First Post/Introduction
Member
Thread Starter
Join Date: Apr 2016
Posts: 229
First Post/Introduction
Hello fellow SR community members,
This is my first post and so I apologize if it’s a little bit long. But at last, after nearly nine tumultuous months, I feel like I have finally found a place where people are going to not only understand what I’m going through, but will be able to help offer me practical advice based on their own experiences. So thank you in advance for that. You have no idea the relief I felt (or maybe you do), when I stumbled into this place.
In June of last year, I accepted a new job with a company located on the opposite side of the country from me. It was in a state and a city that I never imagined myself living in, but the company made me an offer I couldn’t refuse and my husband at the time thought it would be a wonderful opportunity both of us. We had been struggling with intimacy issues for over six years (during which time we were in therapy, though it really was more about him being in therapy as they always told me they needed to see him and would call me in as needed). In those six years our communication skills improved (his especially) but the intimacy issues never got any better.
The plan was for me to commute to the new job for the first couple of months while we tried to sell our home (some weeks I came back every weekend, others, I’d go two weeks in between trips home). When I arrived in the new city I knew no one. But I remembered that an old school sweetheart and friend of mine and his family lived there and so I set about trying to reconnect with them. The last I knew, he was married with three children, and I was excited about the possibility of meeting them, seeing his folks and his siblings (and their families), etc. Thanks to the “miracle” of social media it wasn’t hard to find him. We clicked immediately – it was as if no time had passed at all – and I was so relieve to have someone in the city that I knew. Sadly, I found out that he and his wife had divorced (it was multi-year process that had just been finalized earlier that month), but they’d been separated for over three years. As we talked we realized that we needed to get together for an in person catch-up and I was so excited to reconnect with him.
My husband, at that point in time, was still looking for work our new city and was planning to move to be with me, etc. but I couldn’t help but feel my leaving has put this distance between us that really didn’t make either of us all that sad. I began to wonder if a separation wasn’t imminent for us, as well.
When I finally met up with my old friend, it was like a homecoming. Seeing his smile and his face; hearing his voice and his laugh all brought back so many happy memories. He was my first boyfriend in the sixth grade. I’d had a crush on him long after we’d “broken up” and we remained friends through our sophomore year in high school when our parents were forced to move because the military installation we were stationed at was closing. We lost touch until 2001 when I (pre-Facebook!) tracked down over 200 alumni, school administrators and teachers and put together a reunion. Even back then there was chemistry between us. But shortly after he’d returned home he met the woman who was now his ex-wife, had his children, etc. and it clearly wasn’t meant to be. (Though I’ll tell you, he was forever on my mind, and I couldn’t explain it. I’d have the most vivid dreams about him long after that 2001 reunion. I remember one so vivid that I woke up, sat up bolt right in bed and said out loud, to myself, “What are you trying to tell me?!”)
I tell you all of this to set the stage. You can see how even before we reconnected in person I was still carrying deep, emotional feelings for this person. Because of history, what could have been … all of it.
The first evening I went to his place, it was obvious he’d lost everything in his divorce. He was living in a pretty rundown apartment complex with questionable neighbors to say the least. Most of them I would later find were selling or doing drugs (prescription and illegal) and the majority weren’t working. At least he was working. And his apartment was nice. It was clean, decorated well, he had an adorable loving cat and it seemed he took great pride he what he’d managed to maintain. We spent hours catching up that first night. Looking at old year books from our time together as well as the time we spent apart, and his story slowly began to unfold. The other thing I remember about that night was how much he seemed to be drinking. But I thought it was my imagination. I swore he’d had a beer… and then then next thing I knew that beer was still there but the bottle seemed more full. And that happened a couple of times. Then after dinner he opened a bottle of sweet red wine. I’m not much of a drinker but I had about three quarters of my glass before he refilled it and I didn’t drink any more. He finished the bottle and then finished mine. So my antenna were up, but he seemed totally coherent and I wondered if he was just enjoying himself and it was nothing more than that.
Over the next couple of weeks, we continued to talk and I found out that he was an alcoholic. He’d been through an in-patient rehab program that lasted three months and drank less than 48 hours after being released. He was advised to move in with his parents and get away from his wife but he wanted to make things right between them and went back to her, where their volatile relationship continued. He’d driven a car into a retention pond, been arrested for a DUI, and, most damning, had broken the rule of a child custody agreement when he had a beer while the children were at his place about a month before I met him. He already had a court-ordered alcohol monitoring device in the car (though he knew how to play/beat the system, but when his oldest (a teen) called their mother to come pick them up because their dad was drinking he got into a scuffle with his ex-wife’s boyfriend and he lost the rights to see his kids until they could work out some kind of supervised visitation schedule. Originally his parents had said he could visit the children at their place, but it turns out they changed their minds. And I discovered that he wasn’t speaking his family, had no friends and was basically going to work, and coming home to drink every night until I entered the picture. He definitely didn’t drink as much when I was around and sometimes went a full day without a drink, but more and more details emerged of a very broken individual who’d experimented with drugs in college and had been drinking since I had known him in junior high. That shocked the heck out of me. But then I also learned that alcoholism runs in his family and just about everyone has been affected by it in some way, including his siblings and parents.
While I was learning all of this, my marriage finally hit the skids for good and my husband and I decided a separation made sense since I was half way across the country. I was devastated, yet relieved at the same time, and it gave me the freedom to become physical with the man I will now refer to as my ABF. I knew I couldn’t fix ABF’s alcohol problems, but I hoped that I would give him a reason to consider getting his life on track again and I genuinely loved and cared for him. And he definitely did better when I was around. Of course, what was really happening was we’d developed a full blown codependent relationship. I hadn’t been with a man who’d been interested in my physically for the better part of my nine year marriage, and here was a man who seemed love me, made me feel special and wanted to be with me. Plus there was all of that emotional history. He had no one and nothing. And so I was on the road to becoming a full blown codie.
Around this time ABF lost his job. I can’t prove it, but he made a very poor decision (I believe because of impaired cognitive function) and the company had no choice but to fire him. That was the first time I saw him on a binge. But it certainly wouldn’t be the last. He had left a bunch of stuff at my hotel because he was staying a night here and there and I couldn’t reach him to save my soul. I called and called and got no answer. He wouldn’t let me come and see him. “You have your s%$*,” he would say, “and I have mine. Take care of yourself.” But I’m a fixer. I’ve always been a fixer. And I could see he was suffering, he had nowhere to turn, he had become my “rock” (yeah, right!) and now he had no money. What was he going to do? He’d mentioned suicide in the past and I was so worried. I drove out to his place, hoping for the best.
I found a broken man, sobbing … the first of many of these episodes to come. And I was planning to stay at his place with him that night. But he asked if we could get out of the dump he lived in and I happily obliged. I helped him pack a few things and took him back, broken, and under my wing. What happened in the following weeks/months would take another six pages to type out. But here’s the gist: I bought him a $200 netbook so he could get online at the hotel or at the library and look for work, he filed for unemployment (which he was ultimately denied because he was fired for cause) and an amended child support agreement, and I (or rather my company) paid for our food and essentials while I was there. He had enough money to get through about a month and a half and still make his child support payments, cover rent, cell phone, and electric. “Okay,” I told him, “as long as I’m here and you’re working to get on your feet, you’ll stay with me so I can make sure you’re safe and hopefully you can get a job sooner versus later.”
Meanwhile, my new job was NOT was it was cracked up to be. And the stress of my dissolving marriage and ABF’s drinking, job loss, etc. certainly didn’t help me settle in. I also hated the city. It was sprawling, there was nothing to do, work was dysfunctional and eventually it came out that they had no funds to pay for the work I was actually hired to do. I would leave work at 2 p.m. in the afternoon because everyone was gone. Some days I’d get back to the hotel and ABF would be gone. Others he was sitting in front of the TV, having had a drink (or drinks) – which HE was paying for btw – and smoking cigarettes (another habit that I hate). Not the best use of what money remained either. When I would go home for the weekends he’d fall apart and I’d spend hours on the phone with him, frustrating my separated husband even more, making me think I should be back with ABF. It was a constant push and pull and I was slowly unraveling without even realizing it.
ABF twice got so wasted I had to get us back to the hotel from a place I was completely unfamiliar with. Once at the bar when telling me he was going to the rest room. I paid $60 for a meal that neither of us ate. He couldn’t walk down the stairs to leave the restaurant and I had to try to find the car in this place I didn’t know and get us back to the hotel. He wandered outside and passed out by the pool. I couldn’t find him for almost an hour and was completely freaked out. Of course, he remembers none of this. I don’t know why but I still thought I could help. And he was my old boyfriend. This was love reunited. We were meant to be together, right?!
He didn’t want to take the money, but I insisted on paying his rent, cell phone, and electric bills and doing some grocery shopping for him for about three months. I tried very hard not to give him cash so he couldn’t use it on booze and cigarettes. I’d pay the bills directly myself or buy the items he needed. But he still needed a little for gas for his car, etc. and I know where most of that went. I justified it by saying that I wasn’t paying for anything anyway, because the company was covering everything and I was making a ridiculous salary. If it would help him get his life together it was worth it.
I heard a couple of conversations between him and his parents and they were AWFUL. Even when he had week-long stretches of sobriety they talked to him like he was a messed up piece of you-know-what. I got it. I understood his choices had destroyed his family. But I felt like there was a way to help someone, even if detached, with love and without being a total jerk about it.
I think in my gut I knew all of this was wrong and I decided to resign from the job that was falling apart; to come back home and see if maybe my now XH and I could work it out…and get away from the ABF. But as soon as I did it, I knew that was wrong too. ABF was the only one who’d shown me any love, despite his alcoholism, and I felt so alone; so desperate. I knew I wasn’t going to be able to save the marriage. I couldn’t imagine my life without ABF in our hotel room, holed up together “playing house,” being held, feeling like I mattered. Like I said I was a full-blown codie (we both were) all the way… (This was despite the fact that he was hiding fifths of vodka in the trees outside our hotel room, etc. btw!) But it was hard. Initially at least, I couldn’t always tell when he was sober enough to remember our conversations and when he was too drunk to remember anything. Much later I found out that many of the happy times I thought we had together he didn’t remember at all. That was devastating.
