Just for argument sake
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Just for argument sake
I just want to chew the fat so to speak. I was thinking that if I were in a different relationship where alcohol or drugs was not a problem…would I still do all that I do now. My answer is yes. Would I love deeply? Yes! Would I still work hard to make every day great? Yes! Would I do little things that are asked of me? Yes! Am I really codependent because I give as much of myself as possible? I still make time for myself and pretty much enjoy life. Basically I would not change who I am even if I were in a relationship that was alcohol free. I feel good about the person that I am. I have a good heart. I care…often times too much. Is that really bad? I’m just asking those of you who have reached serenity. Would you change who you are or did you change who you were to become who you are today? 
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Join Date: Nov 2007
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One of the ways I like to think of codependency is in terms of balance. I can have as big a heart as I do, and give a huge amount.
But in a relationship, it should be balanced by the other person doing the same. The same respect, the same consideration, the same attitudes, etc. Not tit for tat, but equal value and respect.
It's when I allow (or I accept) a relationship to function way out of balance that I exhibit codependency.
CLMI
But in a relationship, it should be balanced by the other person doing the same. The same respect, the same consideration, the same attitudes, etc. Not tit for tat, but equal value and respect.
It's when I allow (or I accept) a relationship to function way out of balance that I exhibit codependency.
CLMI
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I get what you are saying. I have torn myself apart asking why this has happened to DAH. I know I have done everything in my power to make our lives great. I really thought that being a great partner would be enough. We once had balance. AH was always attentive, thoughtful and we shared something I thought was impenetrable. AH has moments or times of sobriety and he is that man once more. Makes my head spin as to why he can't just put it down and go back to being happy. I just always associated having rough patches with marriage. That every relationship had its ups and downs. He does things for me that I can do for myself...i.e. make sure my oil is changed and the air pressure in my tires is good. I'll come home and the dishes will be done or the house will be cleaned. On occasion he will pick me up a latte (my fav). He does kind things and is generally a kind-hearted person. Truly baffling. I think though...that even if we do not make it...I'm not sure I will change all that much about myself. I'm far from perfect, but you know what...I sure try hard to be a good person. Anyways...sorry for the pshycobabble. Just thinking with my fingers.
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Actually, one of the things that led me to end my marriage was when I realized I didn't like who I had become. I was angry a lot of the time, resentful about doing everything and getting nothing in return, and obsessed with getting him to change. All the while oblivious to the fact that I was changing in ways I never thought I would.
I also agree that there is nothing wrong with being a committed partner to your spouse when that spouse is a committed partner to you. When it gets out of balance, and you keep shoveling all that love, caring, and compassion into a bottomless pit, then you have to look at it and ask yourself why.
I don't really think I have changed who I am. I have, however, drastically changed how I behave. Plus, I think it's really impossible to know what you would do in a particular circumstance until you are in that circumstance. JMHO.
L
I also agree that there is nothing wrong with being a committed partner to your spouse when that spouse is a committed partner to you. When it gets out of balance, and you keep shoveling all that love, caring, and compassion into a bottomless pit, then you have to look at it and ask yourself why.
Basically I would not change who I am even if I were in a relationship that was alcohol free.
L
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"Christin,
I have stayed out of fear, I have stayed out of love, I have stayed out of support and I have stayed for the simple fact that I think it is crappy that alcohol could be the reason my marriage has failed. The only part about drinking that I have not encountered is the physical side. Emotionally my AH left our marriage a very long time ago. He left when he loved the bottle more than his family.
If you are in a position to do so...lay it on the line and set boundaries that you can keep. For your baby's sake...dont let him grow up to be a wife beater or a drunk....as that is what he is learning from his dad right now.
I look into the eyes of my son and Im terrified that he will follow in his father's footsteps. The statistics are clear. My son has a 99% chance of being an alcoholic just because of his dad...grandpa, great grandpa, uncles, aunts etc. No one on my side of the family drinks including me. I am his only hope of a normal life and I finally had to face that.
My daughter will probably marry an ungreatful manipulative man because I have trained her how to stick it out through thick and thin...even when it is not in return. I have to live with that every single day.
Make the best choice for yourself.
