prayers. I've always felt weird about praying - although I've tried. I've wondered weird things like 'are you only supposed to pray when you're in the worst situation of your life?' and 'are you allowed only a certain number of prayers and if you pray too much, then when you really need help, you won't receive it?' I know nothing about religion except what I've picked up from others. I've been afraid of it, because I find it hard to believe something that can't be proven to me. I've never been a 'pushover'.
Whatever is happening to me is VERY POWERFUL. I feel a sense of calm and freedom that I haven't felt in years - maybe ever. By repeating the things I did - whether I believed them or not, did I trigger something within me that I'm not aware of? Have I 'let go and let God' without even realizing it? All I know is that I feel the weight of the world slowly lifting off my shoulders. Wow. How can something work like that when you don't feel you did anything to 'make it happen'? I'm baffled, but I feel an amazing sense of rejuvenation.
Has this ever happened to anyone else?