When I got back home I felt like I’d made an equally huge mistake. It was obvious my XH and I were not going to get back together, and I was away from ABF. I missed him horribly. We’d Facetime each other and talk on the phone and cry for hours. Sometimes he was drunk and sometimes he was sober. I started another job but couldn’t concentrate because all I could think of was him. I felt like he was for me like alcohol was for him. He’d become my drug. I started exploring other jobs back where he lived. I paid for a plane ticket for him to come and visit me one weekend here, and one weekend, on a whim, I used air miles four hours before the flight was due to take off to go and visit him for a weekend because I was so desperate and depressed and miss him so much. I was smart enough to start seeing someone from the EAP program at work who quickly diagnosed me with situational depression – a situation which only got worse when I came back from my impromptu visit and found out that my now XH had been cheating on me since November of 2014. Well before I started looking for another job or anything else. In fact, the day after I started my job in ABF’s hometown, XH sent a picture of his “junk” to a mutual friend on Facebook which I discovered after he forgot to log off the computer the day I returned from visiting ABF that spontaneous weekend. I was crushed. No wonder there’d been no intimacy in our relationship and therapy wasn’t working! XH was lying to me, to our therapist, to himself…to everyone. It was awful. I met with a lawyer and got the paperwork started for dissolution while trying to hold it together. I was missing, ABF, hating the job I’d taken back here. Oh, and my mother has stage IV cancer, btw. So, as an only child, I’m trying to support my parents through all of that, too. Yeah. I was depressed, alright.
ABF still couldn’t find work in his hometown, I was still paying for the rent, cell phone, electric, etc. (Enabling, I know…) and finally we decided we just couldn’t be apart. I was still living with XH in what was my house and was miserable. The economy is better here so I suggested he look for work with my old company, where I thought he would thrive. I paid for him to drive up for a job fair and interview and used the hotel points I’d earned over the summer to house us for a few days. He wanted a fresh start in a place where no one would know him, he could start going to AA meetings (so he said) and this would be it. To my surprise, he got the job. I reached out to a friend of mine who is a substance abuse counselor and who I’d talked to about the situation numerous times because her mother used to rent a room out of her home; I thought that might be a nice living option for him. Turns out the room wasn’t available, but my friend had a house she’d been unable to sell and was willing to give him the place including all utilities for a meager $400 a month through the spring while he got on his feet. Her son is a recovering heroin addict and her husband has some form of substance abuse issues of his own. So she understands better than anyone I’ve ever known. It was the “perfect” situation. ABF drove 13 hours from his hometown to mine on new tires that I paid for, and made his home in the house my friend rented him. This was right before Thanksgiving.
I was still seeing my therapist and couldn’t leave the house XH and I shared because until I got a new job and could cover my own health insurance I couldn’t file the dissolution papers with the court. So when ABF moved here we started playing house in his home again. I was there every Friday – Sunday. Every night for dinner and until about 9 p.m. when I’d basically go home just to sleep. It was like picking up where we left off. The drinking seemed to have improved (though he was still drinking, he wasn’t getting “wasted”) and it seemed like we might be on to something. Sure it did…
I invited him to my parent’s for Thanksgiving. I knew it would be hard for him being away from his kids for the first time and my parents weren’t exactly thrilled about any of this (most of which I had been honest with them about to be fair… some things I just left out … but they knew what was going on). The first day we were there he wasn’t very social which bothered them. He’d met my parents when we were kids, obviously, and had a real connection with my mom because she worked in our school. He’d wept when he told me what he imagined it would be like seeing her again for the first time. So when he barely said two words to her, I was perplexed. Now, while ABF has alcohol issues, I’ve never seen him take pills. That said, I take klonopin to sleep for a neurological disorder I suffer from and I’d always kept it hidden…just in case. You know where this is going, don’t you? I left it out for some reason at my parents. (I guess I thought, “He wouldn’t do that while he’s here with them out of respect!”) I swore I caught him out of the corner of my eye taking something but then dismissed it. Until about an hour later when he was practically comatose. It turns out he took 4 of my 2mg klonopin. And he didn’t even know what they were. He didn’t care. He just wanted to “escape.” It was a move that endangered us both – him taking something when he didn’t even know what it was and taking something that is a controlled substance that I can’t just not take for fear of withdrawal seizures, etc. Just no regard for any consequence at all. All of this on Thanksgiving in my parent’s house. It was awful. My mother cried, “This could be my last Thanksgiving and this is what we have to deal with? What if something happens to him in our home?!” I felt horrible. My mother was angry. I was angry and upset. ABF was more or less comatose for the next 48 hours. I should have ended things then. But of course I didn’t. Our codie ways continued. He started training for his new job, I stayed at his place… Eventually one night while XH was out of town and he stayed at my house he stole alcohol from my XH. That was great…explaining that one. He left the house, of course, and we did our usual song and dance.
Eventually I landed a job with benefits of my own and filed the dissolution paperwork with the courts. My XH and I had a court date set for February 1 and I started looking for a place of my own. I knew I couldn’t involve ABF. I shopped for furniture, cried over the loss of my marriage (despite being cheated on), signed a lease, started my new job and at the end of February moved into my new place all without the assistance of ABF. The one thing I have known from the beginning: I will NEVER let ABF move into my place (nor will I move into his). It’s been one thing to stay with one another because there’s always a place of refuge (our own homes). But the moment we would move in together? It would be over.
In the months leading up to this, of course, ABF continued to drink (many times hiding – or trying to hide – it from me). I’d show up at his place and he’d be wasted. We’d make plans to do something and he’d be so drunk we’d just sit there with me feeling sad and him being a sloppy drunk. (I will say this: thank goodness his is not a physical or violent drunk. If anything, he opens up more; becomes very loving, teary, etc. That said, he still says mean things that hurt my feelings. He calls me a liar all of the time which irks me more than it should, since I know I’m not lying about anything. I have two cats who I adore and have been my support system through this hell and his tells me they’re too thin and one of them is a “d^%$” or an “a$$h)&^” he uses a derogatory term for people of African American descent. He comes across as uneducated and callous and he makes me HATE being with him.
I should mention that since he’s moved here, suddenly his family is back in his life. His parents talk to him at least weekly, he’s talking some to his XW and his youngest child (the other two still refuse to speak with him after what happened last May … they’re old enough to really understand).
He’s never attend an AA meeting despite saying one of his goals was to get sober. I cut him off financially as soon as I got him moved into his place. I got him set up and stepped away as soon as his first paycheck came in. When we’d stay together we’d take turn buying the food for meals, etc. and I was fine with that. He’s still using my Netflix account, which seems super minor in the grand scheme of things, though he should have had at least $600 left over since he never paid his November rent when he moved and somehow that was all gone.
He tells me that he doesn’t like coming over to my place now. I live in a gated apartment community where you have to be buzzed into the building and the keys cannot be replicated. It’s also a non-smoking community. He thinks it’s pretentious. I feel like I’ve lost everything and to have a nice place where I don’t feel like I’m walking on eggshells and I’m safe is good for me. He gets pissed off at me because I expect him to treat my new things with respect (I had to buy new furniture when I moved out, some linens, etc.).
I started therapy again a couple of weeks ago because I’m dealing with my mom’s cancer which is worsening, a job I still hate, the loss of my husband and my friends (who mostly worked at the place I left when this whole mess started). I’m GRIEVING. And I’m dealing with ABF and trying to learn how to detach now that I no longer (for the most part…I still have my moments) need him. I am minimally co-dependent at this point. He, on the other hand still needs me. I may be lonely from time to time, yes. But I have my own space. I’m not walking on eggshells around him or my XH. I have a sanctuary. So when ABF comes over and sticks his stinky feet on my new $80 throw pillows that came with my sofa. Or wipes his toothpaste covered mouth on my clean BATH towel, I get a little ticked off. To me it’s a lack of respect. He says crap like, “why do you care? You don’t own this place. It’s just a stupid apartment.” But for as long as I’m there, it IS my place. I paid to have it painted. I bought new blackout shades for the bedrooms, etc. It’s mine. And when I feel like I’ve lost everything else in my life, the cats and the apartment are all I have.
Needless to say, we’ve begun to argue. About four weeks ago I wrote him a letter and told him that I love him, but I need to work on healing myself and I can’t be responsible for him. That I need stability in my life and he can’t provide that for me. And I made it VERY clear (because there is a chance he will lose this place he’s been renting … and I’ve been encouraging him to start looking for a room to rent for about three months now…) that we will never live together because we both need to learn how to live responsibly on our own. It hit him hard and we haven’t been the same since (not to say that we were exactly “good” before!) But I spelled out (on paper) that we can either find a way to stay in each others lives with respectable boundaries, or we can go our separate ways. He’s financially irresponsible and owes thousands of dollars to the government and the college he attended and never graduated from. He’s almost always late with his bills, and drinks and smokes everything away. Why would I want that?! We’ve been working on honesty and I asked him to tell me honestly if he was going to take a drink/right after he takes his first one, so that I don’t come over and have to deal with him, don’t have to pick up the phone and take his calls, etc. He said he would. But that’s slipped a bit in the last few days, which have been tumultuous to say the least. (Not that ALL of this hasn’t been!)
Over the weekend, after his comment about me being “F-ing OCD about everything” and me asking why he wiped his mouth on my clean bath towel, he left my apartment without saying a word (real mature) and I tried to call him. When he wouldn’t answer, I sent him a text that said, “That was mature.” And then I said, “I think we’re done. I’m not playing these games anymore.” He texted back, “Wow. That’s just great, jenniferlynne.” And I should have just let it go. Being with him is exhausting me. I NEED to detach (and it doesn’t come easily for me, because I care about people and doing things the nice way). But he’s keeping me from healing from my divorce, my mom’s illness, and the job changes and moves, and everything going on in my life by adding unnecessary drama. And I can’t deal with just leaving things along. So of course I tried to get him to see me and to talk (which was stupid because he was already drinking by then). And I went to his place (which I swore I’d stop doing…) and sat there and took the same drunk verbal abuse and guilt he’s been putting me through. Then Sunday we agreed we could’ve handled things better and we said we’d have dinner on Monday, maybe he’d stay the night, etc. But Mondays are his days off. And you know what idle time means for an alcoholic, right? I almost would’ve bet my life savings on the fact that he wouldn’t make it through the day yesterday. And I was right. His texts to me became more sporadic throughout the day and I called him to tell him I was on my way home and he didn’t answer…because he’d taken a drink. I shouldn’t have stayed on the phone with him for the hour I did, but the conversation wasn’t bad (because he hadn’t had much to drink…yet) and I let him know I was prepared for it. I was disappointed but getting used to the situation. (It’s one of the reasons he’s yet to and will never meet any of my friends…because you never know what you’re going to get and I refuse to put myself or my friends in an embarrassing position). And I finally said I was letting him go because I needed to shower and get something to eat. And he wasn’t happy about that (he tends to try to keep me on the phone talking with him when he’s drinking which is stupid…he doesn’t even remember our conversations and it just eats my down/quiet time!). He said he’d drank everything he had and wouldn’t be drinking any more that night. That’s the ONLY reason I answered the phone when it rang around 8 p.m. last night. Ugh. I should’ve known. He was wasted. And he kept me going around in circles for an hour. The same stuff as always: why aren’t we like we used to be, your cats are jerks, I hate your place, why I am here (I always get the “I moved here for you!” guilt trip, but the truth is, I was only part of it, I always remind him…you also needed a freaking job!), and on. Eventually what he was saying didn’t make any sense at all and I told him so. He said something to the effect of “well, we should just get off the phone then.” And he hung up. Which I was SOOO relieved by. I don’t know why I’m afraid to do that, especially since he’s even admitted himself that he won’t remember the next day who did or said what! But I DO! And that’s the problem.
