ghostgirl

hey gang, this is really kind of silly, but its really got me scatching my head...

saturday i had my sponsor over to my house for the first time, and her nine year old daughter came with her. her daughter is a wonderful little girl, and she gets along vvery well with my little girl. they played and were together the whole of the two/three hours that my sponsor was visiting. other than going to the bathroom a couple of times, i was with my sponsor the whole time.

the next morning when i was getting ready for church i noticed that one of my glass candle holders had been broken... not only broken, but the pieces carefully placed back together... i wouldn't have noticed had one of the pieces not fallen off. i knew it wasn't broken prior to the visit because i cleaned and picked it up to dust.

anyway, i called my daughter in to ask if she had broken it. she swore she didn't. (when she does something like that, she tells me right away... i tend not to get upset over broken things, as they are just things... and this wasn't anything really meaningful to me). i asked her if her friend broke it, and she said she didn't know, but the friend had been with her the whole time.

the only thing i can think of is my sponsor picked it up to look at it and dropped it while i was doing something else???

either that, or i have a ghost! (o.k., THATS another story )

i suppose what i'm getting at is that if my sponsor did break it, why on earth wouldn't she just tell me, instead of putting it back to look like nothing had happened??? should i ask her? no one else has been in my home, and i could say one of the pets (cats) knocked it over, but they can't put it back together again!!

my daughter does tell the occassional fib, but i can always tell when she does, and like i said, she always tells me anyhow if she breaks something. amd her friend was with her the whole time...

what do you guys think? i mean, as trivial as it seems, if she broke something in my home and can't just tell me, is she a good sponsor? but then again, i may be saying she did something she didn't do????

and i don't know how to approach her about it??
or should i?

BigSis

I don't know - I actually had something like this happen, too.

I had a house full of AA/Alanon gals - ones I would trust with my LIFE... we have a Saturday meeting that rotates between houses, once a month.

After they left, I discovered the entire toilet paper roll holder had broken off the wall and had been set on the floor beside the toilet. No one told me. No one mentioned that it broke... that also bothered me.

My husband said maybe one of them leaned on it to get up and broke it off that way - no biggy. But it gave me that same sort of feeling... how honest ARE we really?

If I was dealing with just one person, I might bring it up in a conversation.... with as much honesty and kindness as I could muster.

How much time in program does your sponsor have? Does she also have a sponsor?

Tazman53

LOL I do not mean to laugh but let me tell this first and you will see why I laughed.

I was at my sponsors working steps and he went to the restroom, while he was gone I noticed that my pen had left a small mark on his "WHITE LEATHER" couch!!! I was thinking "Holy cow, do I tell him?" Well I did because the last thing I wanted to do was lie to him, myself or anyone else, being a liar is what kept me drinking so I told him. He said "No problem man, my wife does it all the time and she cleans it off with some special stuff."

The mark is still there months later!

Okay now to what you are asking about, I would ask her about it, if she did it and is working a good program herself she will come clean and both of you will be the better for it, because I am sure it is weighing heavy on her if she did it. It could be her daughter did it when yours was using the restroom, if she didn't do it then she should ask her daughter, to me that sounds like a kid thing. Who knows maybe your daughter doesn't want to rat out her friend.

ghostgirl

thanks... yeah, she has a sponsor. my sponsor has been in the program around four years.

paulmh

Wow, that's wierd......

I'm with Sis, honesty is everything - with love!

(I wouldn't be able to rest until I found out what had happened!)

Tazman53

You know ghostgirl the more I think about it the more important I think it is for your sobriety and your sponsors as well to ask her about it, nicely and honestly of course, but sponsors are not perfect either! I remind myself of that constantly working with my sponsee and actually caught myself and immediately corrected myself blowing a little smoke up his rear.

Was what I was BSing him about important? Absolutely not, but I know that brutal honesty is what got me and keeps me sober, honesty is mentioned tons of times in the BB, heck it is mentioned 2 times in the first paragraph of "How it works". Some folks would not have even considered what I said to be a lie, they would have called it an exageration, which to this old goat is still a lie.

leeside

I think putting it back together isnt something an adult would normally do. It is something a kid would do. Kids have been known to cover up or "not rat out" a friend (and think it is the honorable thing to do).

