isitme

This is so true for me also. I've been close to leaving before, and am so again. It's almost a mutual decision at this point. I don't know how it will happen but I know that it will. I can see the damage surfacing in other areas an I know it's time, I just don't know how to do it.

Florence

When it's time you'll do it. Another factor for me was that I'd spent all this time learning about addiction and about myself and trying to figure out how to change my life and get out of this awful rut. It was like a series of small shifts in my thinking and acting, and one day I realized that the world was open to me, that I really didn't have to live this way, and I could see the path out. It was bigger than my marriage to my AH. It was also about my career disappointments, my other friendships and relationships, my ongoing issues with depression. ALL of this was affected by my deep commitment to change.

For people who aren't there yet, my wish is that they keep learning about addiction and about how they got here and continue learning how to stop accommodating unacceptable behavior and learning how to better care for oneself regardless of one's life circumstances. The common thread here that I've seen is that most of us were accustomed to living with unacceptable behavior PRIOR to getting together with the addict and to break free we have to unlearn whatever grooming made us that way.

But once you know it? You can't un-know it. It's with you forever. The ground shifted. It doesn't go back.

Summerpeach

When I caught him cheating......5 yrs done! See you and never looked back. Was the hardest time of my life. That was 3 yrs ago and I good

Wavy

When he went away for the weekend and I realised I was so much happier when he wasn't around, dreaded him coming back and felt the shift from freedom to prison on his return. I couldn't let go of that freedom once I'd tasted it and set about getting it permanently.

ETA: it seems so crazy that that was what it took, not the violence, the stalking, the threats, the crazy-making, the cheating, not any of that terrible stuff, almost the opposite, but a glimpse that life didn't have to be that way. Florence is right, once you learn it there's no un-learning.

Carol Star

When he went to jail for a dui and I realized he was not going to change......he considered everything everybody else's fault; me, the cop, the judge....the boss........

Flavia2

Wow, Florence. That is really profound. I am in the midst of the chaos and can't quite see my way out. But I know I am done, that this relationship is not fixable. That I will find my way out.
I had a huge breakthrough at therapy today. I have lived my whole life with alcoholics, neglect, embarassment, chaos and unacceptable behavior. I cannot fix him. I finally am starting to understand addiction. What it really means. And that I need to fix me.

What books did you read to help you on your way? I am currently reading "Codependent No More".

djayr

When another man called 20 times in a row to declare his undying love for AW. I had lost all dignity and self respect and I just had to get away. I felt like a loser and a schmuck. It had to get really bad, and sure enough it finally did. I agree with those who say, when you know, you know.

OnlyOneProblem

I remember saying to myself, "So this is what it feels like when YOU KNOW." You just know! Like others have said, it wasn't a big event. It was my change in perspective that gave me the clarity to see that I no longer wanted to live with the drama.

I called him out on his behavior, he did not take responsibility for himself, he began to blame shift. I was finally able to see what was happening and how, in the past, this same situation would be the set up for a 3 day mentally exhausting feud. My health has suffered due to these battles over the years. I was working hard on restoring my physical health and also my emotional health, reading here on SR for the past 3+years, counseling and attending AlAnon. I told him I wanted a divorce and that I respected his decision to drink and he needed to respect my decision that I didn't want to live with it.

It's hard. He filed first (long story) and as shocked as I was, I now consider it a gift. Deciding I was done was one thing - actually making the change is another. He has since changed his mind and wants to make our marriage work. I do struggle every day with my decision to follow through. Everyones situation is different. There was a lot of good in my relationship with my AH. However, the reality is - He SHOWED me who he is.

I'm following through. I am focusing on positive affirmations to get me there.

