lillamy

Yes. Yes there has to. As a runner, I compare it to that point in a race when you're hurting all over and you're asking yourself what on earth possessed you to voluntarily put yourself through this... and then you remind yourself that the pain is temporary. It goes away.

I am hoping, somewhere, that he will hit a bottom that doesn't have a trap door before he drinks himself to death. But I'm not holding my breath.

DreamsofSerenity

Thank you so much for this thread, lillamy. I have been struggling with similar feelings but had no idea even how to articulate them.

I am at peace with the fact my relationship with exabf is over. But I am not at peace with the fact that he is not at peace. How do I get there? It is EXACTLY what you said, "how do you grieve someone who is still alive?" And furthermore, how do you find compassion for someone who only has resentment for you? That part is an enormous spiritual challenge for me. I'm not the Dalai Lama with his infinite wisdom and insight. I think I'm karmically still very young. When someone hurts me, I want to hurt back.

The good news is you know where you need to go. That has to be half the battle. I think if we keep praying for and meditating on compassion, that maybe it will slowly come.

I don't know about you but I expect all these changes to happen so quickly. I forget that all of the changes take time--and are painful like you said.

HUGS

lillamy

I think part of it, for me, is to allow myself to feel the compassion. Feeling compassion without acting on it. Because part of detaching for me was NOT allowing myself to feel pity and compassion because that sucked me right back in.

I stumbled on some old e-mails from him today -- from when he was in rehab and sober and was begging me to come back, to give him another chance. It still stabs me right in the heart. He sounds like a three-year-old who's been abandoned by his mother. He really truly doesn't see his behavior in the same way others see it. He really truly to this day does not understand why I left him just because he threatened to kill us all. And I'm saying that without sarcasm. It's the truth. He doesn't.

DreamsofSerenity

^^^^^ I understand this. It's how I feel about my addict brother. I have to suppress my pity and love for him in order to remain strong enough to enforce my boundaries.

With my ex, I simply just wish he would drown in his own vomit or something. I don't like feeling this way.

I'm sorry your ex threatened to kill you and your kids. I didn't know that. I admire you for leaving. It sounds like you are truly on the right path to being able to grieve him. Maybe you just need a little more time.

owathu

I had to respond to this thread, because that is exactly how I got through the grief, hatred, disappointment, sadness all of it. For all intents and purposes, he is dead. The person I met 9 years ago, this person he is now? Not the same person.

Like someone else posted, I get angry in fit and spurts, and it maybe now happens once a week, and I am still so gobsmacked by it all you know?

But for the most part, my life has improved so so much since he left. I mourned him and what I thought was our marriage, I mourned the passing of a hope, dream, future I thought was happening. I mourned the waste his life has become, and will continue to become while he continues down this path.

BUT...NOT MY PROBLEM ANYMORE. I still have enough anger at him and what he did that I hope he marries her and they live "happily" ever after. They truly, truly did me a favor.

Otherwise, I really could care less. For the most part I pity him. Waste of a life and what could have been a brilliant man.

lillamy

Big fat hugs, Owathu.

I think you put my feelings into words in your post. And you made me happy by using the word "gobsmacked" -- it's one of my favorite words.

owathu

I've been using it A LOT, lol. Hey, at least we have our sense of humor still!

I also wanted to add, that the only pictures I have of my soon to be ex are of him either wasted or sleeping. More of him sleeping, because that's all he did when he wasn't drinking. And the only pics of us together are on our wedding day or 3 months after I first met him. I married a ghost. He was already gone.

Edited again to add, that cripes. I am so disappointed in myself for this situation. No hiking, camping, vacation, going out with friend pictures. Jesus...I am just hit in the face with this. I never really thought about it before, and it was right there staring at me in my picture folder. Him sleeping, him drinking at the counter...my pics? Me out with friends, festivals, skiing, out doing stuff...none of it with us doing it together...he was at home drinking. I had a blob at home, while I went out and lived my life. A ghost. Epiphany right now.

love4menotu

Hi lillamy-

Yes, I struggle every day with this. How I am being blamed and made out to be a villain for wanting a divorce. How I was loved one day and then HATED the next. The absurdity of it still amazes me. The fact that he doesn't see that abusing his wife resulted in the end of our marriage.