This morning I called him. I call him every morning to make sure he’s alive. It’s something I probably need to stop doing too. But it started when I was here and he was in his old home town and I needed to know that he was at least alive and made it through the night. I asked if he remembered any of our conversation last night. He didn’t. I told him I foolishly believed he’d had nothing left to drink when he told me that and going forward when he told me he’d had a drink I would no longer be taking his calls unless he texts me 911 or tells me its an emergency (which he wouldn’t do anyway to be honest). But I said, “I can’t keep doing this. I’ve told you that and I mean it. It’s exhausting and I let you take up two and a half hours of my evening last night when you don’t even remember a stitch of it.” He said he understood and didn’t blame me. That’s the other thing that kills me about him. He’s so self-aware! He knows I’m upset. He doesn’t even blame me for being upset when he’s sober.
And there’s still so much more. But this is the gist. How we got here. Where we are. And I need help. I won’t keep doing this. I looked into Al-Anon meetings locally but I have a really early work schedule (I have to be up at 5 a.m. and in bed by 9 p.m.) and the meetings around here don’t start until 7:30 or 8 p.m. most nights, so a friend of mine suggested I look for an online resource. And when I found this community last night I immediately registered and couldn’t wait to start talking. I have to start taking care of me. I need to learn to detach from him. I’m seeing my therapist and we’re working on some of this there, but as I shared, I have a lot of other stuff going on too. So please, feel free to share your experiences with me, offer feedback, etc. and I plan to jump right in. Because I’m tired of crying every day. I’m tired of being sad, and unlike ABF, I REFUSE to be a victim. It’s time to change. Thank you for reading…
This is my first post and so I apologize if it’s a little bit long. But at last, after nearly nine tumultuous months, I feel like I have finally found a place where people are going to not only understand what I’m going through, but will be able to help offer me practical advice based on their own experiences. So thank you in advance for that. You have no idea the relief I felt (or maybe you do), when I stumbled into this place.
In June of last year, I accepted a new job with a company located on the opposite side of the country from me. It was in a state and a city that I never imagined myself living in, but the company made me an offer I couldn’t refuse and my husband at the time thought it would be a wonderful opportunity both of us. We had been struggling with intimacy issues for over six years (during which time we were in therapy, though it really was more about him being in therapy as they always told me they needed to see him and would call me in as needed). In those six years our communication skills improved (his especially) but the intimacy issues never got any better.
The plan was for me to commute to the new job for the first couple of months while we tried to sell our home (some weeks I came back every weekend, others, I’d go two weeks in between trips home). When I arrived in the new city I knew no one. But I remembered that an old school sweetheart and friend of mine and his family lived there and so I set about trying to reconnect with them. The last I knew, he was married with three children, and I was excited about the possibility of meeting them, seeing his folks and his siblings (and their families), etc. Thanks to the “miracle” of social media it wasn’t hard to find him. We clicked immediately – it was as if no time had passed at all – and I was so relieve to have someone in the city that I knew. Sadly, I found out that he and his wife had divorced (it was multi-year process that had just been finalized earlier that month), but they’d been separated for over three years. As we talked we realized that we needed to get together for an in person catch-up and I was so excited to reconnect with him.
My husband, at that point in time, was still looking for work our new city and was planning to move to be with me, etc. but I couldn’t help but feel my leaving has put this distance between us that really didn’t make either of us all that sad. I began to wonder if a separation wasn’t imminent for us, as well.
When I finally met up with my old friend, it was like a homecoming. Seeing his smile and his face; hearing his voice and his laugh all brought back so many happy memories. He was my first boyfriend in the sixth grade. I’d had a crush on him long after we’d “broken up” and we remained friends through our sophomore year in high school when our parents were forced to move because the military installation we were stationed at was closing. We lost touch until 2001 when I (pre-Facebook!) tracked down over 200 alumni, school administrators and teachers and put together a reunion. Even back then there was chemistry between us. But shortly after he’d returned home he met the woman who was now his ex-wife, had his children, etc. and it clearly wasn’t meant to be. (Though I’ll tell you, he was forever on my mind, and I couldn’t explain it. I’d have the most vivid dreams about him long after that 2001 reunion. I remember one so vivid that I woke up, sat up bolt right in bed and said out loud, to myself, “What are you trying to tell me?!”)
I tell you all of this to set the stage. You can see how even before we reconnected in person I was still carrying deep, emotional feelings for this person. Because of history, what could have been … all of it.
The first evening I went to his place, it was obvious he’d lost everything in his divorce. He was living in a pretty rundown apartment complex with questionable neighbors to say the least. Most of them I would later find were selling or doing drugs (prescription and illegal) and the majority weren’t working. At least he was working. And his apartment was nice. It was clean, decorated well, he had an adorable loving cat and it seemed he took great pride he what he’d managed to maintain. We spent hours catching up that first night. Looking at old year books from our time together as well as the time we spent apart, and his story slowly began to unfold. The other thing I remember about that night was how much he seemed to be drinking. But I thought it was my imagination. I swore he’d had a beer… and then then next thing I knew that beer was still there but the bottle seemed more full. And that happened a couple of times. Then after dinner he opened a bottle of sweet red wine. I’m not much of a drinker but I had about three quarters of my glass before he refilled it and I didn’t drink any more. He finished the bottle and then finished mine. So my antenna were up, but he seemed totally coherent and I wondered if he was just enjoying himself and it was nothing more than that.
Over the next couple of weeks, we continued to talk and I found out that he was an alcoholic. He’d been through an in-patient rehab program that lasted three months and drank less than 48 hours after being released. He was advised to move in with his parents and get away from his wife but he wanted to make things right between them and went back to her, where their volatile relationship continued. He’d driven a car into a retention pond, been arrested for a DUI, and, most damning, had broken the rule of a child custody agreement when he had a beer while the children were at his place about a month before I met him. He already had a court-ordered alcohol monitoring device in the car (though he knew how to play/beat the system, but when his oldest (a teen) called their mother to come pick them up because their dad was drinking he got into a scuffle with his ex-wife’s boyfriend and he lost the rights to see his kids until they could work out some kind of supervised visitation schedule. Originally his parents had said he could visit the children at their place, but it turns out they changed their minds. And I discovered that he wasn’t speaking his family, had no friends and was basically going to work, and coming home to drink every night until I entered the picture. He definitely didn’t drink as much when I was around and sometimes went a full day without a drink, but more and more details emerged of a very broken individual who’d experimented with drugs in college and had been drinking since I had known him in junior high. That shocked the heck out of me. But then I also learned that alcoholism runs in his family and just about everyone has been affected by it in some way, including his siblings and parents.
While I was learning all of this, my marriage finally hit the skids for good and my husband and I decided a separation made sense since I was half way across the country. I was devastated, yet relieved at the same time, and it gave me the freedom to become physical with the man I will now refer to as my ABF. I knew I couldn’t fix ABF’s alcohol problems, but I hoped that I would give him a reason to consider getting his life on track again and I genuinely loved and cared for him. And he definitely did better when I was around. Of course, what was really happening was we’d developed a full blown codependent relationship. I hadn’t been with a man who’d been interested in my physically for the better part of my nine year marriage, and here was a man who seemed love me, made me feel special and wanted to be with me. Plus there was all of that emotional history. He had no one and nothing. And so I was on the road to becoming a full blown codie.
Around this time ABF lost his job. I can’t prove it, but he made a very poor decision (I believe because of impaired cognitive function) and the company had no choice but to fire him. That was the first time I saw him on a binge. But it certainly wouldn’t be the last. He had left a bunch of stuff at my hotel because he was staying a night here and there and I couldn’t reach him to save my soul. I called and called and got no answer. He wouldn’t let me come and see him. “You have your s%$*,” he would say, “and I have mine. Take care of yourself.” But I’m a fixer. I’ve always been a fixer. And I could see he was suffering, he had nowhere to turn, he had become my “rock” (yeah, right!) and now he had no money. What was he going to do? He’d mentioned suicide in the past and I was so worried. I drove out to his place, hoping for the best.
I found a broken man, sobbing … the first of many of these episodes to come. And I was planning to stay at his place with him that night. But he asked if we could get out of the dump he lived in and I happily obliged. I helped him pack a few things and took him back, broken, and under my wing. What happened in the following weeks/months would take another six pages to type out. But here’s the gist: I bought him a $200 netbook so he could get online at the hotel or at the library and look for work, he filed for unemployment (which he was ultimately denied because he was fired for cause) and an amended child support agreement, and I (or rather my company) paid for our food and essentials while I was there. He had enough money to get through about a month and a half and still make his child support payments, cover rent, cell phone, and electric. “Okay,” I told him, “as long as I’m here and you’re working to get on your feet, you’ll stay with me so I can make sure you’re safe and hopefully you can get a job sooner versus later.”