Lover"
Lover,
Here is one of your posts from 2007. I just wanted to keep you remembering that there is really a problem--with your husband and his continued drinking, and with you staying, according to YOU. Unless things have drastically changed and your children are no longer witnessing events in the home, it is still something to think about. At least back in 2007, it seemed like you would wish to do some things differently. I'm not saying you are wrong for being in love, but is it right to keep hanging in there after all this time? Only you can make that call, for you and your kids.
Love,
KJ
I have stayed out of fear, I have stayed out of love, I have stayed out of support and I have stayed for the simple fact that I think it is crappy that alcohol could be the reason my marriage has failed. The only part about drinking that I have not encountered is the physical side. Emotionally my AH left our marriage a very long time ago. He left when he loved the bottle more than his family.
If you are in a position to do so...lay it on the line and set boundaries that you can keep. For your baby's sake...dont let him grow up to be a wife beater or a drunk....as that is what he is learning from his dad right now.
I look into the eyes of my son and Im terrified that he will follow in his father's footsteps. The statistics are clear. My son has a 99% chance of being an alcoholic just because of his dad...grandpa, great grandpa, uncles, aunts etc. No one on my side of the family drinks including me. I am his only hope of a normal life and I finally had to face that.
My daughter will probably marry an ungreatful manipulative man because I have trained her how to stick it out through thick and thin...even when it is not in return. I have to live with that every single day.
Make the best choice for yourself.
Lover"
Lover,
Here is one of your posts from 2007. I just wanted to keep you remembering that there is really a problem--with your husband and his continued drinking, and with you staying, according to YOU. Unless things have drastically changed and your children are no longer witnessing events in the home, it is still something to think about. At least back in 2007, it seemed like you would wish to do some things differently. I'm not saying you are wrong for being in love, but is it right to keep hanging in there after all this time? Only you can make that call, for you and your kids.
Love,
KJ
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Join Date: May 2007
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Thank you for that reminder. I didn't even recognize that as being me. I have changed so much in 2 years and so has AH. I still don't know if it is enough. I hear people say that I will know when I have had enough. My kids tell me that they have a great time with their dad most of the time. I enjoy most of my time with him as well. Its the times that he is selfish and drinks himself into oblivion that I feel I have been let down and that I cannot live with him. In 2007 is when AH really slid down that slippery slope. It was only then that I had come to realize that he was an alcoholic. Each time he would come back from the dead and try to clean up his act. He does really really well for quite awhile and then somehow slips back down the slide. I guess I should go back and read all my posts. I truly did not know those were my words until I saw my name at the bottom. Scary.
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Loving, caring, nurturing, helping, supporting, etc.... these are defintely all good things -- but, and this is a big BUT, there is also defintely such as thing as too much of a good thing.
If my loving, caring, nurturing, helping, supporting, etc....is totally focused on others to the extent that I do not -- and never even think about -- doing those same things for myself, then there's a problem.
If my loving, caring, nurturing, helping, supporting, etc... is focused only on those others who do not and cannot give a reasonable amount of the same back to me, then there's a problem.
If my self-worth and my identity depend on my being engaged in loving, caring, nurturing, helping, supporting others, then there's a problem.
If, when I sit quietly by myself for an extended period of time, I feel an uneasy sense that I "should" be doing something for or somehow relating to someone else, then there's a problem.
If my taking care of others deprives them of the chance to learn and to grow and to do the things they need to be doing for themselves in order for them to have healthy self-resepct and a sense of dignity, then there's a problem.
Basically, there's problem whenever and insofar as I do any of these basically good things -- loving, caring, nurturing, helping, supporting, etc.... to such an over-the-edge, unhealthy and dangerous to self-and-others extreme that their affect actually ends up being the exact opposite of what it would be in a healthy, truly loving situation.....There's also a problem whenver I engage in any behavior usually associated loving, caring, nurturing, helping, supporting, etc..., not for motives that have anything to do with real love and respect, but for motives (often sub-conscious) that have to do with fear, and control, and manipulation, and the desire to somehow compensate for lack of healthy, strong, separate self and sense-of-self.
