Originally Posted by
Gottalife 
The truth will set you free, but first it will tend to make you miserable.
That was a giant chunk of humility Tufty. I wondered if I was a little too direct, but this was a realisation that I also had to come to. I am the alcholic here, I am the one with the problem. It is not up to anyone else to change to suit me. It's my problem.
Once I could accept that, I was well on my way to a solution. I trust you will be too.
It is a realisation I have had to come to as well. The first time I spoke to about my feelings around my dad in AA, a man who I have a lot of respect for approached me in coffee time and asked, 'is your dad doing anything different to what he always does?' Of course, I replied that no, he's always this bad. Well, thats the shortened version anyway. Lol. Then he said to me 'so why did YOU expect him to be different?' He explained to me that 'my part' in this problem is me holding onto false expectations and letting wishful thinking direct me. Ohhhh! Was I mad!! Here was I telling him all the things my dad had done wrong, and this bloke was picking on me, and making it all my fault? I fumed all the way home, but like I said, I've always respected this man, and what he'd said in the past always seemed sane and helpful, so I prayed on the resentment I was forming for him, and thought back about it. And (eventually) I realised that he was right. It is insane of me to expect my dad (in his 70s now) to change from how he's always been, and that insanity doesn't hurt him. It hurts me, as resentments always do. HE is the Acceptance part of the deal, MY expectations are the Change part of the deal. And good old Nick, well I suppose while I didn't have that wisdom myself, he was there to lend me some of his, even though he knew I might not like it.
God, Grant me the serenity to accept the things I can't change,
The courage to change the things I can,
and the wisdom to know the difference.
For the record, I still occasionally struggle a little with issues around my dad, but nowadays I know that if I do some work around my expectations then I'll get over it, and that does work. Hopefully as I continue to do this work on this, my acceptance around my dad will start to come more naturally for me. It's one of those Simple, but not necessarily Easy things. But, according to my mother, that's what I was like with walking at first, and nowadays I do just fine with that (esp now I'm sober lol).
And you know, one of the amazing things about me being responsible for how we react to things others say and do, is that I no longer have to feel a victim. I felt like a victim for years, always reacting to others, or my fears about others, at the drop of a hat. I never even realised it was a choice! That was something that I realised after my AA step 5. It was immediately scary, but so, so freeing. That doesn't mean to say I don't feel the pain of someone being beastly, BUT I don't need to attach myself to that pain now. I can observe it, then make the decision to let that go. It can be a real 'chewy' conscious decision for me sometimes. I ask myself 'BB, be honest, do you WANT to feel better?' And sometimes I'll rage back 'No, I effing don't. ' followed by some inner rant about how things or people 'should' be. And just have to remind myself, that I can choose to feel better any time I like. If I make the decision to wallow in this thing,then that's my own fault. Sometimes once fear or hurt or whatever has flipped into anger, I can wear my rage like some like of invisible armour. Thing is, that armour has spikes. And those spikes are on the inside as well as the outside.
Anyway. That turned into a bit of a ramble didn't it. Sorry about that. Anyway - take care. And well done for being so reflective x