Meanwhile, my new job was NOT was it was cracked up to be. And the stress of my dissolving marriage and ABF’s drinking, job loss, etc. certainly didn’t help me settle in. I also hated the city. It was sprawling, there was nothing to do, work was dysfunctional and eventually it came out that they had no funds to pay for the work I was actually hired to do. I would leave work at 2 p.m. in the afternoon because everyone was gone. Some days I’d get back to the hotel and ABF would be gone. Others he was sitting in front of the TV, having had a drink (or drinks) – which HE was paying for btw – and smoking cigarettes (another habit that I hate). Not the best use of what money remained either. When I would go home for the weekends he’d fall apart and I’d spend hours on the phone with him, frustrating my separated husband even more, making me think I should be back with ABF. It was a constant push and pull and I was slowly unraveling without even realizing it.
ABF twice got so wasted I had to get us back to the hotel from a place I was completely unfamiliar with. Once at the bar when telling me he was going to the rest room. I paid $60 for a meal that neither of us ate. He couldn’t walk down the stairs to leave the restaurant and I had to try to find the car in this place I didn’t know and get us back to the hotel. He wandered outside and passed out by the pool. I couldn’t find him for almost an hour and was completely freaked out. Of course, he remembers none of this. I don’t know why but I still thought I could help. And he was my old boyfriend. This was love reunited. We were meant to be together, right?!
He didn’t want to take the money, but I insisted on paying his rent, cell phone, and electric bills and doing some grocery shopping for him for about three months. I tried very hard not to give him cash so he couldn’t use it on booze and cigarettes. I’d pay the bills directly myself or buy the items he needed. But he still needed a little for gas for his car, etc. and I know where most of that went. I justified it by saying that I wasn’t paying for anything anyway, because the company was covering everything and I was making a ridiculous salary. If it would help him get his life together it was worth it.
I heard a couple of conversations between him and his parents and they were AWFUL. Even when he had week-long stretches of sobriety they talked to him like he was a messed up piece of you-know-what. I got it. I understood his choices had destroyed his family. But I felt like there was a way to help someone, even if detached, with love and without being a total jerk about it.
I think in my gut I knew all of this was wrong and I decided to resign from the job that was falling apart; to come back home and see if maybe my now XH and I could work it out…and get away from the ABF. But as soon as I did it, I knew that was wrong too. ABF was the only one who’d shown me any love, despite his alcoholism, and I felt so alone; so desperate. I knew I wasn’t going to be able to save the marriage. I couldn’t imagine my life without ABF in our hotel room, holed up together “playing house,” being held, feeling like I mattered. Like I said I was a full-blown codie (we both were) all the way… (This was despite the fact that he was hiding fifths of vodka in the trees outside our hotel room, etc. btw!) But it was hard. Initially at least, I couldn’t always tell when he was sober enough to remember our conversations and when he was too drunk to remember anything. Much later I found out that many of the happy times I thought we had together he didn’t remember at all. That was devastating.
When I got back home I felt like I’d made an equally huge mistake. It was obvious my XH and I were not going to get back together, and I was away from ABF. I missed him horribly. We’d Facetime each other and talk on the phone and cry for hours. Sometimes he was drunk and sometimes he was sober. I started another job but couldn’t concentrate because all I could think of was him. I felt like he was for me like alcohol was for him. He’d become my drug. I started exploring other jobs back where he lived. I paid for a plane ticket for him to come and visit me one weekend here, and one weekend, on a whim, I used air miles four hours before the flight was due to take off to go and visit him for a weekend because I was so desperate and depressed and miss him so much. I was smart enough to start seeing someone from the EAP program at work who quickly diagnosed me with situational depression – a situation which only got worse when I came back from my impromptu visit and found out that my now XH had been cheating on me since November of 2014. Well before I started looking for another job or anything else. In fact, the day after I started my job in ABF’s hometown, XH sent a picture of his “junk” to a mutual friend on Facebook which I discovered after he forgot to log off the computer the day I returned from visiting ABF that spontaneous weekend. I was crushed. No wonder there’d been no intimacy in our relationship and therapy wasn’t working! XH was lying to me, to our therapist, to himself…to everyone. It was awful. I met with a lawyer and got the paperwork started for dissolution while trying to hold it together. I was missing, ABF, hating the job I’d taken back here. Oh, and my mother has stage IV cancer, btw. So, as an only child, I’m trying to support my parents through all of that, too. Yeah. I was depressed, alright.
ABF still couldn’t find work in his hometown, I was still paying for the rent, cell phone, electric, etc. (Enabling, I know…) and finally we decided we just couldn’t be apart. I was still living with XH in what was my house and was miserable. The economy is better here so I suggested he look for work with my old company, where I thought he would thrive. I paid for him to drive up for a job fair and interview and used the hotel points I’d earned over the summer to house us for a few days. He wanted a fresh start in a place where no one would know him, he could start going to AA meetings (so he said) and this would be it. To my surprise, he got the job. I reached out to a friend of mine who is a substance abuse counselor and who I’d talked to about the situation numerous times because her mother used to rent a room out of her home; I thought that might be a nice living option for him. Turns out the room wasn’t available, but my friend had a house she’d been unable to sell and was willing to give him the place including all utilities for a meager $400 a month through the spring while he got on his feet. Her son is a recovering heroin addict and her husband has some form of substance abuse issues of his own. So she understands better than anyone I’ve ever known. It was the “perfect” situation. ABF drove 13 hours from his hometown to mine on new tires that I paid for, and made his home in the house my friend rented him. This was right before Thanksgiving.
I was still seeing my therapist and couldn’t leave the house XH and I shared because until I got a new job and could cover my own health insurance I couldn’t file the dissolution papers with the court. So when ABF moved here we started playing house in his home again. I was there every Friday – Sunday. Every night for dinner and until about 9 p.m. when I’d basically go home just to sleep. It was like picking up where we left off. The drinking seemed to have improved (though he was still drinking, he wasn’t getting “wasted”) and it seemed like we might be on to something. Sure it did…
I invited him to my parent’s for Thanksgiving. I knew it would be hard for him being away from his kids for the first time and my parents weren’t exactly thrilled about any of this (most of which I had been honest with them about to be fair… some things I just left out … but they knew what was going on). The first day we were there he wasn’t very social which bothered them. He’d met my parents when we were kids, obviously, and had a real connection with my mom because she worked in our school. He’d wept when he told me what he imagined it would be like seeing her again for the first time. So when he barely said two words to her, I was perplexed. Now, while ABF has alcohol issues, I’ve never seen him take pills. That said, I take klonopin to sleep for a neurological disorder I suffer from and I’d always kept it hidden…just in case. You know where this is going, don’t you? I left it out for some reason at my parents. (I guess I thought, “He wouldn’t do that while he’s here with them out of respect!”) I swore I caught him out of the corner of my eye taking something but then dismissed it. Until about an hour later when he was practically comatose. It turns out he took 4 of my 2mg klonopin. And he didn’t even know what they were. He didn’t care. He just wanted to “escape.” It was a move that endangered us both – him taking something when he didn’t even know what it was and taking something that is a controlled substance that I can’t just not take for fear of withdrawal seizures, etc. Just no regard for any consequence at all. All of this on Thanksgiving in my parent’s house. It was awful. My mother cried, “This could be my last Thanksgiving and this is what we have to deal with? What if something happens to him in our home?!” I felt horrible. My mother was angry. I was angry and upset. ABF was more or less comatose for the next 48 hours. I should have ended things then. But of course I didn’t. Our codie ways continued. He started training for his new job, I stayed at his place… Eventually one night while XH was out of town and he stayed at my house he stole alcohol from my XH. That was great…explaining that one. He left the house, of course, and we did our usual song and dance.
Eventually I landed a job with benefits of my own and filed the dissolution paperwork with the courts. My XH and I had a court date set for February 1 and I started looking for a place of my own. I knew I couldn’t involve ABF. I shopped for furniture, cried over the loss of my marriage (despite being cheated on), signed a lease, started my new job and at the end of February moved into my new place all without the assistance of ABF. The one thing I have known from the beginning: I will NEVER let ABF move into my place (nor will I move into his). It’s been one thing to stay with one another because there’s always a place of refuge (our own homes). But the moment we would move in together? It would be over.
In the months leading up to this, of course, ABF continued to drink (many times hiding – or trying to hide – it from me). I’d show up at his place and he’d be wasted. We’d make plans to do something and he’d be so drunk we’d just sit there with me feeling sad and him being a sloppy drunk. (I will say this: thank goodness his is not a physical or violent drunk. If anything, he opens up more; becomes very loving, teary, etc. That said, he still says mean things that hurt my feelings. He calls me a liar all of the time which irks me more than it should, since I know I’m not lying about anything. I have two cats who I adore and have been my support system through this hell and his tells me they’re too thin and one of them is a “d^%$” or an “a$$h)&^” he uses a derogatory term for people of African American descent. He comes across as uneducated and callous and he makes me HATE being with him.
I should mention that since he’s moved here, suddenly his family is back in his life. His parents talk to him at least weekly, he’s talking some to his XW and his youngest child (the other two still refuse to speak with him after what happened last May … they’re old enough to really understand).
He’s never attend an AA meeting despite saying one of his goals was to get sober. I cut him off financially as soon as I got him moved into his place. I got him set up and stepped away as soon as his first paycheck came in. When we’d stay together we’d take turn buying the food for meals, etc. and I was fine with that. He’s still using my Netflix account, which seems super minor in the grand scheme of things, though he should have had at least $600 left over since he never paid his November rent when he moved and somehow that was all gone.
He tells me that he doesn’t like coming over to my place now. I live in a gated apartment community where you have to be buzzed into the building and the keys cannot be replicated. It’s also a non-smoking community. He thinks it’s pretentious. I feel like I’ve lost everything and to have a nice place where I don’t feel like I’m walking on eggshells and I’m safe is good for me. He gets pissed off at me because I expect him to treat my new things with respect (I had to buy new furniture when I moved out, some linens, etc.).
I started therapy again a couple of weeks ago because I’m dealing with my mom’s cancer which is worsening, a job I still hate, the loss of my husband and my friends (who mostly worked at the place I left when this whole mess started). I’m GRIEVING. And I’m dealing with ABF and trying to learn how to detach now that I no longer (for the most part…I still have my moments) need him. I am minimally co-dependent at this point. He, on the other hand still needs me. I may be lonely from time to time, yes. But I have my own space. I’m not walking on eggshells around him or my XH. I have a sanctuary. So when ABF comes over and sticks his stinky feet on my new $80 throw pillows that came with my sofa. Or wipes his toothpaste covered mouth on my clean BATH towel, I get a little ticked off. To me it’s a lack of respect. He says crap like, “why do you care? You don’t own this place. It’s just a stupid apartment.” But for as long as I’m there, it IS my place. I paid to have it painted. I bought new blackout shades for the bedrooms, etc. It’s mine. And when I feel like I’ve lost everything else in my life, the cats and the apartment are all I have.
