Jeni26

I'm not sure anyone else can relate to this, but I've always played a part, I'm a total actress in my real life.

Easy going, good natured, everyone's friend. Only one of my close friends knows I'm even an alcoholic, and she doesn't really get it because she isn't one. She and I have drifted apart a little because although she tries to be supportive, she has no real understanding of why I can't moderate my drinking. Not her fault.

SR up until now has been the only place I've been the real me. I can share my vulnerabilities here. Easy to do when you're faceless and anonymous. And I can log off if I don't like a response!

I've been in AA for over a year now, but I've hidden the real me even from my fellow alcoholics.

I go to meetings, I help other alcoholics, I share the mundane. I work the steps, I tell my sponsor the truth about me, at least how I understand it to be, but I'm not honest even with her about my feelings. Because I guess I've never really understood them or acknowledged that its ok to admit to not knowing myself.

But something's changed over the past few weeks. At my home group, I have begun to open up to them. I've shared my confusion and vulnerability. I've shown real emotion, and I never cry in front of others, but I've been on the verge of it a few times.

It feels like I'm really safe there, really cared for. I take a long time to trust anyone, but I am finally allowing people to see the 'real' me. Inside I have always felt like a child who is seeking approval, and the fear of getting it wrong has stopped me making progress.

I guess this feels like some sort of breakthrough. I'm not sure why. But unless I'm really honest, I know progress is superficial, and always will be.

CaiHong

Hi Jen,
Your post got me crying, not sure why but I think the bit about being who you really are, vulnerable and unsure. I really felt that.

love
CaiHong

artsoul

I think it's great that you feel like you can share more. That's one thing that I love about AA (I always thought that's the way church should be, too!) Society doesn't really encourage us to be honest a lot of the time, but it's so freeing when we find out we all have the same fears and hopes.

Good post!

LDT

Jeni.

Hollyanne

Great post.
I am trying to loose the bull''''.
A lifetime of "playing" is hard to change.

paul99

Loved your post, Jeni. I can identify as well - a whole lifetime of not trusting others can do that...I couldn't just open up right away. Just because I stopped drinking didn't mean I stopped my ways of thinking right away. It's taken me time to really open up at meetings, and sometimes i wonder if I am still holding back...if I am giving the version of me I think they want, or am I giving them the real deal. The crux to this of course is that I never knew who the real me was...so I couldn't say because I didn't know who the real me was. The more I find out, and the more I search and seek, the more I reveal to others.

I can't disclose what I don't know or have.

And it sounds like you're opening up at a time you're finding your true self, through AA and your Higher Power.

Wonderful.

HappyDestiny3

All I can say, is beautiful Jeni..

Keep going and growing, and as it is promised we will be rocketed into the 4th dimension. And we have no idea at this stage, of all the great growth will can have as long as we stay the course..

You are awesome..... Stay on the Beam..

newby1961

Great post and I too sure can relate to it. I think it is so cool when the walls start tumbling down kinda like the song. I hear at a meeting if you don't think you have the best AA group as your home-group you better continue to search.

Jeni26

Thankyou everyone.

I guess Veritas post about doing the 4th step inventory really got me thinking too, because I found it so difficult to write a list of resentments when I did mine.

I really didn't/don't think I have many at all. And that's despite a fair amount of crap being dished out to me by people I should have been able to trust in the past.

I guess that's because the real me, the hurt and frightened kid inside of me, has been buried. And I'm really uncomfortable with emotions, especially my own. Looking at resentments means looking within, and that means taking off that emotional overcoat of mine....The one that is labelled 'I'm ok', and that is quite a painful process for me.

I'm so grateful to have found AA. I think the real process of change has only just started for me.

It will be ok to learn who I am. And it's not going to be dependent on what I think others need me to be. It's quite scary you know? But it is the only way forward.

Thanks everyone. That's more or less what I shared last night at my meeting. Xxx