Ideally, I think healthy adult relationships should be interdependent, and, in such relationships, obviously one is going to be doing some of the same things one does in a, unhealthy, controlling co-dependent relationship......but to a hugely different extent and for very, very different reasons.
freya
If my loving, caring, nurturing, helping, supporting, etc....is totally focused on others to the extent that I do not -- and never even think about -- doing those same things for myself, then there's a problem.
If my loving, caring, nurturing, helping, supporting, etc... is focused only on those others who do not and cannot give a reasonable amount of the same back to me, then there's a problem.
If my self-worth and my identity depend on my being engaged in loving, caring, nurturing, helping, supporting others, then there's a problem.
If, when I sit quietly by myself for an extended period of time, I feel an uneasy sense that I "should" be doing something for or somehow relating to someone else, then there's a problem.
If my taking care of others deprives them of the chance to learn and to grow and to do the things they need to be doing for themselves in order for them to have healthy self-resepct and a sense of dignity, then there's a problem.
Basically, there's problem whenever and insofar as I do any of these basically good things -- loving, caring, nurturing, helping, supporting, etc.... to such an over-the-edge, unhealthy and dangerous to self-and-others extreme that their affect actually ends up being the exact opposite of what it would be in a healthy, truly loving situation.....There's also a problem whenver I engage in any behavior usually associated loving, caring, nurturing, helping, supporting, etc..., not for motives that have anything to do with real love and respect, but for motives (often sub-conscious) that have to do with fear, and control, and manipulation, and the desire to somehow compensate for lack of healthy, strong, separate self and sense-of-self.
Ideally, I think healthy adult relationships should be interdependent, and, in such relationships, obviously one is going to be doing some of the same things one does in a, unhealthy, controlling co-dependent relationship......but to a hugely different extent and for very, very different reasons.
freya
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It's all part of the dance. The things we tell ourselves in order to get through it. THIS time he really means it. THIS time things will be better. THIS time will be the last time. If you actually go back and look, I suspect you will see a definite pattern. With mine, it was approximately 6 months. About twice a year, I would get so fed up and angry I would threaten to leave. He would then 'keep a lid on it' for 4-6 months. Then all hell would break loose again, I would threaten to leave, he would behave for a while. Lather, rinse, repeat. Not coincidentally, my parents followed the same pattern. In talking with my mom, her parents did, too.
The cycle stops with me.
L
The cycle stops with me.
L
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Join Date: Dec 2006
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I care…often times too much. Is that really bad? I’m just asking those of you who have reached serenity. Would you change who you are or did you change who you were to become who you are today?
Like you, I often convinced myself that everything was fine, that I was simply a loving person, and what the heck was wrong with that. That was my justification for why I kept having to pay his bills when he drank up all his money, wonder where he was, clean up soiled sheets, live in a relationship where all of the joy had been extinguished. If I'd had children, I would show them what it meant to "stick it out through thick and thin" in my relationships like it was some kind of badge of honor, thus guaranteeing they would grow up in the same misery I was suffering most of the time.
Because, of course, I had convinced myself I wasn't suffering it at all.
Lover, there aren't enough lattes in the world to make me do that ever again.
Was I a good person then? Sure was. Did I change to become a better, happier, stronger one? Damned straight I did.
Since you asked.
p.s. My folks did the same thing. I learned it from them. Your kids will learn it from you.
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I'll respond more later, because I think this is an important topic, but I agree exactly with LTD's first response and:
I find that I "adjust" according to the relationship, probably more then I should, but I respond to love, communication and integrity in kind the bad news is:
One of the scariest things about my last relationship is after a year or so I had either acquired her behaviors, or bad behaviors in response to her behaviors, she was distrustful, snooped through my stuff, abusive, manipulative etc
By the end of the relationship, if I took her out of the equation (which I did in steps four and five) I realized I was also displaying all of these behaviors.
I agree with LTD in you never know how you will behave in any given situation until you are in it, "walk a mile in someone else's shoes" is a far more important thing then just advice.
This is why we have "experience, strength, and hope" as recovery language, not advice or opinion, because advice or opinion means jack unless you have "walked a mile", it sounds good, but it's ultimately useless because it's not based on reality, it's based on what we think reality should be, which is called "magical thinking"
So for me, I wish I could be Gandhi regardless of my circumstances, and it's what I preached to my sponsees for many many years because I had been a paramedic (dealt with others life and death issues) and had a super risky job (putting my life at risk daily) and had learned to do these with a Gandhi like calm, I thought that would/should be able to be applied to my/your emotional life, and I found that it just wasn't the case for me, that I am deeply affected by my emotional climate.