Needless to say, we’ve begun to argue. About four weeks ago I wrote him a letter and told him that I love him, but I need to work on healing myself and I can’t be responsible for him. That I need stability in my life and he can’t provide that for me. And I made it VERY clear (because there is a chance he will lose this place he’s been renting … and I’ve been encouraging him to start looking for a room to rent for about three months now…) that we will never live together because we both need to learn how to live responsibly on our own. It hit him hard and we haven’t been the same since (not to say that we were exactly “good” before!) But I spelled out (on paper) that we can either find a way to stay in each others lives with respectable boundaries, or we can go our separate ways. He’s financially irresponsible and owes thousands of dollars to the government and the college he attended and never graduated from. He’s almost always late with his bills, and drinks and smokes everything away. Why would I want that?! We’ve been working on honesty and I asked him to tell me honestly if he was going to take a drink/right after he takes his first one, so that I don’t come over and have to deal with him, don’t have to pick up the phone and take his calls, etc. He said he would. But that’s slipped a bit in the last few days, which have been tumultuous to say the least. (Not that ALL of this hasn’t been!)
Over the weekend, after his comment about me being “F-ing OCD about everything” and me asking why he wiped his mouth on my clean bath towel, he left my apartment without saying a word (real mature) and I tried to call him. When he wouldn’t answer, I sent him a text that said, “That was mature.” And then I said, “I think we’re done. I’m not playing these games anymore.” He texted back, “Wow. That’s just great, jenniferlynne.” And I should have just let it go. Being with him is exhausting me. I NEED to detach (and it doesn’t come easily for me, because I care about people and doing things the nice way). But he’s keeping me from healing from my divorce, my mom’s illness, and the job changes and moves, and everything going on in my life by adding unnecessary drama. And I can’t deal with just leaving things along. So of course I tried to get him to see me and to talk (which was stupid because he was already drinking by then). And I went to his place (which I swore I’d stop doing…) and sat there and took the same drunk verbal abuse and guilt he’s been putting me through. Then Sunday we agreed we could’ve handled things better and we said we’d have dinner on Monday, maybe he’d stay the night, etc. But Mondays are his days off. And you know what idle time means for an alcoholic, right? I almost would’ve bet my life savings on the fact that he wouldn’t make it through the day yesterday. And I was right. His texts to me became more sporadic throughout the day and I called him to tell him I was on my way home and he didn’t answer…because he’d taken a drink. I shouldn’t have stayed on the phone with him for the hour I did, but the conversation wasn’t bad (because he hadn’t had much to drink…yet) and I let him know I was prepared for it. I was disappointed but getting used to the situation. (It’s one of the reasons he’s yet to and will never meet any of my friends…because you never know what you’re going to get and I refuse to put myself or my friends in an embarrassing position). And I finally said I was letting him go because I needed to shower and get something to eat. And he wasn’t happy about that (he tends to try to keep me on the phone talking with him when he’s drinking which is stupid…he doesn’t even remember our conversations and it just eats my down/quiet time!). He said he’d drank everything he had and wouldn’t be drinking any more that night. That’s the ONLY reason I answered the phone when it rang around 8 p.m. last night. Ugh. I should’ve known. He was wasted. And he kept me going around in circles for an hour. The same stuff as always: why aren’t we like we used to be, your cats are jerks, I hate your place, why I am here (I always get the “I moved here for you!” guilt trip, but the truth is, I was only part of it, I always remind him…you also needed a freaking job!), and on. Eventually what he was saying didn’t make any sense at all and I told him so. He said something to the effect of “well, we should just get off the phone then.” And he hung up. Which I was SOOO relieved by. I don’t know why I’m afraid to do that, especially since he’s even admitted himself that he won’t remember the next day who did or said what! But I DO! And that’s the problem.
This morning I called him. I call him every morning to make sure he’s alive. It’s something I probably need to stop doing too. But it started when I was here and he was in his old home town and I needed to know that he was at least alive and made it through the night. I asked if he remembered any of our conversation last night. He didn’t. I told him I foolishly believed he’d had nothing left to drink when he told me that and going forward when he told me he’d had a drink I would no longer be taking his calls unless he texts me 911 or tells me its an emergency (which he wouldn’t do anyway to be honest). But I said, “I can’t keep doing this. I’ve told you that and I mean it. It’s exhausting and I let you take up two and a half hours of my evening last night when you don’t even remember a stitch of it.” He said he understood and didn’t blame me. That’s the other thing that kills me about him. He’s so self-aware! He knows I’m upset. He doesn’t even blame me for being upset when he’s sober.
And there’s still so much more. But this is the gist. How we got here. Where we are. And I need help. I won’t keep doing this. I looked into Al-Anon meetings locally but I have a really early work schedule (I have to be up at 5 a.m. and in bed by 9 p.m.) and the meetings around here don’t start until 7:30 or 8 p.m. most nights, so a friend of mine suggested I look for an online resource. And when I found this community last night I immediately registered and couldn’t wait to start talking. I have to start taking care of me. I need to learn to detach from him. I’m seeing my therapist and we’re working on some of this there, but as I shared, I have a lot of other stuff going on too. So please, feel free to share your experiences with me, offer feedback, etc. and I plan to jump right in. Because I’m tired of crying every day. I’m tired of being sad, and unlike ABF, I REFUSE to be a victim. It’s time to change. Thank you for reading…
Member
Join Date: May 2012
Location: Florida
Posts: 6,780
WOW Jennifer, you have been holding onto all of that for a VERY long time, haven't you?!?? 
That's definitely a lot to take in all at once, but I think you're on the right path with your thinking about it all too - you've identified that the problem is so much more than just the qualifier in your life, it's about your own Codependency & how you can see that those habits are not serving your life in positive ways.
You have struck gold with this site in terms of shared experiences, there is an unbelievable amount of information in these forums. I'd start at the very top - literally, lol. The sticky threads at the top of this page represent our Greatest Hits - and are a great jumping off point for anyone new to this site or to recovery as a whole. There are a lot of great book recommendations in those threads, as well as the brave & powerful personal stories of other members.
The fact that you are here, searching for resources says a lot about how you're ready to move from Victim to Survivor mode. Welcome, stick around & keep sharing!!
That's definitely a lot to take in all at once, but I think you're on the right path with your thinking about it all too - you've identified that the problem is so much more than just the qualifier in your life, it's about your own Codependency & how you can see that those habits are not serving your life in positive ways.
You have struck gold with this site in terms of shared experiences, there is an unbelievable amount of information in these forums. I'd start at the very top - literally, lol. The sticky threads at the top of this page represent our Greatest Hits - and are a great jumping off point for anyone new to this site or to recovery as a whole. There are a lot of great book recommendations in those threads, as well as the brave & powerful personal stories of other members.
The fact that you are here, searching for resources says a lot about how you're ready to move from Victim to Survivor mode. Welcome, stick around & keep sharing!!
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Thread Starter
Join Date: Apr 2016
Posts: 229
Thank you so much FireSprite. I've definitely been holding all of this in for a long time. Certain aspects of it people understand and I've felt comfortable sharing. Others, not so much.
I started devouring the stickies and the stories last night when I found this site. Jotting down the names of books, nodding my head in agreement as I read something that would resonate with me.
I look forward to getting to know the folks in this community and to learning from and supporting one another. Trust me...I'm not going anywhere! :-)
I started devouring the stickies and the stories last night when I found this site. Jotting down the names of books, nodding my head in agreement as I read something that would resonate with me.
I look forward to getting to know the folks in this community and to learning from and supporting one another. Trust me...I'm not going anywhere! :-)
Member
Join Date: May 2012
Location: Florida
Posts: 6,780
Originally Posted by jenniferlynne76 
Certain aspects of it people understand and I've felt comfortable sharing. Others, not so much.
And sometimes when you DO try, there's that LOOK, that disconnect, in someone's eyes that makes you think.... they have NO clue what I'm REALLY talking about.
Come to think of it, that remains a problem for me today - except now it's my recovery-speak that draws that blank look a lot of the time.
Member
Join Date: May 2010
Location: USA
Posts: 13,560
Hello and welcome. SR is a place of great support, 24/7
You have ALOT going on. I am going to say something you won't want to hear. You have put a lot into having a nice place. You have pride in what you do and own. That's wonderful, and should continue in your life as you go.
You need to be on your own for a while. This man is an alcoholic who you are enabling. You want to stop, but have a hard time putting your foot down. I understand. Been there, done that, believe me. You have to come to a place where you are good with just being by yourself. With dealing with all that is going on in your life, and grieving what you need to grieve. I think it's not even him that is your addiction, but the IDEA of him. If this were your daughter you may one day have telling you this about her future husband or someone important, what would you say? Say that to yourself.
You deserve peace. You deserve respect. You deserve someone who will treat you that way. However, wasting your time on this relationship is not letting you move forward. You are chaining yourself to your own past.
I know it's hard. Just because it's not healthy to be with someone does not mean you don't care. Your enabling him is holding him back as well. Why would he ever make changes when you come running, even under his horrible behaviors? I remember when my X husband would not remember the night before. So just b/c he would forget, he would expect I would too. No, it does not work that way.
You need to pick YOU.
I hope you keep coming back here to SR and post as frequently as you would like, there are many of us who have walked in your shoes.
You have ALOT going on. I am going to say something you won't want to hear. You have put a lot into having a nice place. You have pride in what you do and own. That's wonderful, and should continue in your life as you go.
You need to be on your own for a while. This man is an alcoholic who you are enabling. You want to stop, but have a hard time putting your foot down. I understand. Been there, done that, believe me. You have to come to a place where you are good with just being by yourself. With dealing with all that is going on in your life, and grieving what you need to grieve. I think it's not even him that is your addiction, but the IDEA of him. If this were your daughter you may one day have telling you this about her future husband or someone important, what would you say? Say that to yourself.
You deserve peace. You deserve respect. You deserve someone who will treat you that way. However, wasting your time on this relationship is not letting you move forward. You are chaining yourself to your own past.