I'm in therapy now trying to deal with it, but obviously I use the three C's... he was very sick before I met him, he just hid his neediness and control issues. He'll find someone else, and abuse her just like he did me.

I have to be grateful that I'm out and it's over. I couldn't help him, gotta help myself.

I can't grieve someone who never really existed.

Lyn

lillamy

Owathu, you know what is still a positive in all that? That you DID to out and live your life. That you didn't become a blob yourself. Celebrate that. In the midst of it all.

Lyn, when I read that, I think I got what Anvil was saying earlier. I don't feel like I'm grieving potential but maybe I am -- grieving a person I thought existed, but a person who really all the time was someone other than my picture of him was.

Either way -- it's so easy to be angry. It's much harder to allow yourself to feel pain and sorrow for someone who has hurt you. It gets confusing. But it also gets easier when you allow the feelings, I notice. Sometimes, there's no other way but through.

lillamy

I figured I might as well tack this onto the end here rather than start a new post.

I'm working step four. And part of that is feeling the pain of my responsibility for the dysfunction in my A marriage. Because AXH takes no responsibility at all for the demise of our marriage, I've done what he did - placed the entire responsibility on the other spouse (him).

It's deeply and thoroughly painful to truly dare see the extent of my dysfunction. I did not say no. I did not stand up for myself. I did not acknowledge my needs or my feelings. I did not handle my feelings appropriately or in a healthy way. I got stuck in his world view and I let myself. Etc. etc. etc.

I was also responsible for the dysfunction. And for the first time, I can accept that. I can accept that what I did was unhealthy. I can accept that without having to say "but if he hadn't been an A, I wouldn't have needed to develop all those unhealthy coping strategies" (in other words, it WAS all his fault).

We both acted in unhealthy ways. And just as I was doing the best I could in a bad situation, so did he.

And now that I accept that, I wish there was a way we could both see that. Take a step back. Stop the accusations. Accept responsibility.

I would like to ask his forgiveness for what I did wrong. But it really is one of those cases of "except when doing so would cause more harm."

I'm healthier now. I can see how unhealthy my behavior was. He's not. He's unhealthier. And he will probably die hating me and blaming me for everything. And that's not the part I'm worried about. But I wish there was a way I could tell him that I do understand that the things he did to me and to our children, they were done under the influence not only of alcohol but also of this debilitating horrid effing disease that is addiction.

I feel a lot of tenderness for him tonight. And I know I can do it only because I'm safe from him. But he didn't want to become the person he has become. And his addiction is winning and won't let him claim his life back easily.

Allowing myself to feel that is safe here. My IRL family and friends wouldn't understand. How can you feel compassion and, well, on some level, love - agape love - for a person who contributed the lion's share to making your life miserable?

You can do it when you accept your own shortcomings. When you accept that you too contributed. And that you didn't mean to any more than he did. You just did what you did to survive. And so did he.

I don't know if any of those ramblings made sense but my sponsor is sleeping so you got to hear it instead.

PippiLngstockng

I have compassion for stbx too, sometimes. It is easier and more pleasant than anger and hate.

But I have to say, part of what got us to this place is that tendency to sympathize, to allow, overlook, continue as though AH was the nice family man he pretended to be.

Others have enormous love and compassion for him right now, as he perfects his 'woe-is-me' stories. He has the support of his family, friends and community. And his children are at high risk for losing their home, having gone from an upper class to below poverty income in a few months time.

My stbx threatened to kill me, too, and that was the day I never let him back in. He has vague regrets about that incident. That's as far as he can extend himself.

I think mistrust and animosity is more appropriate. Anger is too active and involved. Also, we do forgive, because then we can move on. But in the ideal, justice would be served with Stbx, and my children and I would take the reins and succeed in making a stable, loving, prosperous home together. In the ideal, he becomes - irrelevant.

LexieCat

Don't get ahead of yourself, lillamy. The Steps are in order for a reason, and you're not even halfway to the amends step yet. When you get to THAT point is when you and your sponsor discuss whether there is an amends to be made and when and how to do so. Don't get sidetracked by that right now.

