DoubleDragons

I found out my mother (and father) are narcissists in my twenties. My mother, on top of her personality disorders, has now become a full blown alcoholic. I first heard the term "narcissist" in therapy. I was incredibly relieved and validated. Unfortunately, I did not use that knowledge to see how it affects me and how I relate to the world and to how I relate to the people in my life. Instead, any time my bad/sad feelings came about, I drank them away. I continued to people please and try to control everybody and everything, continued to feel empty and angry and resentful, so in order to stuff those feelings, I doused them with alcohol and so, the cycle has continued . . . .until I quit drinking about 7.5 months ago.

I am now taking the step in my recovery to face my demons. I am planning on working the ACoA 12 steps. (I just bought their big book) Anyone up for working the steps with me? (The Adult Children of Alcoholics _ which pertains to any dysfunctional upbringing, my mother didn't turn into a full blown alcoholic until I was an adult) Maybe we could start a thread and go through the steps together??

Unfortunately the closest physical ACoA to me is 25 miles away and there is a note there that they are in need of more members, so I think an on-line group would work better for me.

DesertEyes

I'm game Do note that most of our members stop by once every few days, so it may take some time to pick up some "intertia". If you start the thread I will post my own .02

Mike

Carlotta

You two are braver than I am
I ll be following the thread though but still not ready to be facing my ACOA stuff.

3777

I'm new to all this and willing to give it a go.

DoubleDragons

Awesome!! Mike, I read the sticky about taking your inner child with you and treating that child very lovingly. I started doing it last night. It felt awkward, but wonderful all at the same time, so thank you. I will start our thread with Step One later today.

makomago

Mike... out of interest (if you don't mind my asking?), what's your experience (if any) of the Yellow Book as a method of going through the steps?

If you haven't any experience of it, any thoughts you'd care to share would be appreciated by me (at least).

Thanks

Mako

chicory

DoubleDragons I would like to join in!

My qualifies were both my parents.

Thanks for doing this. I went to an ACA meeting years ago, and loved what I learned. It set me free, but old habits have a way of returning, if not tended to.

biminiblue

The Inner Child stuff - really powerful for me in recovery.

I found a picture of myself as a smiling three year old - before that first bare-bottom spanking at age five or six. What a happy, smiley little kid I was.

I WAS A LITTLE KID, you monster.

There was a lot of healing that took place with me and that picture. I was able to look at her and comfort her in the way a tiny child should be comforted, drying her tears, holding her on my lap, combing her hair, telling her how sweet she was. I had it out in a prominent place for a long time, and it is still out - it reminds me that God made us all as loving innocents. We are not who our parents tried to make us believe we are.

Ipanema

To Biminiblue,

I am glad to see this site and glad I already know you a bit!

What I see about you here and the Monster is familiar, tragic and appalling. I am so glad the child abuse is seen today as a crime. It was nobody's business before.

My first memory of my mother was of shaking and hair pulling at age 4 or 5. The offense was sitting in the yard of our new house before she was ready to meet people. I learned early on to not do anything wrong or some form of physical abuse, as well as awful screams and her distorted angry face would occur. I knew I was a bad bad girl when I was in trouble for such normal and innocent offenses. In therapy and many meetings I learned she chose me, the first daughter, to dump all the pain she had of her Stepmother. My Mother's Mother died when my Mother was 4.

Sorry, but, she should have chosen some other way to handle the anger. I took care of her in her old age, strokes from too much alcohol and prescription drugs combined, moving her several times, selling her condo, etc. To the end she still was angry at me. Her last words to me when I was getting her mail to pay her bills was: "Come over her so I can hit you". I grabbed the mail and ran out of the room. Today I see everything clearly and work hard to forgive her but am told it's better to just take care of myself. If you are here on this site I can only imagine your childhood, Biminiblue. God Bless You

Ipanema

To All,

It feels like the right time for the Steps in ACoA. I have been to meetings but the only one just ended up with too much crime in the area at night. I became scared so I left.1

Ipanema

To Double Dragons,

I'm in! I have the Red Book from some prior meetings. Little by Little I went thru it but believe it was so painful to deal with all this and the meeting in a bad area, that I needed a break. IPPY

DoubleDragons

Glad to have you, IP. We have started with our steps thread and we are on ACoA step one. Our thread is under the ACoA section of SR and has about 6-7 posts already. We plan to take about a week for each step, unless, as a group we feel we need more time for one particular step. We encourage anyone who is wishing to heal from FOO dysfunction to try the steps with us.

Ipanema

Thank you DoubleDragons and will get started on #1. I think FOO is family of origin! The Good, the bad, and the crazymaking! IPPY Have a serene day if you are able////Ippy

DesertEyes

There are a lot of different ways of "working the steps", of which the Yellow Book is just one. I tried the Yellow book for about a dozen pages and found that it was to restrictive for me. Note that I generally am "motor mouth" and tend to talk ( or write ) way too much. I do _much_ better when I can just "run free" without limits.

Other peeps I know say they love the Yellow Book precisely _because_ it gives them direction and helps them _not_ run free.

All of which means that I think every person has to experiment with several different techniques and approaches until they find one that works best for their individual personality.

Mike

3777

The book I bought was light blue called "12 steps for adult children of alcoholics" does Barnes and Nobel have these books? I'm a science thinker and sounds like the yellow book may be a good one although this light blue book is to the point. I wish it had more examples. I think realizing that what I'm doing doesn't work, ((like Nagging my husband to not do things he shouldn't do. ( never works), etc. )) may be what step one is about. I think I do so somethings well so I find the wording a bit hard, but then I imagine cleaning out a closet and examining one piece at a time for its usefulness. Yes, A lot of junk in my closet.

Ipanema

I'm sorry to be slow as we have tremendous fires in San Diego. I am somewhat involved in that I know people who are involved...I will get to this by the weekend. Many Blessings, Ipanema

tromboneliness

Ya, it varies with the individual. For me, it was the Best. Thing. I've. Ever. Done. It enabled my sponsor to recognize two very important patterns (self-abandonment and thinking I don't count [whatever the technical term is for that]) that I had been repeating over and over, blundering my way through life and wondering why the same sh*t kept happening.

But ya, the yellow book has writing exercises that are pretty specific. What I like about it is exactly that -- it makes you put the stuff down on paper and really own your history. By seeing the stuff in there, it also suggests that, "Hey, if this is you, it's normal for an ACoA -- that's why it's in the book. So no need to beat yourself up -- a lot of us have been through the same thing." Do the exercises, figure stuff out.

And if you want to run free, go ahead and bring your own extra paper!

T

my1life

Hi DoubleDragon - sorry for such a delayed reply - I would like to join in the thread. Where is it posted?

ladyscribbler

They're on the same page where you found this one. Each step is a separate thread. Welcome! I started late too, but better late than never, eh?

3777

Where do you get "the yellow book" I bought a 12 steps for codependents book, but wondering about this yellow book.