Peter

Good point lee.

fraankie

can't hurt to ask
but
this is a let go type of thing
was it really expensive or a yard sale item
anyway,
this a whodunit?

i kinda of do the oj thing with this type of stuff
i wasn't there
i didn't see it
and
i'm not the judge

curious
could it have been broken for a while
someone else pieced it together
coincidence you noticed it the day after your sponsor was there

think about it
this is not a brink's job
why cover it up

i would have mentioned it
and
offered to pay a reasonable amount
but
you can't expect others to do what you want
so
possibility sponsor was embarrassed, a bit scared, awkward about it
but
is it a crime
does it deserve punishment?
etc
lol



best
fraankie

ghostgirl

hey there fraankie... yeah, its not anything that is at all pricey... very small, worth maybe a dollar! the only thing that bothered me was that it was put back together... most likely the daughter did it, i just don't know how she could have and no one saw her. well, i'm over it... i just hope it wasn't the sponsor (the only one alone in the room...)

and i know kids don't like to rat their friends out, but if my little saw her do it, i'm sure she would have told me.

oh well.

thanks for all the advice.

BigSis

Ghostgirl... perhaps it is not a "biggy", but it would weigh on me over time, and eventually work its way into the trust I NEED to have with my sponsor.

You can bring it up as a program thing... asking her about this is HARD - and you can tell her that it is hard for you to ask. But if she has been a sponsor and in program - she KNOWS how important it is for you to know, in your heart, whether you can trust her.

I hate secrets.... even the little ones. I wish you the best. ((hugs))

care4uNJ

One might consider this an integrity issue. Afterall, you are basically putting a great deal of trust into this woman and to even second guess that there are integrity issues could be disconcerning. But then again, sometimes people find themselves in particular situations where they have a lapse in judgment. I would love to say that if that was me, I would immediately tell you that I was touching your stuff while you were out of the room and broke it. BUT... who knows? Luckily for me I never was put in that position. She is somewhat of an 'authority' figure to you and perhaps she was just incredibly embarrassed by the entire thing (if it was indeed her).

Ask yourself this -- if you do find out it was her, does it make a difference? Does it make her any less of a sponsor to you? Is it a deal-breaker? Jo

GlassPrisoner

Quick gang, to the Mystery Machine !!!!!

(sorry, I'm silly tonight)

OK, answer the question.

care4yNJ, exactly. Does it matter ? I was griping about a friend or daughter once. My sponsor said "Do you love them ?" I said Yes.......He said "Does it really matter ?, I said No, 'but'.......He replied "then it's just bulls**t. Let it go"

Tazman53

GP are you sure we do not have the same sponsor? LOL

ghostgirl

yeah, its starting to weigh on me, actually. my trust in people is extremely fragile. i don't even feel like talking to her.

ghostgirl

not sure how to address it with her... hey did your kid break that? did you? i know most folks would say its really silly... i really don't want her kid to get into trouble, though.

i guess i could just assume it was her daughter, except i know that if my girl saw her do it she would just tell me... she is that way. its stupid, because i don't give a rats a** about the candle holder, just is odd and my sponsor is the only person who was alone in the room for any time...

and yeah, it would make a difference to me if someone who was supposed to help me through my disease can't be honest about something so damn little. like i said, my trust in others is very fragile.

care4uNJ

Ok, so this is clearly a deal breaker. With that said, there's nothing wrong with pursuing another sponsor. It's your recovery and you need a sponsor that you can trust. You don't even need to give her a reason why you would prefer another sponsor. I'm sure that happens all the time. Simply thank her for all she has done for you thusfar and move on.

barb dwyer

best I can tell ... her daughter isn't in the program ....
I've seen it a good bit.
She just gets dragged along to stuff like that, you know?
She ... isn't In a 'program of rigorous honesty' ...
she's just a kid.

We all probably remember what creeps THEY can be...

*shrug*