Yup, pretty shocking to realize we're part of the problem. OTOH, it's always encouraging, because that means we have the power to fix our side of it.

Hugs,

theuncertainty

Your posts are really making me stop and think, Lillamy. I feel that I've definitely gotten to this point:

It's one reason why I've decided dating at this point is not a good idea for me or whomever I might get involved with. I most definitely don't want to bring my coping-with-AXH-skills into play with some one else. And I'm afraid that I will. That I'll hear AXH's voice when we have our first (or second, or, etc.) disagreement and I'll resort to just shutting down rather than addressing the issue - whatever it might be.

However, when I got to the following, I faltered and am no longer sure of my healing process (emphasis on where I'm getting hung up):

and

Because I don't see it with AXH. I don't see it that way at all. AXH could have tried so much harder. Or maybe he couldn't... Perhaps his sister is still in denial about what their family life was like growing up, but... I think he saw, with his parents, at least some healthy ways a husband and wife could be together. Maybe I'm wrong and xFIL was just like AXH, so maybe AXH didn't have that basis... I don't know.

But, this is one time where I have no problem separating AXH's alcoholism from his abuse. AXH is not abusive because he's an alcoholic. It may not have come to the forefront of our relationship quite as fast if the addiction didn't come into play, but it was there and he would have still been abusive, eventually. Because that's where his... mindset... coping skills... way of being... is anchored. And I think it's been that way for a long, long time.

I'm not sure that will come through to others the way I'm perceiving it...

I don't know, Lillamy.... I'm sorry, I don't mean for this to come off as negative towards you in any way. I hope you don't take it that way. Because I really admire where you are, even if you feel confused about it. And I think you're one of the strongest people I've met. I'm just trying to figure out where I am.

And I'm feeling rather lost again. Not because of this thread, but just everything.

ZenMe

Hey Amy,

I understand what you mean by having been unhealthy and also having been responsible for certain things in the relationship. The whole it takes 2 to tango.

In myself I see certain things that I need to change, how I affected the relationship negatively and how ultimately I ended up with my x to begin with. I'm taking care of working on myself. I still feel though that alcoholism in a partner is a deal breaker. So although I couldn't have done anything to "Save" my relationship, I recognize my own shortcomings that landed me there and were with me during the relationship.

Thanks for sharing!

fedup3

Thanks lillamy, this is exactly where I am right now I cry at unexpected times, then wipe my tears, love him from afar and keep going forward and living.

bigsombrero

I wonder, what if your ex-husband turns the corner and becomes successful, happy, and healthy? What if he got a new job, a new girlfriend, and took a trip to Spain? You'd probably also be miserable. At least, I know I would be. Seems to me that agonizing over the alcoholic will happen either way, as long as you continue to think about them, you can't win.

lillamy

I would be thrilled for him. And I would be thrilled for my children, because it would mean they got a shot at having a father. I would not be miserable, and I'm not miserable now. I'm actually more filled with joy than my posts here might show.

Acknowledging my part of the responsibility for our marriage dysfunction is not miserable. It's painful, but it's necessary and it's growth. My first pass through the steps, I couldn't get to that level. I was still too angry and scraped the surface. This time I'm plumbing the depths. Dredging out the mud on the bottom. And I'm sure next time around, I'll find even more garbage.

But the thing is, right now, I have the strength to handle looking at myself. Five years ago when I first tried working this step, I didn't. And it really feels like cleaning house. There's a vast difference between putting yourself down because you're married to an abusive A and acknowledging your part in the dysfunction. The first comes from inside the dysfunction and serves to maintain it; the second comes from outside the dysfunction and serves to dissolve it.

LexieCat

Great explanation of the difference.

NYCDoglvr

I'm a recovering alcoholic (21 years), one of the lucky ones. There is no reason I can see why I was able to stop drinking and others can't but I never take my sobriety for granted. I'm so grateful, this is a real gift.

You are correct -- active alcoholism is the height of self-destructiveness and all too often the drunk doesn't see it until he/she has been sober a while. You can pray for your ex but that's all you can do. God bless him.

lillamy

You know, all that deep feeling stuff aside, my realty is that I won't ever feel safe again until that man is six feet under. And that's the honest truth. And that complicates the hell out of things.