So for me, although recovery is an inside job, I have found it's pretty important to care for my outsides, not so much by retail therapy say, but by caring for myself and appearance (self esteem), supporting myself (self esteem), not being dependent on others (self esteem), and only having healthy people and thoughts in my life (self esteem) and working a program (self esteem) and only having a relationship where it's 50/50 (self esteem), working with others (self esteem) (esteemable acts)
Anyhow, if I do ALL of these things I have a chance....just a chance, but a chance to be happy and satisfied, if I don't, I absolutely behave differently, that's my experience.
I find that I "adjust" according to the relationship, probably more then I should, but I respond to love, communication and integrity in kind the bad news is:
One of the scariest things about my last relationship is after a year or so I had either acquired her behaviors, or bad behaviors in response to her behaviors, she was distrustful, snooped through my stuff, abusive, manipulative etc
By the end of the relationship, if I took her out of the equation (which I did in steps four and five) I realized I was also displaying all of these behaviors.
I agree with LTD in you never know how you will behave in any given situation until you are in it, "walk a mile in someone else's shoes" is a far more important thing then just advice.
This is why we have "experience, strength, and hope" as recovery language, not advice or opinion, because advice or opinion means jack unless you have "walked a mile", it sounds good, but it's ultimately useless because it's not based on reality, it's based on what we think reality should be, which is called "magical thinking"
So for me, I wish I could be Gandhi regardless of my circumstances, and it's what I preached to my sponsees for many many years because I had been a paramedic (dealt with others life and death issues) and had a super risky job (putting my life at risk daily) and had learned to do these with a Gandhi like calm, I thought that would/should be able to be applied to my/your emotional life, and I found that it just wasn't the case for me, that I am deeply affected by my emotional climate.
So for me, although recovery is an inside job, I have found it's pretty important to care for my outsides, not so much by retail therapy say, but by caring for myself and appearance (self esteem), supporting myself (self esteem), not being dependent on others (self esteem), and only having healthy people and thoughts in my life (self esteem) and working a program (self esteem) and only having a relationship where it's 50/50 (self esteem), working with others (self esteem) (esteemable acts)
Anyhow, if I do ALL of these things I have a chance....just a chance, but a chance to be happy and satisfied, if I don't, I absolutely behave differently, that's my experience.
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Join Date: Nov 2008
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Hi,
Like LaTeeda, I haven't liked the person I HAVE become (by staying in an unhealthy relationship), and currently am trying to get back to my "old" self with new insights. Boy, it is a SLOW process, but when I think about where I was I am miles down the road. Not where I want to be, but far from where I was.
Totally agree with Ago's ideas of building back self esteem. I too am doing that now. Lost almost all self worth/esteem/confidence. Although, superficial retail and spa therapy works wonders for me on very tired, down days when I need to feel pampered and nurtured. L used to nurture me (when he felt like it), but now I am learning to nurture myself.
Had L and I not broken up in the messy way we did, I would have stayed in the relationship, married him and had NO idea that there was anything wrong with me. Scary.
Miss
Like LaTeeda, I haven't liked the person I HAVE become (by staying in an unhealthy relationship), and currently am trying to get back to my "old" self with new insights. Boy, it is a SLOW process, but when I think about where I was I am miles down the road. Not where I want to be, but far from where I was.
Totally agree with Ago's ideas of building back self esteem. I too am doing that now. Lost almost all self worth/esteem/confidence. Although, superficial retail and spa therapy works wonders for me on very tired, down days when I need to feel pampered and nurtured. L used to nurture me (when he felt like it), but now I am learning to nurture myself.
Had L and I not broken up in the messy way we did, I would have stayed in the relationship, married him and had NO idea that there was anything wrong with me. Scary.
Miss
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Originally Posted by loverof1 
My kids tell me that they have a great time with their dad most of the time. I enjoy most of my time with him as well. Its the times that he is selfish and drinks himself into oblivion that I feel I have been let down and that I cannot live with him.
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