FormerDoormat

For those still hanging on to broken relationships and broken dreams, consider this:

What we had with our alcoholic partners was never real. All we had was a combination of fantasies made up in our minds and lots and lots of lies and manipulation on their part. Waiting for our partners to sober up and become whole won't make our relationships with them any more real or any less broken.

Don't you think it's time to let go of the fantasies and hopes of story book endings and begin living in the real world and focusing only on finding our authentic selves and having relationships with folks who are honest, trustworthy, and REAL?

If our partners are able to reach and maintain sobriety one day in the future, it won't make the relationships that we had real. The relationships we thought we had never existed. There is nothing real to rekindle. Whatever we thought we had never was.

MsGolightly

that just hit me today. i don't trust or respect my ex. there is nothing worth saving there anymore.

beautiful post, FD.

cagefree

ITFM - ditto

newenglandgirl

Thanks FD. Just what I needed to hear.
Been trying to figure out what part of me AH filled. Why did I feel so safe, calm, and happy with him for so long? I look back and see all the problems now.
I'm dealing with childhood "stuff" all over again. wtf.

Spiritual Seeker

yep we can't live the life we had planned we can only live the life we have if we want serenity. This isn't a dress rehearsal, we only get one go round and I want to make it all that I can. no time to **** and moan. Cheryl Crow sang "you don't bring me anything but down" if that is the case, it is time to get up and Move on

Bjen

Thanks for putting that into words.

chero

Okay, FD, I'll tell you what, when I first read this I was a little ticked off. I mean I had a real relationship WITHOUT alcohol with my husband once.

Then I started thinking about what if he went into treatment and sobered up and did all the things I said he must do...then what?

I think it was CE who posted earlier that the alcohol is always going to be a part of our relationship with this person(recovery or not). I can see how that is.

But I can't say how I see that "whatever we thought we had never was."
Is that true?? Or is that just for relationships that started out with alcohol.

I do believe I won't have what I once had with my husband. Shoot, I don't even know at this moment that I still have a marriage. But let's just say he goes into treatment and sobers up and stays that way for a year and we reconcile (just for instance)...hmm...I think I had a lightbulb moment.

What you are saying is that it'll be a whole new relationship. Or that it isn't possible?

FormerDoormat

Chero: After you've had a good bit of recovery under your belt, LONG after you've let go of the need to stay in constant contact with and control your A, and you're finally able to break through your own denial, you begin to see things more clearly. You start to see that things were never right in your relationship. Long before the drinking came into play, the alcoholic mind set existed. And long before the drinking reared it's ugly head, the co-dependent mind set existed.

Once you're able to stop fooling yourself and really seek the truth, you start to realize that your alcoholic loved one had two personas: the one that paraded around as a loving, reliable, responsible, faithful, and truthful partner; and the darker persona they hid from you. The one who cheated on you and lied to you repeatedly (overtly or through omission), the one who manipulated and belittled you, the one who hid large portions of his life from you (be it children we didn't know about, ex-wives we didn't know about, debts we didn't know about, affairs we didn't know about, job losses we didn't know about), the one who abused you verbally and emotionally, the one who threatened to or did beat you behind closed doors. That person was always there; we just didn't want to see it.

I've been doing some spring cleaning over the last few weeks. Richard hasn't been at my house in months now, but he left plenty of stuff behind: clothes, coats, shoes, books, papers, etc.

This weekend, I decided that I'm taking my life back. It's not my responsibility to store his things. It's not my responsibility to get them back to him. If he wanted them, he should have collected them months ago. So, I spent a few hours on Saturday throwing some items away, packing others to give away to charity.

He kept a large duffle bag stuffed to the brim with old greeting cards, papers, bills, bank statements, retirement statements and the like. They must not have been important to him because several hundred pieces of mail were never opened. As I was going through them, I began to read the greeting cards. Thought he might want to keep the ones from his son that he hasn't seen in years.

