changes in spending time with friends
 

In the last year since AH and I have separated it seems my whole life has totally changed and besides all the stuff with AH, I am having a hard time feeling connected to friends that probably mean well but just don't get it.

I am still sorting myself out and it is really difficult to meet and chat and catch up with friends that don't have a clue about what A does to a person and to a family.

I was SAHM a year ago and even though I was dependent on AH for over 10 years I managed to get myself into a decent job this last year and am glad not to have that worry over my head. Even so, it has been a big change for my 3 kids, my youngest is 9 and oldest 17.

I am lucky to have flexibility in my workplace to deal with some family stuff during the week but do not have the time I had before to meet with friends. Also getting together to chat just doesn't seem to have the same appeal that it did before.

I almost feel sick to my stomach thinking about it. When I think of some particular friends it always seem we got together and they were full of chatty complaints. I feel like I won't be able to put up with with the usual husband not helping around the house or pre-teen mouthing off issues like I used to. (It was always a little difficult to put up with before but I think it will be worse now.)

When I have issues with my kids I want to hear from other folks who know what kind of environment my kids are dealing with, what it means to not have a partner and how difficult it can all get when you are wrapping your head around where did my life go/how do I let go of the dream/etc...

I find I just want to do new things, try different things or be by myself.

I don't know if I am just feeling that this week since I have been getting emails from some friends wanting to get together to catch up or maybe I'm as codependent to my friends as I was with AH and I'm trying to get away from that.

Anyone else finding they need to spend less time with old friends?

I lost all of my "old" friends over the years, due in large part to his drinking. I almost lost my new set of "mommy" friends(ones I met at LaLecheLeague or playgroup) due to lies he told to me last summer, after I came back to the house. I've actually been rediscovering them lately a bit, as I know I'm going to need their support and friendship in the coming months.

Yes dancing that happened and still happens to me. I have also found when I move somewhere else emotionally, life takes some people away from me but it also brings me new friendships, more in tune to what I am going through at the moment.

In any decision I try to think "what would give me the most peace?". I lost some friends that didn't get it when I was too depressed and wanted to see no one. I got some friends that welcome me back now that I feel better. Do what brings you peace, hang out with people that offer you comfort, strength, affection, hope. That is what you deserve. Have you gone to Alanon meetings? theyget you and can offer a lot of comfort and reassurance in real life.

Yes, TC I recently found an Alanon meeting that is working for me and have been going a couple of months now and I look forward to feeling more comfortable there sharing and interacting with others in the group. It is definitely where I am at now and what I need.

What you said - "In any decision I try to think "what would give me the most peace?"." - Yes, those are words for me to live by right now.

Having you and other folks on SR for support and words that give the ok to say I deserve this, I'm taking care of me makes it so much better.

Thanks.

Welcome dancing, that is what the forum is for, to support each other

Ohh I also need a lot of time for myself! it has been very healing to know myself, just lie and put my hand on my heart and accept whatever I feel..

About being by yourself, these are excerpts from

Osho on Aloneness We are born alone, we live alone and we die alone


We are born alone, we live alone, and we die alone. Aloneness is our very nature, but we are not aware of it. Because we are not aware of it, we remain strangers to ourselves, and instead of seeing our aloneness as a tremendous beauty and bliss, silence and peace, at-easeness with existence, we misunderstand it as loneliness. Loneliness is a misunderstood aloneness. Once you misunderstand your aloneness as loneliness, the whole context changes.




Aloneness has a beauty and grandeur, a positivity; loneliness is poor, negative, dark, dismal. Everybody is running away from loneliness. It is like a wound; it hurts. To escape from it, the only way is to be in a crowd, to become part of a society, to have friends, to create a family, to have husbands and wives, to have children. In this crowd, the basic effort is that you will be able to forget your loneliness.





Those who have known aloneness say something absolutely different. They say there is nothing more beautiful, more peaceful, more joyful than being alone.


To leave husband and wife in a room by themselves is to make them both utterly miserable. his whole effort -- whether of relationships or remaining busy in a thousand and one things -- is just to escape from the idea that you are lonely. And I want it to be emphatically clear to you that this is where the meditator and the ordinary man part. The ordinary man goes on trying to forget his loneliness, and the meditator starts getting more and more acquainted with his aloneness.

He has left the world; he has gone to the caves, to the mountains, to the forest, just for the sake of being alone. He wants to know who he is. In the crowd, it is difficult; there are so many disturbances. And those who have known their aloneness have known the greatest blissfulness possible to human beings -- because your very being is blissful. After being in tune with your aloneness, you can relate; then your relationship will bring great joys to you, because it is not out of fear.

I found that when my AH was so sick in the hospital ... I had no friend that I felt I could call on. My parents supported me and I called a work related friend that was a RA (sober for 8+ years) and he connected me with his wife.

I forgot how to have friends - I still believe I had to learn it again ... as odd as it sounds. I'm with you about sensless chatting from nagging wives, etc. I find that the majority of them are talkers and not listeners!

When I was "open" to making new good friends ... they started showing up over time and they are my lifeline now.

And I have my SR support too :thanks

Nothing worse than having an interview with someone, or worse, listen to a monologue, instead of having a conversation! I no longer find time for such people. I have found that in the end they are not friends, too self-absorbed.

There has to be fairness, I am able to listen and care, I deserve nothing less than someone who listens and cares. Basic rule I am learning at age 28 :lmao

[QUOTE=TakingCharge999;2840588]About being by yourself, these are excerpts from

Osho on Aloneness We are born alone, we live alone and we die aloneThat is powerful stuff, TC. I definitely need to come to grips with my aloneness.

It is amazing to me I am saying this and reading and trying to do all this for myself and still inside my head I keep thinking - if only AH could get this, than we can be together!

I have a long road ahead and once I stop trying to hold on to the past or what I imagined the past was, it will probably stop being a lonely road.

"There has to be fairness, I am able to listen and care, I deserve nothing less than someone who listens and cares. Basic rule I am learning at age 28" - Good for you to realize this so young. I can see how being aware of this 20 years ago for me would have taken me on a much different and more aware path in my life.