minnie

That "loving man trapped inside of this addiction", kg, or the guy that appears when he knows he's screwed up and needs to feed you some of the good stuff to keep you hooked in to his sick game? Only by having some breathing space can you tell the difference, I believe.

And I would always question why having a "good man" for only a part of the time is good enough when there are plenty of men out there who will treat you right all of the time. Staying wrapped up in a dysfunctional relationship absolutely prevents one from being available for someone who will treat you right.

kglast

wow. thanks minnie. it is difficult to accept that he is just"feeding me the good stuff to suck me back in" but i guess it is a possibility....

thanks for giving me more reason to stick to the breathing space...

Cynay

Have I told you how amazing all of you are??????

if not THANK YOU!!!!!!!!

minnie

kg, I am sorry to break this to you but from my experience, both first hand and from the many stories that have been shared with me over the years, it is far more likely that the "nice guy" is part of the game, rather a glimpse of some true self.

(That's not to say that he wouldn't be a good guy after sobering up and some intensive recovery - but I can guarantee that you would then see an entirely different kind of guy than the one that pokes through the alcoholic fog every now and again.)

Jazzman

And that is one of the best lessons I have learned from my own experience. Always, always, and never ever forget to question my motive.... and be brutally honest with myself.

embraced2000

no contact===less pain for me.

some contact====little feeds for me....just enough to keep my own doc in my system

contact===total chaos again

(just for me......i found that i am the master of manipulation and the queen of denial when trying to figure out ways to justify "just a little contact")

Cynay

Yea ... and to say it is humbling is the least of feelings when I take that honest look.

I know myself well enough to know I can easily slip into the ego driven decisions.... My father use to tell me not to "cut my nose off to spite my face" Well Im still working on that, I know I will also remove people from my life that hurt, even if it is a healthy hurt..... only because it is a ego decision and not a one made out of love.

Sometimes I will pitch a fit when one is not warrented, then other times I will allow things that I should have pitched a fit over..... Figuring out which is which is not always easy for me.... Thankfully I have all of you to bounce it off of and help keep me in check.

embraced2000

my best ever excuse for making contact with my xh was the last time he was arrested here at my place.

i convinced myself that i wanted to tell him "goodbye" while he was still alive.
and sober, behind bars. captive audience. roflmao!!!!!!

what a nut case....me!!!!


see, i had it all figured out, cause the next time "out there", may kill him.

to most people, i made myself look like such a sweet, caring, suffering ex wife, that was still very much in love with my ex.....and to those "in the know" ?????......well, there wasn't any foolin them.

Tazman53

Cynan I am an alcoholic but I will answer your question from my personal feelings if I broke up with or was broken up with, I do not think I could handle "Lets just be friends" for a long time, in my mind any type of friendliness I would misinterpet as "Maybe there is a chance!".

You know I can not make my self think any other way and I think because I am an alcoholic almost everything is black and white for me with no middle road, do not get me wrong, the further I progress in my recovery the more I am starting to see there are actually shades of grey in some things, but after 40 years of the world being black and white my head is slow to learn that there are shades of grey in life.

Did the above make sense. You know probably an alcoholic codi could address your question better then me Cynan.

Cynay

Taz that made perfect sense.

I live in Gray..... I have no black/white world so it can be a struggle for me. But I totally understand the problem with trying to "be friends" concept....

If you know what you want, and are ready for it in your life, why would you keep doors open when it has been made clear that there is no relationship. Then again, why close doors when there is a "chance" *shrugs*

Im thinking this is going to give me a headache....

Tazman53

Every time I get into my head I get a head ache! LOL

CatsPajamas

I grabbed that quote from another post on a different forum. She's right you know... That's why we all come here - to check in with OUR network!

Hope you're getting your thoughts sorted out, Cynay...

Hugs
Cat

Cynay

Thanks CP

I have had alot of thinking time.... (scarry ... ya I know) and though I dont have answers .... I have direction and Ideas.... and have answered alot of the questions inside. Its nice to know Im not as off base as I thought I could have been, bumps in the road and minor adjustments is all.

