HP shared this in yesterday's Daily Readings from Melody Beattie:
Originally Posted by
honeypig 
You are reading from "The Meditation Room" of Melody Beattie's website here: Daily Meditations Archives - Melody Beattie
Negotiating Conflicts
Recovery is about more than walking away. Sometimes it means learning to stay and deal. It’s about building and maintaining relationships that work.
— Beyond Codependency
Problems and conflicts are part of life and relationships with friends, family, loved ones, and at work. Problem solving and conflict negotiation are skills we can acquire and improve with time.
Not being willing to tackle and solve problems in relationships leads to unresolved feelings of anger and victimization, terminated relationships, unresolved problems, and power plays that intensify the problem and waste time and energy.
Not being willing to face and solve problems means we may run into that problem again.
Some problems with people cannot be worked out in mutually satisfactory ways. Sometimes the problem is a boundary issue we have, and there is not room to negotiate.
In that case, we need to clearly understand what we want and need and what our bottom line is.
Some problems with people, though, can be worked out, worked through, and satisfactorily negotiated. Often, there are workable options for solving problems that we will not even see until we become open to the concept of working through problems in relationships, rather than running from the problems.
To negotiate problems, we must be willing to identify the problem, let go of blame and shame, and focus on possible creative solutions. To successfully negotiate and solve problems in relationships, we must have a sense of our bottom line and our boundary issues, so we don’t waste time trying to negotiate non-negotiable issues.
We need to learn to identify what both people really want and need and the different possibilities for working that out. We can learn to be flexible without being too flexible. Committed, intimate relationships mean two people are learning to work together through their problems and conflicts in ways that work in both people’s best interest.
Today I will be open to negotiating conflicts I have with people. I will strive for balance without being too submissive or too demanding. I will strive for appropriate flexibility in my problem-solving efforts.
From the book "The Language of Letting Go: Hazelden Meditation Series."
I think this is the heart of my struggle. I am coming to better terms with the fact that his recovery is priority, but I am still dealing with these feelings of fear and resentment about his balancing family/marriage. I don't like the idea of it being a one-way street. I fear the fact that I could be putting in all this work and time, and he'll be sober, but having not have worked on our marriage, we'll have nothing to connect on anymore. I know I need to focus on me and my own recovery, but we BOTH still have this joint responsibility with our 3 year-old, right?
For example, we had a point of contention related to me wanting a 'heads up' about when he'd be home (after a day working with his sponsor, he came home at 3am. Key point here is that he USUALLY comes home between 10 pm and midnight. I rationalize that the driving force to my concern is generalized worry [he's usually home, did he get into a wreck? Did his car stall?] and of course I'm sure that deeper down I fear he left his sponsor's home and is now at a bar or something, but I delude myself into thinking that that isn't my main worry). I deleted about 7 draft text messages, because I would rationalize and think, "really, what impact is him not being home doing?" i didn't need him to care for our already sleeping daughter, i didn't need him to spend time with me (at least I don't think that's the case), there was no reason. Am I being irrational asking for that level of consideration?
I fear that I'm NOT allowed to address these relationship communication pieces, because I'd be going against the advice of most everyone, and I'm not putting his recovery first. "There's the wife, bringing up relationship issues. She's adding to HIS stress and stalling HIS recovery." Again, am I irrational for wanting a heads up, or a check-in? It's not like I'm asking what he's working on in his steps, but am I just soothing my OWN worry? Is this not a normal or reasonable request in a relationship with a recovering alcoholic? Am I stepping over a boundary again?
"Today I will be open to negotiating conflicts I have with people. I will strive for balance without being too submissive or too demanding. I will strive for appropriate flexibility in my problem-solving efforts."