Reddmax

This may be a sister thread to the Isolation and codependence thread going on now.

My question to the group is: When your A insists that the matter to be kept private between the two of you, is that fair or grounded? If you internalize things, you'll go crazy. At least, if you talk to someone else, you get the emotional catharsis of venting, and the added advantage of another viewpoint.

The primary objection my A has to me talking to anyone about my problems is that "What will they think about me." Her desire is that we work it out privately. However, that's the whole problem. She's intoxicated and toxic, and can't work it out.

Very confused,

Redd

LaTeeDa

My thoughts on this are that you have a right to support. Secrecy is a hallmark of dysfunctional relationships.

But, from my experience, I would caution you to choose wisely when looking for support. My friends and family got very tired of hearing about my troubles, and couldn't really provide the kind of support I needed. (although I didn't realize it at the time)

The best thing I ever did for myself was seek out counseling. Many others here have found the support they needed in Alanon. If your A doesn't want you to share in supportive situations such as these, then I would say "too bad."

L

starflier

Keeping it secret keeps it hidden and encourages you to continue having fantasies about how you want the relationship to be, rather than how it really is. I speak from experience.

My entire childhood was spent under the umbrella of secretiveness. As kids, we were severely punished if our mother found out that we told anyone outside of our family anything at all about our family, even innocuous information. That left my mother free to carry out any kind of abuse she could imagine. And, she had a vivid imagination.

When I was married to my abusive husband, I kept the pact and refused to let anyone know what my life was like. Nobody knew, and I mean nobody. Not my family or his family, not anybody. I lived with constant abuse for 15 years and nobody knew.

My current relationship has been the same. I have always lived with the idea that if I choose a partner, and I don't like something about this person, then it's my fault for choosing that person. What a crock!

Only lately have I begun airing any of my feelings to other people. I started by talking to my adult daughters, then to this group, then to one of my sisters, and today I will talk to my therapist for the first time.

I have found that letting my problems come to the surface and be exposed to others makes them real to me, not just secrets I keep to myself that may or may not be true. Keeping unhealthy secrets instills a feeling of craziness in you and destroys your ability to fully examine your life.

I hope my experience helps you understand that maintaining strict silence about what's going on in your home provides a cloak of secrecy that enables the insanity to continue unabated.

Reddmax

So we have two somewhat divergent opinions here. La, why do you say that friends and family didn't provide the support you needed? I'm curious. Is it because the counselor was objective? Could you clarify?

ajangels2

Reddmax,
I agree that not having anyone to discuss these issues with is very difficult. I have learned the hard way by going to family about the issues I've had with my AH. Because I have done this it has made it very difficult for him to even be around them because they have formed their own opinions about his addiction and his behavior. It is now his boundary that instead of me using my family I will use our therapist or my Alanon group for support. If I can't get to someone immediately then I need to journal out what I'm going through and keep trying to get in touch with a friend. Talking it out in a healthy way has been a blessing for me, but I do regret saying so much to my family. Hope some of this helps and that regardless of your A's insecurity about this it is very important to your recovery that you have people to talk about these things.

Peace,
AJ

LaTeeDa

I don't think the opinions are divergent. We both agree that support is needed and secrecy is counterproductive. My friends and family we unable to help me see the things my counselor helped me see. Things I need to look at inside myself. Thoughts, beliefs, and patterns that contributed to the madness. All my friends and family could do was commiserate with me and tell me to leave. I guess what it comes down to is whether you just want someone to listen to you vent, or you want to actually do something productive about the situation.

L

starflier

I'm not sure that our opinions are diverging. I completely agree that you need to choose your confidants carefully. You want people who will support you, be there for you when you need them, but you don't want to abuse that support. If the basis for your relationship with your confidants is the constant haranguing of your partner, it would not be a good thing. They should listen, offer their support, and then you need to move on.

My main point is just to feel that you are free to talk about every aspect of your life to whomever you choose. There should be no unreasonable restraints that make you feel you're alone and begin to doubt your sanity.
Just my 2 cents.

FormerDoormat

His boundary???

Reddmax

Okay... I think I see now. I have to deal with this in a healthy way. Healthy, means a way that is not obsessive, nor clingy. I have to make decisions and trust in myself. It makes sense, its just very scary...

Lilyflower

My exabf hated me discussing our problems with anyone. He would yell at me when I was talking to friends/family on our house phone, sometimes even hanging up on my calls. He would more than often mouth silently what a b**ch, **** etc I was from across the room when I would be on a call, and I would be intimidated enough to end it.

Once i talked to his sister about some things and begged her not to say anothing to the abf. Not realising why this would be bad for me, his sister told him that I had chatted to her about things, little did she realise what she had set me up for. When abf came home that evening drunk and angry I felt the full force of his temper, he punched me in the side of my head.

