hadenoughnow

I read so much about the spouse's or SO's role in this disease that I really do not buy into. My experience is that my behavior (ie detaching or raging or anything else short of leaving for good) has very little short term and 0 long term effect on the progression of the disease or the A's behavior. For years I neither enabled (doing only what is legally required as a spouse) nor raged and he still drank. I asked him if he wanted help and, now he is angry that he is "officially" an A (because an SA counselor and his Dr. told him he is). Nothing short of leaving him is going to improve mine or our son's life. It seems to me that recovery and support systems are all geared to the benefit of the A, not us. This board is extremely enlightened and helpful but I read things elsewhere that disturb me. I wish someone, anyone had told me about the 3C's and said "nothing you say or do is going to make one bit of difference, get out and save yourself".

freya

What I hear in your post is that, in your mind, it is still all revolving around the alcoholic and how to best get him/her to change. If that's the case, then perhaps you've missed the most very basic point of any recovery program -- whether it be for the addict or for those who have been affected by his/her disease: Whatever program of recovery you are looking at or thinking about, it has to be about you.

My personal understanding of what Al Anon "recovery philosophy" says and how it works me is:

1) I did not cause the alcoholism, I can't cure it, and I can't control it. If my thinking, my sub-conscious assumptions, or my behavior is in anyway inconsistent with these basic truths, then I am deluding myself and I am feeding into the family disease of alcoholism......(which is not at all the same as saying that I am making the alcoholic drink or act out!!!)

2) The A drinks (or drugs or whatever the h*ll s/he does) because s/he is an A -- not because of anything I say or do or do not say or do not do.

3) There is nothing I can do or say to control the A's behavior -- around drinking or anything else.

4) I need to accept that the A is what/who s/he is and does / is going to do what s/he does.

5) Based on the above knowledge and acceptance, I make the choices I need to make to take care of myself (and any true dependents for whom I truly do have some measure of responsibility).

6) If I find that I am in any way, shape, or form, however subtle, making my choices -- whatever choices I make - with the hope, the goal, the fantasy, that I am going to somehow influence the A to behave the way that I want/think s/he should be behaving, then I am acting manipulatively and disrespectfully of him/her, and I am feeding into the disease and I am setting myself up for more pain and disappointment.

AL Anon "recovery philosophy" does not say we detach and stop enabling because it is a better, more effective way to get the A to change -- it says we stop because that is the way to a good, healthy, sane, fulfilling life for us -- regardless of what the alcoholic does or doesn't do.

You wrote: "Nothing short of leaving him is going to improve mine or our son's life."

If you know this in your heart and soul with as much certainty as you've stated it here, then you know what you need to do to take care of yourself. If you decide to do it, do it for that reason (i.e. to take care of yourself and your son) and for that reason alone. That is what recovery is all about.

freya

hadenoughnow

I totally agree, my disagreement is with the POV that my recovery will lead the A to recovery.

DesertEyes

I can only share my own experience, so take what works for you and disregard the rest.

My _lack_ of recovery made an enabler out of me. In turn, my enabling protected my ex-wife from the consequences of her actions. I know today that my _lack_ of recovery had a big part in _blocking_ my ex-wife from ever seeing the need for her own recovery. Basically, I was building up her denial.

My being in recovery does _not_ lead my ex-wife to her own recovery. What my recovery does is take away a big source of denial for her and increases the posibility that she may seek recovery some day. It's kinda the opposite of the Berlin wall:

If enough enablers stop building up the wall of denial, someday the wall will come down.

I have stopped being one of her enablers. I pray that some day she find her own recovery, by whatever means.

Mike

hadenoughnow

I see your point, but there is a lot of contradicting information and not enough real statistical data or societal awareness.

guineapigjude

I know what you mean, because a lot of stuff out there is written in a way that can be misconstrued as blaming the enabler. Personally, I've felt so much guilt that I failed, even though I intellectually "get" the 3 c's. I'm now coming to grips with the fact that the only person I had the power to fail was myself (which I did), and by enabling, hiding, pretending, denying and all that, I became part of the problem, not the solution. That being said, he will be who he is, with or without me ... but I can choose to be truthful and no longer provide him a hiding place.

DesertEyes

Goodness yes!! That's why al-anon takes such a strong stand about protecting their copyrights and name. They want to make sure that a _unified_ message gets presented, instead of a zillion contradictory messages.

That's also why they suggest that a newcomer try _at least_ six _differet_ meetings, to make sure they get a broad perspective.

Mike

freya

I'm not sure what societal awareness has to do with your own behavior and your own recovery and your own choices. If you are waiting for some kind of absolute proof/guarantee/agreement that if you do X, then Y will be the result, you could very easily be stuck where you are right now forever. People and human relationships are complicated, and, from what I've seen, I would have to say that even if every single spouse-of-an-addict had done X and Y was the result, that would not guarantee that it was going to work that way in your specific case.

Understanding things intellectually/rationally is great, but there are some things we are never going to understand and some things we will not understand until we have walked through them to the other side -- and even then, in many cases, the way we "understand" them will not be subject to objective proof or to rational explanation . Personally, I don't like that very much...but I do accept it and I try to work with it rather than against it.....mainly because insisting on understanding everything has caused me to stay stuck in a lot or painful places in the past and I've come to the point in my life where avoiding unnecessary pain is more important to me than understanding.

freya

LaTeeDa

I so agree with you, Freya. I do think society is messed up and there is not enough awareness--of anything. But, the only thing I can do to change it is to become more aware myself. And if enough of us become self-aware, society as a whole can in fact, change as a result.

I also believe that there is more than one type of understanding. You can understand something in your brain, but not in your soul. And vice versa. I spent way too many years of my life doing what I perceived to be the "right" thing, only because odds and statistics seemed to show that it made sense. I lost my true, authentic self somewhere along the way.

Recovery for me has been more self-discovery than anything. I'm not exactly sure when it happened, but it stopped being about having been in a dysfunctional relationship with an alcoholic. It's about having been in a dysfunctional relationship with myself most of my life, and how to go about righting that in this lifetime.

L