Thanks guys.... your the best!!! I love my network.

TexasGirl

When I first moved out, I was so terrified that I would get sucked back into him. I knew that if we talked, I would be susceptible to his promises and pleas, and I did not ever want to have to go through the act of leaving again. I hashed out my move for 18 months, and I wasn't about to do it again. I knew where I might be vulnerable, so I put a plug in that hole. Now, I did play his endless voicemails that he left me, which was it's own form of toture. Eventually, he got tired of calling, and I got tired of listening to his messages. It happened naturally as I started to move on.

Today, every so often I will take one of his calls, especially during this ongoing divorce process....there are things to discuss. But it doesn't even hurt a bit. I have no romantic feelings whatsoever, and in fact, I've even listened to him ramble a bit about his girlfriend troubles. I ended that....not because it hurt me, but because I didn't care a BIT and because I had stuff to do that didn't involve him whining about some girl not understanding him.

DesertEyes

Sorry I'm late for the party. You guys always have the best threads when I'm outta town.

"No contact" is _not_ about them. It has nothing to do with the other person, whether they are in recovery or not, married or single, coming or going.

"No contact", just like everything else in recovery, is about _me_. "No contact" is just the first two words, the whole sentence goes like this:

"No contact with the people, places and things I use as an excuse to justify my addiction".
Another word for this concept is "abstinence".

I used my marriage as an excuse to justify my addiction to a woman who had long ago stopped being a partner. As long as I could play the "knight in shining armor" routine I did not have to take off the armor and expose myself as a normal human being. The catch to being a knight is that you can't pull off the act without a damsel in distress.

In order to maintain my own illusion of being a non-fallible human, of being a strong, independent person who _never_ felt pain, I had to have dragons to slay and steeds to ride.
The truth is I _do_ feel pain. I do feel fear. Just like everybody else. If I get in a relationship with someone who is themselves in pain I can spend all my time rescuing _her_ and always ignoring my _own_ issues. If all I do is look at _her_ then I never look at _me_.

Note that what I used as an excuse was my _marriage_. I didn't really matter _who_ I was rescuing, as long as I had _anybody_ to rescue then I could keep the focus off me. Not that different from an alcoholic who is alwyas looking for somebody else to blame for their misfortunes.

I had to maintain "no contact" with _relationships_ in order to stay sane, just like an alkie maintains no contact with booze in order to stay sober. Put me in a relationship, _any_ relationship, and my head spins off and goes straight into the ozone. Doesn't matter who with.

After my marriage ended I maintained no contact from _relationships_ for about 6 months. I did a _lot_ of growing and learning in that time. Then I got involved in a relationship that was far better than my marriage, but still a long ways from healthy. We danced for awhile and then drifted apart. I did a lot more work on _me_, no contact again for about a year. Then I started dating, normal dating. Dated a charming young blonde and was able to _stop_ dating her and _remain_ best of friends. For me that is a sign of a healthy relationship.

Mike

Cynay

Ahhhhh Mike...

There you are my partner in crime....

Better late then never and even though you work that program, here you are my knight in shining armor and another voice of reason.

Thanks sweetie.... your right, today and every day I need to keep that focus on me.

concolor1

Boy, this one has a bunch of old feelings tumbling out of my tummy . . .

Not a lot of wisdom, just a few perspectives from a lot of years on both sides of this fence . . .

Biggest influence was the PB where I was the A (for those wondering, the "P" stands for "Psycho") . . . The split-ups on that one nearly killed me, and both of us wound up getting a lot of therapy . . . The first one helped me get sober since I was forced to "do it for myself."

Of course, after I "did it," she was suddenly back around (seems the guy she dumped me for wasn't all she thought he was). Four years or so of "yo-yo" . . .

That's when I started Al-Anon, and my sponsor--whom I didn't care for all that much because he kept telling me things I didn't want to hear--hooked me with "If you're obsessing on someone else's behavior, Al-Anon is for you."