I knew I needed an outlet, so I quickly learnt never to talk to anyone on our house phone unless he was out, and then to choose carefully those people I knew would not pass anything back to him.

My family would always listen to me, but because of their own codependancy issues and also because they were aware how abusive he was to me, I would just often end up with my mum crying to me, or my dad threatening to come to the house and deal with him - that was not what I needed to get better or rescue myself.

I found SR, I reached out to close friends also in recovery, I found a counsellor. I didn't want to keep putting the emotional strain on those who loved me. They knew I was home with an alcoholic, that we argued etc but the less intimate details they knew the better for them as it tore their heart to hear it from their little girl.

Lily xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Reddmax

Okay... I understand. It's a big thing adulthood. I grew up in a family with problems, but we were always close. Its difficult not to share with them. It's also difficult to sit at home with a bomb ticking. It wears on you.

cmc

There are plenty of safe ways to share; counseling, a trusted friend or relative, meetings and here at SR.

I try to keep in mind the part in Step 9, although taken out of context it helps me make these kinds of decisions:".....except when to do so would injure them or others." First of all...I screen anyone I consider sharing with and ask myself if it will it injure me or possibly harm the person I need to vent about?

If a person is consumed with covering up, sometimes it's just one more consequence they don't want to face. Typically things will progress to the point where it's impossible to hide or cover a problem and in that case the point of privacy is moot.

starflier

Red, I have been thinking about you all morning, and just had to post and ask how you're doing? I'm sure others are wondering, too.

Reddmax

I'm doing okay, I think. I have a myriad of thoughts running through my head, as usual. The biggest problem I have right now is how active I should be in protecting myself.

The AW has said she's going to counseling. But, there are all of the little "conditions" associated with it. It can't be group counseling, the counselors must accept her insurance, not just mine, they have to be close. She was home last night and was tired and irritable. I think she's setting me up to say " I'm handling this by myself, you see, I've only had two beers a night for the last week, I don't need counseling". I'm dreading that.

The reason I'm dreading that is I don't want to spend 30k because someone else is crazy. I know its reality, and I know I'll survive, but its still sad.

I also am dreading my therapist appt. tomorrow. In another thread I brought up BPD (Borderline Personality Disorder). My therapist has that as a specialty, and I am going to ask her if that will complicate the divorce process.

And the last thing, and most important thing, is that I'm lonely. When I go home tonight, I'll be alone. No one to talk to, just work to do, and its driving me insane. The daughter is staying away, just because she wants to avoid stuff.

And then the last question that echos through my head. How in the heck did I get myself into this?

Reddmax

Also, the future is pretty scary to me.

Normally, I'm a great believer in myself. Now, I'm aging, and my dreams are slipping away, and the economy sucks.... especially in my state. I'm balancing my responsibility to the commitments I made here, and comparing them to what I believe the future may bring, and its making everything more complicated.

GiveLove

Red,

Do you have any friends you can be with instead of your usual routine of go-home, work-on-the-house, wait-for-wife-to-drink-or-not-drink ?

Can you break your pattern tonight?

Or has she manipulated you into isolating yourself from your friends too? that's a fairly common pattern.

Me, I would not hesitate to confide in my family if I needed their help and support. I wouldn't confide in my spouse's family, but I would certainly speak with my own, especially if you're close. That's what family is for, in my book, and I know I would need the closeness and support if I were currently in your shoes.

You don't need to be negative - it doesn't have to be a bash-the-wife session. You can explain what's going on and what you're hoping will happen and talk about your fears. It may help. Isolation is paralyzing you.

You do not need to be isolated. There is not one good reason for it.

GiveLove

This is what being with a manipulative alcoholic will do to you -- undermine the inner strength you know you have deep down inside, and make the future look ominous and dark.

I left a strong career at 40 in a crappy economy to start my own (very) small business. I made it so that I didn't need much to live on (though I had to do without the $3000.00 TVs; I haven't missed them), I started having fun hanging out with people & family instead of spending, I stopped spending five hundred dollars a month on gas, and voila, everything worked out fine.

You can do whatever you want to do. It doesn't matter your age, or even necessarily the state of the economy. You identify where you can put your skills to best use and make a little money and have a fun life. Don't let your fear lock you into just one way of thinking. Grab a copy of Barbara Winter's "Making a Living Without a Job" if you don't believe me. It's not easy, but it's also not hard.

Everything is possible, Red.