I know it's hard. Just because it's not healthy to be with someone does not mean you don't care. Your enabling him is holding him back as well. Why would he ever make changes when you come running, even under his horrible behaviors? I remember when my X husband would not remember the night before. So just b/c he would forget, he would expect I would too. No, it does not work that way.
You need to pick YOU.
I hope you keep coming back here to SR and post as frequently as you would like, there are many of us who have walked in your shoes.
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Join Date: Mar 2013
Location: Midwest
Posts: 11,481
Jennifer, welcome--as FireSprite said, you've found a wonderful resource for your education and support. Like you, for quite some time my schedule was either so early or so irregular that it was really difficult to make it to an Alanon meeting with any consistency. One of the great things about SR is that it's always there for you, no matter the day or time. Another thing I really like about SR is that there is a huge breadth of experience and thoughts, simply b/c we have such a tremendous diversity of members here.
I'm glad to hear that you're reading stickies and jotting down book info. Learning about alcoholism and codependency is the place to start--how could you figure out how to get better if you don't understand what's wrong in the first place?
Keep on reading and posting, and like they say in Alanon, "Keep coming back!"
Wishing you strength and clarity as you start your recovery journey.
I'm glad to hear that you're reading stickies and jotting down book info. Learning about alcoholism and codependency is the place to start--how could you figure out how to get better if you don't understand what's wrong in the first place?
Keep on reading and posting, and like they say in Alanon, "Keep coming back!"
Wishing you strength and clarity as you start your recovery journey.
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Thread Starter
Join Date: Apr 2016
Posts: 229
Yes, yes, yes, hopeful4! I actually DO want to hear you say these things. Because they are things I have said to myself over and over again. In my heart, head, gut...you name it, I know you are right. I actually don't disagree with a single thing you've said. Including the fact that I am caught up in the idea of him! I've said the same thing myself. And I agree: I know what needs to be done. I'm just having a VERY tough time doing it. Which is part of why I'm here. I need to hear from folks like you. People who see through the "smoke and mirrors" and are willing to call it for what it is. Honestly, I appreciate you commenting more than I can possibly state. Please, all of you, keep it coming. And thank you!
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Thread Starter
Join Date: Apr 2016
Posts: 229
Thank you for the warm and supportive welcome, honeypig. One thing I know for certain: I made a good decision in coming here and sharing my story; finding new resources and a new source of support. I really do look forward to learning from you all.
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Join Date: May 2012
Location: Florida
Posts: 6,780
Originally Posted by hopeful4
You need to be on your own for a while.
You need to pick YOU.
You need to pick YOU.
The 2 years that RAH & I spent separated were so hard but paid off 100fold in the long run, for me. I've watched so many friends so exactly the opposite, only to end up right back where they started because they moved from one dysfunction to another with no break in between. (Insanity: they keep doing the same things that never worked before)
Sometimes, it's a great way to avoid the hard, internal work & sometimes they've been miserable for so long they just want to start living.
I also needed time to really see my own bad patterns of behaviors in order to heal & grow. I learned a lot about myself!
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Join Date: Feb 2012
Location: Wisconsin
Posts: 1,572
Welcome, and big giant ((HUGS)), JL. Your story resonates with me, because I reconnected with one of MY high school boyfriends during my divorce from my first husband. And that high school boyfriend is now my STBXAH. So, I do understand the emotional layers that come with reuniting with an old love.
You have received lots of great feedback and suggestions, and this place is truly a haven for those of us dealing with these types of things. A few things that you wrote really stood out to me...
I think that stories like this are a pretty huge indicator that, at the very least, your ABF is not the innocent victim of a harpy wife and a marriage that "just wasn't meant to be," nor is he abandoned by heartless parents. I know you didn't say that he IS an innocent victim or abandoned by his parents, but so many of us believe this outright, or subconsciously, which is why we make excuses for our qualifiers for so long. If I were you, I would read that paragraph over and over again. Imagine how you would feel if you were the mother of these children. Imagine how you would feel if you were a parent, and your adult child had manipulated and abused you over and over for years, and then suddenly wanted you to supervise visitation with his children, after he very deliberately chose to override his interlock device and drink around his kids in direct violation of a court order. I think most people here would agree that if he told you he had "a beer" while the kids were there, it is very likely that he had much, much more than just "a beer." My experience has been that facing the cold, hard truth about things was critical to my ability to detach and care for myself.
Around this time ABF lost his job. I can’t prove it, but he made a very poor decision (I believe because of impaired cognitive function) and the company had no choice but to fire him.
I also think that word choice matters. Even when describing this situation, you seem to still be making excuses for him (impaired cognitive function) and characterizing it in a way that suggests his employer was obligated to fire him. Maybe spend some time on this one...where do you think the blame REALLY lies? My friend, I used all sorts of literary gymnastics to avoid placing the blame for things directly on my STBXAH, when frankly, that was where it belonged.
He didn’t want to take the money, but I insisted on paying his rent, cell phone, and electric bills and doing some grocery shopping for him for about three months.
***
I was missing, ABF, hating the job I’d taken back here. Oh, and my mother has stage IV cancer, btw. So, as an only child, I’m trying to support my parents through all of that, too. Yeah. I was depressed, alright.
He definitely sounds like a master manipulator, and I can very much understand why this whole situation has left you in such dire emotional straits. If he didn't want to take the money, he wouldn't have.
My STBXAH was also very good at subtly manipulating me when I was in a weakened emotional state--after I lost my job, after my mother died. Like your ABF, my STBXAH absolutely knew when I was at my lowest, and he used those moments to hook me further into the insanity. And I went willingly.
(I will say this: thank goodness his is not a physical or violent drunk. If anything, he opens up more; becomes very loving, teary, etc. That said, he still says mean things that hurt my feelings. He calls me a liar all of the time which irks me more than it should, since I know I’m not lying about anything. I have two cats who I adore and have been my support system through this hell and his tells me they’re too thin and one of them is a “d^%$” or an “a$$h)&^” he uses a derogatory term for people of African American descent. He comes across as uneducated and callous and he makes me HATE being with him.
I do not think this sounds like someone who becomes more "loving" when he drinks. This is verbal abuse. My STBXAH was like this at first, and since we all generally accept that alcoholism is progressive, I can tell you that with time, the drinking will get worse and the abuse will get worse. Although to date my STBXAH has never physically abused me, five years ago I would have declared physical abuse completely unfathomable in our relationship. Today? I am wise enough to know that anything is possible.
I am minimally co-dependent at this point. He, on the other hand still needs me.
I say this with nothing but love and respect for the fact that you clearly HAVE done a tremendous amount of work on yourself, and you obviously are in a much better place than you were even a few months ago. I do not think that you are minimally co-dependent at this point. That is strictly, 100% my opinion, and feel free to tell me to get lost. 
But the sentence "he still needs me" shows it, I think. He doesn't need you. Not really. If he wants to drink, he will choose to drink and he will find a way to do it. If that means he ends up homeless, and jobless, and estranged from his children, that is his decision to make. He (and his disease) benefits from your involvement, so he keeps you hooked. And you are still hooked. After all of this, you still refer to him as your ABF. We all follow different paths and timetables to recovery. For some of us, that eventually means separating from our qualifiers. And I am not one to judge--it took me FIVE YEARS of abuse to walk out the door. There is still a ton of enmeshment here, and I am so glad to hear that you working on yourself, because THAT is what will keep you on a path to emotional health.
That’s the other thing that kills me about him. He’s so self-aware! He knows I’m upset. He doesn’t even blame me for being upset when he’s sober.
I'm willing to bet that at least part of this "self-awareness" is tied up in his manipulation of you. Truly self-aware people who honestly understand that their behavior is hurting loved ones ALSO work to modify that behavior. Talk is cheap. Actions speak louder than words. He SAYS he understands, but his actions show he just wants to keep you on this merry-go-round, paying all or some of his bills at various points in the future, hoping that if/when he IS evicted, you will acquiesce and let him move in because he "needs you." Just keep your guard way, way up.
Because I’m tired of crying every day. I’m tired of being sad, and unlike ABF, I REFUSE to be a victim. It’s time to change. Thank you for reading… Much love to you, JL. We all get to that point, in different ways. You do not deserve this chaos and disease in your life. I hope you keep coming back and reading, and that you will take what I wrote in the spirit I intended it--with love, with a goal to help, and with the knowledge that we can always, ALWAYS take what we want, and leave the rest.
You have received lots of great feedback and suggestions, and this place is truly a haven for those of us dealing with these types of things. A few things that you wrote really stood out to me...
Originally Posted by jenniferlynne76
He’d been through an in-patient rehab program that lasted three months and drank less than 48 hours after being released. He was advised to move in with his parents and get away from his wife but he wanted to make things right between them and went back to her, where their volatile relationship continued. He’d driven a car into a retention pond, been arrested for a DUI, and, most damning, had broken the rule of a child custody agreement when he had a beer while the children were at his place about a month before I met him. He already had a court-ordered alcohol monitoring device in the car (though he knew how to play/beat the system, but when his oldest (a teen) called their mother to come pick them up because their dad was drinking he got into a scuffle with his ex-wife’s boyfriend and he lost the rights to see his kids until they could work out some kind of supervised visitation schedule. Originally his parents had said he could visit the children at their place, but it turns out they changed their minds.
Originally Posted by jenniferlynne76
Around this time ABF lost his job. I can’t prove it, but he made a very poor decision (I believe because of impaired cognitive function) and the company had no choice but to fire him.
Originally Posted by jenniferlynne76
He didn’t want to take the money, but I insisted on paying his rent, cell phone, and electric bills and doing some grocery shopping for him for about three months.
***
I was missing, ABF, hating the job I’d taken back here. Oh, and my mother has stage IV cancer, btw. So, as an only child, I’m trying to support my parents through all of that, too. Yeah. I was depressed, alright.
My STBXAH was also very good at subtly manipulating me when I was in a weakened emotional state--after I lost my job, after my mother died. Like your ABF, my STBXAH absolutely knew when I was at my lowest, and he used those moments to hook me further into the insanity. And I went willingly.
Originally Posted by jenniferlynne76
(I will say this: thank goodness his is not a physical or violent drunk. If anything, he opens up more; becomes very loving, teary, etc. That said, he still says mean things that hurt my feelings. He calls me a liar all of the time which irks me more than it should, since I know I’m not lying about anything. I have two cats who I adore and have been my support system through this hell and his tells me they’re too thin and one of them is a “d^%$” or an “a$$h)&^” he uses a derogatory term for people of African American descent. He comes across as uneducated and callous and he makes me HATE being with him.
