grrl77

So tonight. I'm with my girlfriend, we're in a bookstore. I run across a jazz book - one of course, my ex-ahbf would completely appreciate. Not even thinking, what do I do? Whip him up on the phone. I wanted to know his fave jazz artist, because I thought he might be in the book and wasn't sure. No answer. So I text him. No answer. I can feel myself getting annoyed, my head going to places like rehashing our breakup all of a sudden, things like "Why is it that he gets to "be the smarter one" in this? Why isn't he chasing me? Why does he get to be the one who avoids me when he's the one with the problem?" And it really started to get to me. I really believe that in his mind, he broke up with me to "save me" from him. And he may have, but I think he also did it because he didn't wanna give up the drink, so in reality, heh.. it's not some heroism on his part, it's total selfishness.

It frustrates me that all this still matters to me. It frustrates me that, while I know it's been over for fourteen months now, that we still have feelings for eachother, somewhere in the middle of all this. And while I know for sure that in reality, it's so not this simple, my mind can't help but go into this place of, "My God, if you weren't an alcoholic, we probably could have had a fair shot and actually do all the things we used to talk about. But nope. You broke up with me, that's how it'll remain, and we'll both always sit here and still miss one another and probably think about one another - at least I think about him, and yeah, I get on a rampage where I wonder if he still thinks about me, I wonder if he ever misses me, or saved any of my cards or letters, or anything of that nature.

I guess tonight, I'm missing being missed. I wanna be chased. I wanna have lots of attention thrown my way because I'm worth it. Yet the man I want it from more than anything, can't give me jack. He can't give anyone, anything.

So. I shut my phone, and walked right over to the self-help section and snagged myself CoDependent No More. Hoping I can read this and get a little light shed. I'm still frustrated with these thoughts though. They drive me crazy, and I'm left with feeling like I *really* miss him tonight. I wonder what he's doing, where he is. It pisses me off that I even let it invade my thoughts when just two days ago, I was so confident and good with all of it.

transformyself

Sweet! What a fantastic location to determine you're ready to read that book.

For me, once I start down that path of regret and abandonment, it's a steep rocky climb back out of the abyss. But not impossible. Just hard work.

wanting

You know...I have had to get to a place where I am OK with the fact that AH may have left me because he might just not love me or be into me that much. It may not be this dramatic thing where he secretly is pining over me, but wants to save me from himself. It may be that he just doesn't have feelings for me. It was a hard thought to face, but I feel 1000 times freer than when I tried to romaticize things. I was keeping myself in a prison by having those thoughts. I don't know, maybe you could work with just trying out that thought for awhile. Try telling yourself, "He doesn't love me, and that's OK. He doesn't miss me, and that's OK." And then maybe, one day you'll realize that you didn't love him or miss him either. Maybe you just loved the dream, missed the dream, that you had of who he was. One thing I did was a make a list of all the horrible things that happened in our relationship, and then, I made a list of all the things I truly wanted in a relationship. Then, I went through the "what I want" list and wrote "yes" or "no" next to each one, depending on whether AH matched up. Out of about 50 items, he matched up with 3.

grrl77

I guess that's what's hard to accept, because (and I don't think I'm just fooling myself) I don't think that's really the case. Together, we made a great team. He used to talk about how good we were for each other, even in the end. He'd tried cutting back, and going sober for a week to see if he could do it, for me. It was all on his own volition, I didn't make him. He'd come out here for vacation, we had a great time - he met my family, he went back and told his family all about me. And then a few weeks later, as the date of his "I'm Going To Get Help" thing approached (he'd said he was going to get help within a certain time frame, and it was looming closer and closer) he just called me and broke out with how we're just not a good match, and I'm not this and that for him.. None of it made *any sense* at all given what just happened weeks before. We honestly (aside from the drinking, of course) had a pretty good relationship and we'd just gotten back from such a fun time together. I think what happened is, the "due date" so to speak was looming closer and it scared him because he wasn't really ready to quit.