“The secret of change is to focus all of your energy, not on fighting the old, but on building the new.” - Socrates

LSC1

Allavita that voice yelling that same question at me ATM.

fairlyuncertain

I knew when I looked at the worst case scenario--possibly losing my home, my kids resenting me, an angry divorce with a narcissist, health issues and no financial independence, the fear of being alone--all the possible things that can go wrong--and decided that it would be an improvement over the stress of my current reality!

ladyscribbler

As soon as I had a safe place to go. But I had been there five years and I knew it was only going to get worse.

spiderqueen

When, after a particularly lovely weekend together, with a long, rare vacation coming that we were both looking forward to, he chose to spend those 2 weeks drunk instead. He wasted that precious time being wasted.

I finally understood that I would always come second to that damn bottle, no matter how passionately he claimed and promised otherwise.

(I should add, I spent the two vacation weeks alone, terrified at first, sad & angry, and lonely - but gradually I realized that I preferred my company to his.)

Cyranoak

Or when did I do it? Two completely different questions.

I knew right away. I didn't do it for many years. Then I took her back. I still know. I'm still with her.

Ugh.

Cyranoak

Shiningthrough

I knew that it was time to leave when my ABF told me that he no longer considered himself in a monogamous relationship after 12 years of raising his two kids and having two of our own. I had been faithful, supportive and there for him through his disease that still lingers today. Although I had wanted to leave in the past I didn't have the courage to do so until he said that to me. He did for me what I couldn't do for myself. Today we are still under the same roof bc of financial reasons but everyday I'm getting closer to my making a break for good. Financially I am working hard to be self supportive. The best part of this process is that I have come to acceptance of where the relationship is and what "I want for my future" with my kids. I'm excited and happy to move forward.

nbay2013

For me, it was of course, everything...but I had a random breaking point. The proverbial straw that broke the Camel's back. We went for a drive; he was hung over, grumpy and complained about people the whole time. We were sitting in a pretty park, with kids playing, families out. He was eating a sandwich, and then threw the remaining uneaten part onto the lawn which is not like him...he was SO very anti littering. About 5 minutes later, when we were leaving, I picked it up and threw it away, and he said, "Wow Carrie, you just hate everything about me, don't you, I just can't do ANYTHING right" And then didn't speak to me all the way home. The immaturity, the bizarreness, the silliness, the stupidity of it all just hit me hard. I broke it off a week later. Now granted, I got sucked back when he got sober. But that is another story of my awakening of mine and another breaking point.

Tuffgirl

For me - it was this above - when reality smacked me squarely between the eyes. He had been sober for a while (so he says) and we were trying to find some path back to reconciliation, and he started in on me again, in the same old pattern of every few months he'd create drama. Only this time, he told me I have an "inappropriate relationship" with my Dad. That was the defining moment for me. There was a long list of "inappropriate relationships" with other men, according to him, but my Dad? Ewwww!!! The ridiculousness of it was something I couldn't get past.

I realized NOTHING I was doing, or could do, would ever change this guy's distorted perception of reality. He was so bogged down in his own stinkin thinkin, drunk or sober, and I just finally lost all respect for him as a man.

xmrscran

Mine is really stupid, my STBXAH bitched at me about forgetting dog food and told me what a horrible wife and mother I was because of it. I told him that he was a big boy with a vehicle and that he was fully capable of getting dog food himself, and that I was tired of him micromanaging ME! (he always told me whenever I called him to see where he was, asked where he'd been all night, how much he drank, smelled his breath or acused im of drinking that he was not going to allow me to "micromanage" him.

Linkmeister

I knew it was time when I was more alone when he was in my life and still drinking.

Moving on and moving out was scary at first but I soon discovered the difference between living alone ( as in by myself) as opposed to being alone, while ABF was in my life.
As of now, no one in my life except for my dog and I like it that way. Doesn't rule out any future relationship but for now, I'm happy with the way things are.

brownhorse

I left when home was the last place I wanted to be. I feared what I was going home to.

Now, I realize he is exactly the same today whether I stayed or left. It had nothing to do with me.

LoveMeNow

For those of you that have left.........were you struggling to leave prior to the event that made you finally leave or end the relationship??