Originally Posted by jenniferlynne76
I am minimally co-dependent at this point. He, on the other hand still needs me.
But the sentence "he still needs me" shows it, I think. He doesn't need you. Not really. If he wants to drink, he will choose to drink and he will find a way to do it. If that means he ends up homeless, and jobless, and estranged from his children, that is his decision to make. He (and his disease) benefits from your involvement, so he keeps you hooked. And you are still hooked. After all of this, you still refer to him as your ABF. We all follow different paths and timetables to recovery. For some of us, that eventually means separating from our qualifiers. And I am not one to judge--it took me FIVE YEARS of abuse to walk out the door. There is still a ton of enmeshment here, and I am so glad to hear that you working on yourself, because THAT is what will keep you on a path to emotional health.
Originally Posted by jenniferlynne76
That’s the other thing that kills me about him. He’s so self-aware! He knows I’m upset. He doesn’t even blame me for being upset when he’s sober.
Originally Posted by jenniferlynne76
Because I’m tired of crying every day. I’m tired of being sad, and unlike ABF, I REFUSE to be a victim. It’s time to change. Thank you for reading…
Much love to you, JL. We all get to that point, in different ways. You do not deserve this chaos and disease in your life. I hope you keep coming back and reading, and that you will take what I wrote in the spirit I intended it--with love, with a goal to help, and with the knowledge that we can always, ALWAYS take what we want, and leave the rest.
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Thread Starter
Join Date: Apr 2016
Posts: 229
Originally Posted by FireSprite
AMEN Hopeful! I think the worst thing we can do is jump right into a new relationship as we're leaving a bad one.
The 2 years that RAH & I spent separated were so hard but paid off 100fold in the long run, for me. I've watched so many friends so exactly the opposite, only to end up right back where they started because they moved from one dysfunction to another with no break in between. (Insanity: they keep doing the same things that never worked before)
Sometimes, it's a great way to avoid the hard, internal work & sometimes they've been miserable for so long they just want to start living.
I also needed time to really see my own bad patterns of behaviors in order to heal & grow. I learned a lot about myself!
The 2 years that RAH & I spent separated were so hard but paid off 100fold in the long run, for me. I've watched so many friends so exactly the opposite, only to end up right back where they started because they moved from one dysfunction to another with no break in between. (Insanity: they keep doing the same things that never worked before)
Sometimes, it's a great way to avoid the hard, internal work & sometimes they've been miserable for so long they just want to start living.
I also needed time to really see my own bad patterns of behaviors in order to heal & grow. I learned a lot about myself!
Member
Join Date: Sep 2012
Location: atlanta, ga
Posts: 3,581
Welcome to SR Jenniferlynne.
Lots going on. What sticks out to me is you clearly are self motivated successful female. Yet you were in a marriage for 8 (?) years that was unfulfilling. Then you entered into a relationship with a person who has more red flags than the average A.
The question I would be asking is WHY? Why would you settle? Why would you accept all these people's problems? When things were going South with ABF you contemplated returning to the Ex, and giving it another go when it was clear the relationship was dead (and should be).
I'd try and keep the focus on you and your actions. In order to move forward into a healthy mindset you must resolve why you pick men that have BIG problems. It just not about being a fixer.......
As for the ABF there is nothing good to come out of that. NOTHING. You aren't going to get lemonade out of that lemon. Start with small things to detach......the morning phone calls sound like a good place. What would you do if you couldn't get in contact with him? Call the police? Go to his house? If something happens to him overnight you can't do anything about it. ok? You can't stop what he is doing. If we had that power none of us would be here. Focus on accepting what you can't control and can is important! You can control YOU, not him.
Look forward to your contributions here. Its a great community with many caring people who so understand what you are going through.
Lots going on. What sticks out to me is you clearly are self motivated successful female. Yet you were in a marriage for 8 (?) years that was unfulfilling. Then you entered into a relationship with a person who has more red flags than the average A.
The question I would be asking is WHY? Why would you settle? Why would you accept all these people's problems? When things were going South with ABF you contemplated returning to the Ex, and giving it another go when it was clear the relationship was dead (and should be).
I'd try and keep the focus on you and your actions. In order to move forward into a healthy mindset you must resolve why you pick men that have BIG problems. It just not about being a fixer.......
As for the ABF there is nothing good to come out of that. NOTHING. You aren't going to get lemonade out of that lemon. Start with small things to detach......the morning phone calls sound like a good place. What would you do if you couldn't get in contact with him? Call the police? Go to his house? If something happens to him overnight you can't do anything about it. ok? You can't stop what he is doing. If we had that power none of us would be here. Focus on accepting what you can't control and can is important! You can control YOU, not him.
Look forward to your contributions here. Its a great community with many caring people who so understand what you are going through.
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Thread Starter
Join Date: Apr 2016
Posts: 229
Originally Posted by Wisconsin
A few things that you wrote really stood out to me...
I think that stories like this are a pretty huge indicator that, at the very least, your ABF is not the innocent victim of a harpy wife and a marriage that "just wasn't meant to be," nor is he abandoned by heartless parents. I know you didn't say that he IS an innocent victim or abandoned by his parents, but so many of us believe this outright, or subconsciously, which is why we make excuses for our qualifiers for so long. If I were you, I would read that paragraph over and over again. Imagine how you would feel if you were the mother of these children. Imagine how you would feel if you were a parent, and your adult child had manipulated and abused you over and over for years, and then suddenly wanted you to supervise visitation with his children, after he very deliberately chose to override his interlock device and drink around his kids in direct violation of a court order. I think most people here would agree that if he told you he had "a beer" while the kids were there, it is very likely that he had much, much more than just "a beer." My experience has been that facing the cold, hard truth about things was critical to my ability to detach and care for myself.
I think that stories like this are a pretty huge indicator that, at the very least, your ABF is not the innocent victim of a harpy wife and a marriage that "just wasn't meant to be," nor is he abandoned by heartless parents. I know you didn't say that he IS an innocent victim or abandoned by his parents, but so many of us believe this outright, or subconsciously, which is why we make excuses for our qualifiers for so long. If I were you, I would read that paragraph over and over again. Imagine how you would feel if you were the mother of these children. Imagine how you would feel if you were a parent, and your adult child had manipulated and abused you over and over for years, and then suddenly wanted you to supervise visitation with his children, after he very deliberately chose to override his interlock device and drink around his kids in direct violation of a court order. I think most people here would agree that if he told you he had "a beer" while the kids were there, it is very likely that he had much, much more than just "a beer." My experience has been that facing the cold, hard truth about things was critical to my ability to detach and care for myself.
I also think that word choice matters. Even when describing this situation, you seem to still be making excuses for him (impaired cognitive function) and characterizing it in a way that suggests his employer was obligated to fire him. Maybe spend some time on this one...where do you think the blame REALLY lies? My friend, I used all sorts of literary gymnastics to avoid placing the blame for things directly on my STBXAH, when frankly, that was where it belonged.
He definitely sounds like a master manipulator, and I can very much understand why this whole situation has left you in such dire emotional straits. If he didn't want to take the money, he wouldn't have.
I do not think this sounds like someone who becomes more "loving" when he drinks. This is verbal abuse. My STBXAH was like this at first, and since we all generally accept that alcoholism is progressive, I can tell you that with time, the drinking will get worse and the abuse will get worse. Although to date my STBXAH has never physically abused me, five years ago I would have declared physical abuse completely unfathomable in our relationship. Today? I am wise enough to know that anything is possible.
I say this with nothing but love and respect for the fact that you clearly HAVE done a tremendous amount of work on yourself, and you obviously are in a much better place than you were even a few months ago. I do not think that you are minimally co-dependent at this point. That is strictly, 100% my opinion, and feel free to tell me to get lost. But the sentence "he still needs me" shows it, I think. He doesn't need you. Not really.
But the sentence "he still needs me" shows it, I think. He doesn't need you. Not really.
If he wants to drink, he will choose to drink and he will find a way to do it.
If that means he ends up homeless, and jobless, and estranged from his children, that is his decision to make. He (and his disease) benefits from your involvement, so he keeps you hooked. And you are still hooked. After all of this, you still refer to him as your ABF. We all follow different paths and timetables to recovery.
I'm willing to bet that at least part of this "self-awareness" is tied up in his manipulation of you.
Truly self-aware people who honestly understand that their behavior is hurting loved ones ALSO work to modify that behavior. Talk is cheap. Actions speak louder than words.
Much love to you, JL. We all get to that point, in different ways. You do not deserve this chaos and disease in your life. I hope you keep coming back and reading, and that you will take what I wrote in the spirit I intended it--with love, with a goal to help, and with the knowledge that we can always, ALWAYS take what we want, and leave the rest.
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Thread Starter
Join Date: Apr 2016
Posts: 229
Originally Posted by redatlanta
Welcome to SR Jenniferlynne.
Lots going on. What sticks out to me is you clearly are self motivated successful female. Yet you were in a marriage for 8 (?) years that was unfulfilling. Then you entered into a relationship with a person who has more red flags than the average A.
The question I would be asking is WHY? Why would you settle? Why would you accept all these people's problems? When things were going South with ABF you contemplated returning to the Ex, and giving it another go when it was clear the relationship was dead (and should be).
I'd try and keep the focus on you and your actions. In order to move forward into a healthy mindset you must resolve why you pick men that have BIG problems. It just not about being a fixer.......
Lots going on. What sticks out to me is you clearly are self motivated successful female. Yet you were in a marriage for 8 (?) years that was unfulfilling. Then you entered into a relationship with a person who has more red flags than the average A.
The question I would be asking is WHY? Why would you settle? Why would you accept all these people's problems? When things were going South with ABF you contemplated returning to the Ex, and giving it another go when it was clear the relationship was dead (and should be).
I'd try and keep the focus on you and your actions. In order to move forward into a healthy mindset you must resolve why you pick men that have BIG problems. It just not about being a fixer.......
