Helping Myself

Liquid Oxygen...that is what I call my bf's beer. He has to have it as soon as he gets up in the morning and then drink at least a six pack before he goes to work. He can't live without it. I really wish I could understand the disease, but I can't.

I have decided that I am not going to call him at the bar tonight and I am not going to get upset when he doesn't come home on time. I am re-reading the chapter on detachment in "Codependent No More" and I hope I can stick with that. I'll need your prayers for tonight and the weekend. I can and will do this...I just have to! And I want to. I wish I could be as strong as a lot of you are, but I am not there yet. I will be there someday though and when I am..."Let freedom ring".

smoke gets in my eyes

Hang tough Helping Myself!

Those first few times of "not doing" can be killer... but it gets easier and eventually we learn to fill the time with something besides chewing our hangnails and saying "don't think about it, don't think about it." Ann started a great post awhile back called "how to have fun when you don't feel like having fun". There's a link to it up in the power-post thread on this forum. When you finish reading about detachment, you could read through that and get a glimpse of your future. You're doing great.

Hugs,
Smoke

sunflowergal29

Every baby step you make, you'll feel stronger and stronger!! You're on the right track, you're taking the focus off him and putting it right where it should be- on you!!! SUPER!!!

Doug

Hi HM,

As an addict/alkie myself, I really wish I could understand the disease too, but I can't either.

Doing what your doing, while it's painful and difficult, is the best you can do for you and him. Even though it may not feel like that.

Hang in there.

Chy

Extra support from this alkie too! Your doing the right thing.. really!

JT

Ward told me waaaay early when we met that if I call him at the bar I get what I deserve. He is sitting there with friends so of course he is going to beat his chest and try to imitate the call of the wild one. "I am leaving when I finish this one" or worse...

Smoke is right...it is tough in the beginning but it gets so much easier...

Hugs,
JT

Lorelai

Something I try to remember is this: Has what I have been doing done any good? If you call him at the bar, what happens? Does it make things better? I keep remembering Jeff's line of "Why keep doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results?"

Maybe if you try something different, it will make things better - at least for you. I was to the place where anything was worth a shot and it did make things so much better for me.

Good luck !
L

Jeff_C

“Trying on� new behaviors for “us� is always a challenge. They’re never immediately comfortably familiar, and the “committee� is always in the background chattering away, urging us to do what we have always done in order to get the ‘payoff� that we’ve always gotten. The rationale to continue in our pursuits is a mélange of determination, analytical analysis, faith, judgment, and interpretation of results.

It’s never the booze or the boyfriend we’re in conflict with. It’s always ourselves, our view of the “idea� of ourselves in relation to the rest of the world and it’s minions. Only when we are able to fully appreciate first the “idea�, warts and all, then dispatch that idea, with the openness of “action�, that our life becomes, that we will be truly free from the prison we’ve built over the years.

Hang in there. Give yourself, a fair shot, and surround yourself with a program and folks that know where you’re comin’ from-------------and where you’re tryin’ to get to. You’re already on your way.
Jeff