isn't part of amends listening to the other person about how our/your action impacted?
wouldn't giving your wife the space and time to say her piece be a necessary part?
wouldn't it be necessary for you/us to hear it without arguing about it?
maybe set aside a time that's mutually convenient without kids around and tell her the amends you're making (being sober and treating her 'better') and accept what she might need to say?
lol shes said it believe me shes said her piece more times then I can count. She has yet to really drag me through the mud over my drinking but while i drank she did upon occaision rightly so too. She's dragged me through the mud about other things sometimes jokingly sometimes not. Dont get me wrong shes not some kind of a monster etc.. and I'll gladly endure the drag when its deserved and yeah its really deserved this go around BUT the kicker is I drag myself through the mud enough as it is i have enough of my own shame etc.. I dont want to be dragged again through it by anyone i do a good enough job of that myself. Of course others dont know that i guess.
EndgameNYC your right and the issues with my stepfather are so stinking old but they still sting just as bad if not worse now then they did then. In my drinking days I hit a point in the end where I looked int he mirror and saw his face and that horrified me.
Many have told me to forgive him. pray about it etc.. maybe I have ? and it still hurts? Maybe I have not? When dee posted the piece about having someone by there throat i thought yeah i guess i do still have him by his throat. Lucky for us we live very far from each other and have not spoken or seen each other in almost 20 years. Him walking out on the family was the best thing he coulda ever done. He did manage to do that for us.
When i think about his situation from the perspective of he was clearly a sick person not sane and suffering from many various ailments. I can then have some sympathy compation even wanna extend a helping hand (tho i know he'd yank me in and drown me) but from that perspective what he did seems very forgiveable. he's sick he needs help its not exactly his fault he's so wacked I feel bad for him.
The reality is on the surface i tend to just simply thing how much of a monster he was without giving it further thought.
I luckily dont think i ever hit lows anywhere near the kinda lows he hit. My wife just doesnt deserve someone who selfishly drank like a fish night after night for 13 years of our marriage falling down drunk barfing all over etc.. She should not have had to tolerate that. She deserves better. It was disrespectful for me to behave like that for all those years despite any excuse i might have it was not the right thing to do.