I've asked myself that question a lot. And I'm glad you asked it today because I think it's something I'd like to explore further with my therapist this evening. My mom once asked me why I was so needy because I am a successful professional woman. I'm financially secure, well-educated, etc. And I responded to her, "Mom, I've always been needy." And you know what? I think I have. I'm an only child and remember feeling so alone when my friends would choose to spend their time with someone else. When we'd move from base to base. I remember begging for a dog because I wanted someone to love me no matter what. I don't know if that's tied to this or not. But it's the only connection I've been able to draw thus far. Perhaps this desire to feel constantly needed and wanted (even if I'm really being used and manipulated if we're being honest).
As for the ABF there is nothing good to come out of that. NOTHING. You aren't going to get lemonade out of that lemon. Start with small things to detach......the morning phone calls sound like a good place. What would you do if you couldn't get in contact with him? Call the police? Go to his house? If something happens to him overnight you can't do anything about it. ok?
You can't stop what he is doing. If we had that power none of us would be here. Focus on accepting what you can't control and can is important! You can control YOU, not him.
Look forward to your contributions here. Its a great community with many caring people who so understand what you are going through.
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Join Date: Sep 2012
Location: atlanta, ga
Posts: 3,581
every man I got involved with needed fixing
Just my opinion......control issues. Codies are very controlling anyway. Its a lame horse. The horse needs you, the horse won't leave you, the horse will love you. No one else wants the lame horse but you. You go to the ends of the earth to heal the lame horse, the horse should love you more for it. The horse will never leave you. Why would the horse leave its savior?
And after all that the horse is still lame, and often leaves you for greener pastures. You are surprised anyone else would want the lame horse!!! You expect the lame horse will return because you are the only person on the earth that really loves it.
Then you find out there are others just like you waiting for a lame horse to cross their path. After all you did, its quite a blow.
The "why" is not complicated.
Just my opinion......control issues. Codies are very controlling anyway. Its a lame horse. The horse needs you, the horse won't leave you, the horse will love you. No one else wants the lame horse but you. You go to the ends of the earth to heal the lame horse, the horse should love you more for it. The horse will never leave you. Why would the horse leave its savior?
And after all that the horse is still lame, and often leaves you for greener pastures. You are surprised anyone else would want the lame horse!!! You expect the lame horse will return because you are the only person on the earth that really loves it.
Then you find out there are others just like you waiting for a lame horse to cross their path. After all you did, its quite a blow.
The "why" is not complicated.
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Thread Starter
Join Date: Apr 2016
Posts: 229
Originally Posted by redatlanta
every man I got involved with needed fixing
Just my opinion......control issues. Codies are very controlling anyway.
The "why" is not complicated.
Just my opinion......control issues. Codies are very controlling anyway.
The "why" is not complicated.
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Join Date: Aug 2011
Posts: 16,246
Jennifer.....I don't know if you live in the states or not... (a couple of words that you used make me think that, possibly, you do not.....
I don't know if you have CoDA meetings in your location---Co-Dependents Anonymous......
I think that may be more specific to your needs (in addition to your therapy).....
Alanon--too bad about the schedule. do you ever get a day off? If so, maybe you could make some meetings on those days........
The more time and space that you p ut between yourself and the boyfriend.....the easier it will be for you to do the grieving process that you will be going through.....
I am going to make a guess---that you have issues from your early growing up years that you have brought as baggage into all of your adult relationships.....
That is a very common thing, you know.....
If a person is thirsty for intimacy and love....and, especially if they may have low self-esteem.....they will be drawn to it ANYWHERE and with anyone who offers it.....That is a very human reaction. And, unfortunately, if it is not from the right person.....it is like emotional heroine....very addictive (and, with the same destructive consequences)......
I am glad that you are living alone in your own place, with your sweet kitty.
You will benefit from being on your own and learning to love yourself.......
dandylion
I don't know if you have CoDA meetings in your location---Co-Dependents Anonymous......
I think that may be more specific to your needs (in addition to your therapy).....
Alanon--too bad about the schedule. do you ever get a day off? If so, maybe you could make some meetings on those days........
The more time and space that you p ut between yourself and the boyfriend.....the easier it will be for you to do the grieving process that you will be going through.....
I am going to make a guess---that you have issues from your early growing up years that you have brought as baggage into all of your adult relationships.....
That is a very common thing, you know.....
If a person is thirsty for intimacy and love....and, especially if they may have low self-esteem.....they will be drawn to it ANYWHERE and with anyone who offers it.....That is a very human reaction. And, unfortunately, if it is not from the right person.....it is like emotional heroine....very addictive (and, with the same destructive consequences)......
I am glad that you are living alone in your own place, with your sweet kitty.
You will benefit from being on your own and learning to love yourself.......
dandylion
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Join Date: Aug 2011
Location: Pa
Posts: 4,872
Hi Jennifer, and welcome to the family,
You already got really good information above, and I'm not sure if I can expand on that.
I'm going to get a little strange here, so please bear with me. To me, a HS sweetheart, is like trying to relive your past because you don't really like the present time. Not going to say that it never works, sometimes it does.
It's sorta like I can meet friends from years ago, and go back into that time when we were really good friends. I see them as they were then, not what I am seeing presently.
I think our mind matures at like age 25, and I think sometimes we continue to think at that age, even though our bodies are older. It's like trying to relive a past that we wish we had or something like that.
OK, Sorry for getting strange there.
This guy that you are talking about is abusive. Presently he is mentally, verbally, emotionally abusive, perhaps even financially. I was also one that said well he wasn't violent, or physical with me. That all changed before my 10 yr anniversary, when he pushed me to the ground and kicked me in the ribs.
Do you really know how much damage that psychological abuse can cause? You're already feeling it. You stated that you "walked on eggshells". Think about that. Why should you "walk on eggshells" in any relationship? Aren't relationships about being happy and wanting to be with the other person? You say that you have situational depression. I know some of this may have to do with your mother, and I am sorry for what she is going through. I'm just saying that after 25 yrs in my situation, I was diagnosed with situational depression, c-ptsd, anxiety disorder and panic attacks.
This isn't even a very long relationship, or a decade long relationship, and he is already verbally abusive to you. He is cutting down your self confidence and self esteem. He is showing you no respect with your apt, and the new things you purchased for it. This is stuff that you got, and you felt good about yourself for pushing forward like this, and he is disrespecting it.
I don't usually talk like this, but you wanted people to be straightforward, so that you could do what you needed to do, to put this in your past.
I agree with everyone here, that said that going from one relationship, that was really an empty devoid of emotion relationship to another, who is a needy person, who needs you to make him feel better about himself is a big mistake.
I really do think that sometimes the people that come across as somewhat pitiful, or whatever, appearing to want to be seeking help (maybe a better way to put that) they don't really want to. I think they feel comfortable the way that they are, and sometimes I think that those verbal jabs are a way for them to feel better, because they are trying to bring you down or even below their level of how they are feeling.
I also agree that he is manipulative, with that always sad story that he has. There is a reason why his mother, his ex wife, and his kids really don't want to talk to him. Where are his friends? does he have any? or did he burn those out also?
I appreciate that you came here with opened eyes, and ears that what to hear and listen, and learn.
I know you have been through h3ll, now you are going to get out of there.
(((((hugs)))))
amy
You already got really good information above, and I'm not sure if I can expand on that.
I'm going to get a little strange here, so please bear with me. To me, a HS sweetheart, is like trying to relive your past because you don't really like the present time. Not going to say that it never works, sometimes it does.
It's sorta like I can meet friends from years ago, and go back into that time when we were really good friends. I see them as they were then, not what I am seeing presently.
I think our mind matures at like age 25, and I think sometimes we continue to think at that age, even though our bodies are older. It's like trying to relive a past that we wish we had or something like that.
OK, Sorry for getting strange there.
This guy that you are talking about is abusive. Presently he is mentally, verbally, emotionally abusive, perhaps even financially. I was also one that said well he wasn't violent, or physical with me. That all changed before my 10 yr anniversary, when he pushed me to the ground and kicked me in the ribs.
Do you really know how much damage that psychological abuse can cause? You're already feeling it. You stated that you "walked on eggshells". Think about that. Why should you "walk on eggshells" in any relationship? Aren't relationships about being happy and wanting to be with the other person? You say that you have situational depression. I know some of this may have to do with your mother, and I am sorry for what she is going through. I'm just saying that after 25 yrs in my situation, I was diagnosed with situational depression, c-ptsd, anxiety disorder and panic attacks.
This isn't even a very long relationship, or a decade long relationship, and he is already verbally abusive to you. He is cutting down your self confidence and self esteem. He is showing you no respect with your apt, and the new things you purchased for it. This is stuff that you got, and you felt good about yourself for pushing forward like this, and he is disrespecting it.
I don't usually talk like this, but you wanted people to be straightforward, so that you could do what you needed to do, to put this in your past.
I agree with everyone here, that said that going from one relationship, that was really an empty devoid of emotion relationship to another, who is a needy person, who needs you to make him feel better about himself is a big mistake.
I really do think that sometimes the people that come across as somewhat pitiful, or whatever, appearing to want to be seeking help (maybe a better way to put that) they don't really want to. I think they feel comfortable the way that they are, and sometimes I think that those verbal jabs are a way for them to feel better, because they are trying to bring you down or even below their level of how they are feeling.
I also agree that he is manipulative, with that always sad story that he has. There is a reason why his mother, his ex wife, and his kids really don't want to talk to him. Where are his friends? does he have any? or did he burn those out also?
I appreciate that you came here with opened eyes, and ears that what to hear and listen, and learn.
I know you have been through h3ll, now you are going to get out of there.
(((((hugs)))))
amy
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Join Date: Jan 2015
Location: Indiana
Posts: 503
GO TO THE EVENING ALANON MEETINGS!! they only last 1 to 11/2 hrs and you might get so much out of it. I think you need toe social aspect of it as well. I felt so alone and now I have a group of beautiful people I consider friends. Try it. It can't hurt!
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Join Date: Feb 2012
Location: Wisconsin
Posts: 1,572
Originally Posted by amy55
I'm going to get a little strange here, so please bear with me. To me, a HS sweetheart, is like trying to relive your past because you don't really like the present time.
Amy, I never once thought of my own situation this way, but you are absolutely right! When STBXAH and I got back in touch, I was a year into an ugly divorce that seemed like it would never, ever end. Every interaction with my XH was difficult and painful. I was in a job (and honestly, a career) that made me miserable. My first marriage was NOT one of deep romantic love, and I felt starved for affection and for someone to put me up on a pedestal (after years of coming in second to my XH's family of origin).
You speak the truth, Amy. At least, you speak MY truth.
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