P.S. The best life-changing book about rearranging my life so it meant something was "Your Money or Your Life". It doesn't matter who you are or how much you make -- that book really opens your eyes to what the whole money-in money-out thing means, and how to make it work for you, no matter what the times are. Smart, interesting, and full of hope. I can't recommend that strongly enough.

freya

I don't really believe that it is possible to overstate the importance of truth telling to successful recovery and/or to being able to get the support one really needs in order to work and maintain a successful recovery. As others have said, enforced silence and secrecy are two of the major ways that dysfunction and abuse protect and perpetuate themselves. This is where all of those cliches about "the elephant in the living room," "we don't air our dirty laundry in public," "don't give your family (or your company, or your country, or whatever) a black eye," blah, blah, blah...

My partner was really big into trying to tell me I shouldn't be talking about what was up in our relationship when she was in major dry-drunk relapse...Actually now that I look back on it, the worse she got, the more she tried to push this line of manipulative, alcoholic BS on me, which, now that I think of it, is a pretty good sign that it is definitely BS right there.

Luckily, I've got to say that this was one thing I was absolutely 100% clear about way before I ever heard about Al Anon: I have the right to have support people (family, friends, professionals, etc....whomever I choose to trust) in my life. I have the right to talk openly and honestly about what is going on in my life -- and if that includes the insanity of alcoholic behavior on the part of my significant other, then so be it. There is something really crazy-weird (as in "controlling, isolating, and borderline ABUSIVE") -- not to mention totally unacceptable -- about a partner trying to keep me from exercising these rights. And, finally, there is no way that anyone is getting away with this crap with me.

What is really going on when an alcoholic -- or any other abusive person -- starts up with this line of BS????? 1) They know that their behavior is unacceptable, and they know that if you get the healthy help and support you need, their "free ride" on your enabling is in danger; and 2) They know that, if word gets out about their behavior, they're not only going to be embarrassed, but a lot of other people might start thinking twice about trusting them, employing them, helping them out....whatever; In short, they know 3) that the the first step to dealing with any problem comes with speaking the truth about what the problem is, and, since their behavior constitutes a large part of the problem, they are scared sh*tless that the truth might be known.

Now, I most certainly am not advocating anyone's going around and indiscriminately yack-yack-yacking about the alcoholic's (or anyone else's) bad behavior......i.e. I am not advocating gossiping or being stuck in endless, distracting focusing on the problem. But, in order to get to solutions, the problems must first be honestly identified, discussed, and worked through, and yes, that means talking about what is really going on as much as you need to with the people with whom you feel you need to talk about it.

And, if the alcoholic doesn't like the fact that when you or anyone else speaks honestly about her behavior this does indeed cause her to be viewed more negatively by people, then guess what????? She has every right in the world to change her behavior so that she will be viewed more positively!!! (Usually a concept unimaginable to an active alcoholic, but the truth, nonetheless.) But, she never has any right to stop anyone from speaking the truth....or from getting the help and support they need by doing so.

freya

GiveLove

Amen! Though it sounds like such hard work to an alcoholic: repair the damage I've done to the relationships in my life? Oh no!

starflier

Maybe one of the reasons I found myself thinking of you is that your situation is, in many ways, similar to my own. My AP has severe anxiety disorders, which she self-medicates with alcohol. She has the same kinds of restrictions on what kind of counselling she will seek because of her disorder, so there can't be any group therapy, which rules out any kind of in-patient facility, and no AA meetings. She, too, says she'll go to a therapist, but unless I look up which ones are covered by our insurance, and probably even then unless I make the first appointment for her, she won't do it. I've gone that route before, and refuse to do it this time.

Basically, just a bunch of stalling techniques and unwillingness to do anything about her alcoholism, which is clearly progressing.

I've been working lately at breaking the routine of my evenings, as GiveLove is suggesting. For the last few years, I would arrive home at about 6:30 pm, and my AP would be fairly inebriated by that time. I would usually have a couple glasses of wine to try to lull my irritation, and we'd sit and watch a video while eating supper. Then to bed.

In the last couple of weeks, I quit drinking completely, as I found that "lulling my irritation" was a big key to how I'd stayed in this relationship so long. I was just treading water, and that's what I wanted to stop doing. So now, I come home, and I find it really hard to be around her. I've started going out and working in the yard instead of being inside the house, I've been staying later at work, I am now taking an online course in real estate investment, which I'd been putting off for a while, and I am taking my dog for lots more walks. I know, not too exciting, but it's a change from my regular routine.

Of course, my AP is getting more and more anxious, is starting to follow me around, telling me in a weepy voice how much she loves me, and is basically getting more childlike. This is not an easy road, and if I'm not careful I get depressed, but that's one of the reasons I started therapy this week.

I'm curious about what you mean regarding spending 30k because someone else is crazy?