To this day, he's made comments about how it wasn't really about us, he just didn't wanna give up drink. I know that probably doesn't make it any better, but in my head, it's so frustrating. One of those, "Well if you didn't have this problem, we'd be okay. If you could get over this problem - like you admit you need to - we'd be okay."

Know what I mean?

FindingPeace1

He gifted you from being in the painful, revolving door, craziness of partnership with an alcoholic. He gifted you. He freed you.
Now, your misery is due to your thoughts. Just your thoughts. Your life is clear and clean. HOORAY! Why? Because you can choose to step away from thoughts in the blink of an eye and be back in the clean, simplicity of the life you want to create.
Congratulations.
Hugs.

wanting

I get it. I really do. Why don't you try replacing "drink" with "other woman" and see if that feels OK. Because it's the same thing. He loves the drink more than you. If he said he loved another woman more than you, it would be a lot easier to let go, even though it's the same thing. We want to make it different, because it hurts less that way.

On Thanksgiving, my AH started sobbing and apologizing and saying he loved me and that maybe we could work things out. Yet, he was planning to leave in a few days to go on a road trip with the person he had an affair with and help her move back here to be with him. I feel so lucky right now that it's another woman involved, and not *just* alcohol, because I know I would have been so swept up in his declarations of love and I would have rationalized it away if he was going on a road trip with his fave drinking buddy instead of with the other woman. (He's sober at the moment, btw.) But it would be the same thing. He still can't be the man I deserve and he still isn't truly sorry or truly in love with me.

wanting

I wanted to add that I totally understand about wanting to contact them because of stuff you know they'd appreciate. AH and I were pretty friendly before this latest episode. We are pretty into music and he introduced me to a new band a couple of weeks ago and I introduced him to a new one too. Well, I just picked up the new Bust magazine, and both bands are featured. I *so* want to text him or just give him the issue next time he comes to get the kids. But no. No, no, no, 1000 times no.

grrl77

I'm trying really hard to get to that point. Some days I am. Some days, he IM's me and I just close the window. I'm strong. Other days, I dunno what happens. I just miss him, the thoughts come racing back of, "Jesus, if only you could get your sh*t together, we could have had something amazing. If only you could do what you KNOW you need to do, what you said you were goin to do." And I know it's not that easy; I can empathize. I really can.

I know you're right. He's not the man that deserves me right now. I guess what bothers me is, will he ever be? He runs away from everything. He's never had a relationship that lasts more than a year, I'm guessing it might have something to do with his problem. Either she's like "eff this," or he just gets to feeling bad because he knows what he should be able to provide is something that he simply cannot, and so he feels bad for keeping said girl on the line, so he lets them go. It's what he did to me. I remember the night that he said as much, he just sobbed. It's like it broke his heart just as much as mine. But then I'm sure he hit the bottle again to numb it all, and hence the cycle continues. I just wonder what'll make him snap out of it. I guess that's not me to decide. I just pray for him every single day, because he lives a life of emptiness. He goes to work, he comes home, he plays video games, and he drinks. That's it. He doesn't have any friends, his family's all far away, and I guess it tugs at my heartstrings. I remember how close we used to be. He used to tell me I was closer to him than his own family. This last go round, he was drunk, and went off about how "in case I didn't know, it's not like he's ready to have a kid or buy a house or anything, so forget him." That just pisses me off. Basically, he's saying, "Look I know we have something, but I know you want X (which I'm not even ready for right now, btw) and I cannot provide that to you." I want to yell at him, well, heh. You COULD, you just choose not to." I guess that's the same thing. (Listen to me, sit here try to make sense of this. Blah!)

It's not like I'm putting my life on hold. Really, I know I gotta do a lot of things for me instead of putting everyone else ahead of me, like I usually do. I'm not really ready to jump into another relationship, but sometimes get to feeling lonely, wishing I had that attentive guy I deserve, the guy that deserves all my kindness and sweet thoughts. I guess it's just hard because underneath it all, he's there, in my ex-ahbf. It's who I fell for y'know? But it's not who he is now, and I suppose that's all that matters.