Not seeing her was the best thing that happened to both of us; I'm of the belief it's good for the other person, too (what, I'm not this wonderful all-things-to-all-people God myself? Oh Dear!).

Fast forward eight or nine years with no seeing each other, and by then she's in a relationship with a guy I think the world of (plus her dysfunctional parents are gone; they were a huge chunk of the problem). So I rented a house from her for a time (her late parents) . . .

We all survived without getting hurt, but I also realized a "landlord/tenant" relationship creates more boundary issues, and I'm grateful to be living elsewhere now . . .

I did laugh my hind end off when her live-in BF was doing some stuff around the place and asked me about her parents and even her grandmother, whom I also knew . . . I gave sort of a non-commital reply, and he made a comment about how unbelievably dysfunctional and whacko that whole crowd must've been . . . And then he sighed . . .

Guy's a whole lot more laid back than I am, and I'm a pretty tolerant sort . . . I wish them well . . .

I've also reached the conclusion she isn't all that nice of person, despite the work she did, and while the intellectual stimulation was there, the drama allowed me to avoid looking at my "boredom issues," and that was a huge part of my addiction (give me a choice of how I can feel, and I'll pick "numb" everytime).

That's just my stuff, BTW . . . I recently got some strokes when I abruptly cut something off because I saw something really scary . . . I felt trying to seek any cloture would be futile (the old GF and I wound up in the sack quite a few times because of that one way back when; it was reasonably healthy while I rented from her, however), but I did get some feedback from someone really knowledgeable...

She pointed out that "nice guys are magnets" for those sorts . . .

Which meant, for me, finally, came the realization it wasn't me that was doing all the choosing . . . And I hope you nice girls out there can reach the same truth, and give some nice guys a chance . . . Might mean giving up some of the drama, though . . .

I trust this will be taken for what it's worth; others have choices as well, and letting go for me means they are accountable for them as well . . . It's kind of the difference between being an adolescent and an adult, a distinction that isn't all that obvious at times . . .

Curiously, there wasn't much "no contact" between my daughter's mother and myself; things petered out amicably (I'm grateful for my kid's sake), and anytime I get "sucked into the drama stuff," I get to tell myself that's her new husband's problem . . .

But I had to have a healthy sense of myself in order to do that, and that was a long time coming . . .

Cynay

Very well said and another interesting point...... Thank you.

OK.... how way off base is this, but perhaps the no contact is also dependent on the amount of drama? Also being a codi in recovery ... if there is the drama ... that should be one of those big red flags that you stay away from and keep looking else where right?? So why are you in the situation anyway?

Trust me Concolor, if I met a nice guy who did not have the drama and was not only totally into me but was able to give himself to a relationship???? I would not hesitate one moment to enjoy his company and see what the possibilities were... I am way over wanting the bad boy/drama king.

denny57

Not for me. Bottom line in my decisions with people now, alcoholic or not, is does maintaining contact with them enhance my life? If not, what am I trying to prove?

concolor1

And it was more about me than anyone else; I seem to have been through some frustrating times with ladies who have deep trust issues with men . . .

Call it a particularly subtle whine . . .

Anyway, one of the set-ups in codependency is the "chemistry stuff," and I wind up double-checking or triple-checking my perceptions since I go for the "female analogs" of the "bad boys." "Doormats" leave me cold, but there's the matter of independent ladies and I getting into a competition which is also problematic . . .

Anytime I think I'm immune on that one, I wind up right in the middle of it, and the last two times I've felt strongly enough about the issue I wasn't going to back down and was willing to sacrifice the relationships on principle. This last relationship I ditched, BTW, was a friendship with professional overtones, and nothing romantic . . . Those were my choices, and it may seem cold, but I'm comfortable with my decisions even if the losses were very real . . .

I'll PM you with the particulars if you want . . . I have reasons for not disclosing more on a public forum, particularly since they involve issues beyond alcoholism and codependency . . .