As I read them, a different Richard emerged. With a completely different life than the one he had presented to me. Among them I found several years worth of cards from a woman named "Sandra," cards that one lover would give to another. Other cards were from "Sandra and the kids." Still others were from "Sandra's" children: Father's Day cards where the children referred to him as their dad. These cards were dated from 1996-1998. We have been a couple since 1982. So this man, who I cherished so, and remained ever faithful to, and fought so hard to get help turned out to be a fraud. And that's probably just the tip of the iceberg. I could have gone through his bag years ago, but never felt the need nor desire to do so. I'd say the reason for that was because I trusted him, but that would be untrue.

The reason was because I was in denial. Deep down I knew that I wouldn't have to look very hard to see that our relationship was floundering and that he wasn't trustworthy. I convinced myself that what I didn't know wouldn't hurt me.

I'm no longer afraid of the truth; I'm no longer willing to look at the world through rose-colored glasses; I no longer believe in fairy tale romances, storybook weddings, and happily ever after; I'm no longer willing to live in denial. I want to live a life that's authentic, real, and honest, even if knowing the truth hurts. And above all, I'm no longer willing to associate with people who hide their true selves from me.

That's what I mean when I say the relationships we had with our alcoholic partners were not real and all we had was a combination of fantasies made up in our minds and lots and lots of lies and manipulation on their part.

To find the truth, you have to dig down deep. Sure it hurts, but it's all part of healing.

MsGolightly

FD, i'll have you know that my eyes filled with tears as i read this part.

i'm finally at this stage (although i do still believe in happily ever after ) and it took me a long time to get here. i think it just happened today. as i read posts from you and other wise members here, it just struck me, that i haven't deserved what i've gotten, and that i'm holding out for more. because there IS more.

chero, i can see what you're saying, too. my ex was sober all of last year, and boy, did i love our relationship and think we had something totally "real" - but i learned after we broke up how she cheated on me and how she left me for someone else, that she had known way before me. i was totally duped, and i fell for everything she said the whole time we were together - and apparently, none of it was honest. it hurt like heck to learn that, it still makes me angry that something i thought was so real, never really existed.

(i'm not saying your marriage is like that, i'm just understanding what you're saying because i was there too not so long ago)

chero

Wow, FD! I think I can sort of understand what you are saying now.

If I had that duffel bag in front of me right now I could not go through it. Guess I'm still a little bit afraid of the truth.

Brian and I were only married a year before the drinking started and after reading what you wrote I can see how he did not know the real me. Maybe it was the honeymoon phase or something. But that means I probably didn't know the real him either. There wasn't enough time to totally be ourselves without alcohol.

I'm not ready to open the duffle bag but I understand why now. Thanks.

FormerDoormat

"i'm holding out for more. because there IS more."

I agree, InThisForMe. When I started holding out for more, I got more. We all deserve so much more than we've settled for in the past. It's time to reclaim our lives and demand more.

denny57

Thank you for sharing, FD - that's very powerful stuff.

minnie

FD, you're a star. I have never been able to truly put into words what I think about this subject and you have done so beautifully. Thank you. And I am so sorry that you had to find those cards and letters. I know, for me, that I was liberated when I realised I was nothing more than an object in R's life, however that feeling did not come without pain and hard work.

Chero - do you really think you had an alcohol-free relationship or did he just hide it well until a) it got progressively worse so that he could hide it no longer and b) that he had worked on you enough that you would accept the unacceptable? And no, the relationship will never be the same again, regardless of whether he gets sober or not. How can it be?

As you can imagine, I have a ton to say about it, but I have to dash to work now.

mallowcup

We can let go of what we have but we can keep what we have on our own terms. Leaving him, isn't just leaving him. It's leaving the home I've built and loved. It means altering the realtionships I have with all the people around him that I have come to love. This life and this house are the evidence of "me". Sometimes leaving him means leaving so much more and THAT is the hard part. So many people have said to me, "Why don't you leave?". My reason have les to do with him and more to do with my home, my dogs, my garden, my bed, my kitchen, tho ones who love US being together. For years I thought my choices were limited to staying or going.
I have manipulated my own life to be what I want it to be. I work now during his peak drinking hours. He has his patterns and I have mine.