No Closure
 

I haven't been on here in a while. A lot has happened in the last 7 months. After a talk my AH and I had, I knew there was no chance of him getting the help he needs because he believes there is no problem. I should just accept his drinking because he provides for us. He is the "functioning" kind so to speak. He thought we were just going to separate. However, after our "talk" I saw an attorney to start divorce proceedings and took half the money out of our accounts. I advised him that there was a 120 waiting period for the divorce process and that if he wanted to get help I would be willing to see how things go and possibly cancel the divorce proceedings. A few days later he realized I actually had taken half of the funds and he was irate with me. I came home that evening and he verbally assaulted me and pushed me around and held me hostage in my own home. I was finally able to get out. I called the police to get some of things out of the home so I could go to work the next day. Since I left 7 months ago, he has not spoken to me once. He has only blamed me for the divorce (because he only wanted to separate). I have gotten some blaming emails and he even sent my parents a letter about his thoughts on why our relationship ended including the fact that he needs demonstrated affection and words of encouragement on a regular basis which I was not able to provide. (I wonder why) As for his drinking, he basically dismisses it. Because we all know that I am the cause of his drinking at least in part because his job also causes him to drink and the economy, etc. He never apologized to me for the hateful words he spoke to me as well as physically pushing me around and scaring me to death. I was afraid for my life and I never was before. He never once asked for me to come back to work things out. He never once said he was willing to get the help he needs or even attempt to quit. In the beginning I worried about him but not so much anymore. I also ruined his relationship with his family (not true) because I finally told them the truth. His brother already rarely had contact with him because he had already discussed the issue with him a few times. The issue I have is will I ever get to tell him how I really feel about the things he put me through? Will I ever get closure on our relationship if he won't talk to me. I was never able to speak about how I felt because I was always shut down - He didn't want to talk, I wasn't allowed to raise my voice because he has depression and it makes him feel bad, I wasn't allowed to cry, if I did then I was doing it on purpose to hurt him. Now he just acts like I don't exist. He appears at work to be just torn to pieces over the divorce but I am not privy to any of his sadness from my departure. Is this normal? I am seeing a counselor. She advised to wait until the divorce is final and send him a letter asking him not to return a letter because this would be for me and my closure to once and for all get my feelings out there without being shot down. I look forwarding to hearing your thoughts.

For me, when I accepted that my STBXAH was never going to validate my feelings, I was able to give myself closure in counseling, meditation, and a LOT of self-reflection.

Someone here told me that the people that hurt us aren't and never will be the people that heal us, and I believe that.

You'll be at your strongest when you don't need his agreement to move on with your life.

Oh, the poor sod. *sigh* *rolling my eyes*

I understand the need for closure. I also agree with Florence that you will probably never get closure from him. When I left AXH, he was begging me to meet with him so that he could get closure. "Closure" for him meant he would get to tell me how wrong I was in everything I felt, what an awful wife I had been, and that he would in his great magnanimity be willing to give me the chance to come back and be a better wife this time around. So I said, FTS. I don't need that.

What I finally decided was that just as I had my view of what had happened, and why our marriage deteriorated, he had his story. And "closure" for each of us would have meant getting the other person to acknowledge that they were wrong and I was right. When I realized that he would never come around to seeing things my way any more than I would come around to taking the entire blame for his drinking, his abuse, his appalling behavior towards me and the kids? I also realized that any attempt at getting closure from him was a waste of time and emotional energy.

He won't ever see things from your perspective. You will have to find a way to be satisfied with knowing that you know what happened, you know that you did the right thing when you left, and that he is living his delusion and there isn't a thing in the world you can do to change that.

I keep thinking about this whole closure thing too. I think Lillamy is absolutely right, it is about us getting the other to admit and acknowledge that we were right, they were the problem, their drinking was a problem, etc....and that to me says we are still wanting control over the situation. It goes along with wondering as some of us do...how can they just walk away as if we don't matter, how can they move on to another, as if we don't matter, its horrible to realize we matter so little to those we have loved so much. I have no idea, I mean truly, no idea how I will ever get over what has happened and yes, it would tremendously help if he acknowledged his behavior...but it will never happen. I know he is blaming me, they always blame us because gee...it couldn't be because of them could it, and I know its because of the drinking or he is just crazy...or both. I know one day he will most likely realize what he did..and even if he doesn't, it really doesn't matter. I have to move forward. Being stuck on the idea of him finally getting it, or finally saying sorry, or whatever...it just shows you are still embroiled in the codependency and trying to control the situation. If I am wrong, someone please correct me here. I don't think anyone ever gets closure in the train wreck of relationships with alcoholics. We have to just pick ourselves up and try to stand on our own wobbly legs again, taking one slow step at a time away from it all. They get to stay stuck in the drama and chaos, so their world likely doesn't change much, even if the players in it do when the addict finds new enablers. They get the easy path I think.
As Lillamy said, your own acceptance of its ending needs to be enough. I am starting to believe and understand that apologies and the acceptance of accountability from a half crazy alcoholic doesn't matter worth a **** and I would be better off focusing on my new start in life....freedom, my kids, and the rest of the 50 or 60 years I will be on this planet. I chose to walk away from him...and now I get to choose to shut the door on his ******** and move on.

I think for me it was also a case of lacking confidence and trust in my own emotions/decisions. I somehow wanted him to tell me it was OK to leave him. Crap, I wanted everyone to agree with me that I did the right thing.

It took me a long time to accept that I really didn't need anyone's permission to choose how I wanted to live my life. And that I didn't need anyone's permission to protect my children.

Yeah, my STBXABF is very similar to your husband. I don't believe I will ever receive closure from him. I think the only way I will have closure from this relationship it to accept apologies that never came, say what I need to say to MYSELF, feel the pain, and then let it go.

Closure is up to us - they aren't cable of providing much for anyone (including themselves) and I think expecting closure from my A is just setting myself up for another disappointment.

Even if I had a chance to let it all out to him / at him, the response would be the same as it always has been - drink until indifferent. I have had enough of that.

(((HUGS)))

Same for me...I had no idea it was ok to let go of him, break up, whatever. It was like I didn't know I had the choice not to be with someone anymore if I was unhappy. I just kept continuing on in the relationship like this was just it for me, how my life was going to be from then on. Lillamy you are also right, I lost trust in my own emotions and decisions, because I had been told for so long that I was the problem, etc, that I no longer trusted my own feelings and self. I am still working on learning to live the way I want, regardless of what others think. So hey, to hell with all those toxic people..I just pushed them the bleep out of my life. I'd rather be alone than unhappy...isn't that how the song goes (Whitney Houston or something)? And hell no, I did not need anyone's permission to protect my kids.

Closure is a gift I give myself, a moving-on from the enmeshment of painful and toxic relationships. My own mother will never know exactly how my upbringing made me feel, the consequences her actions had on my development and future relationships -- even if I somehow FORCED her to sit down and hear those words, there's nothing I can do to make another person listen or understand. For a long time I believed I needed that, that it would somehow erase the pain of my experience. But it is exactly that pain that made me who I am now, and I accept it right along with my genetically pear-shaped figure and my bad eyesight.

I had to let go of the idea that telling someone how I feel is the experience I imagine it will be for the other person, and therefore the experience I imagine it will be for me. The only acknowledgement and validation of my feelings that has any true meaning is the one I give myself.

agreed, the validation we are REALLY seeking is our OWN. that is why we so often remain in flux and restless and trying to get others to FIX us....we haven't learned how to do that for ourselves.

feel what you feel. cry your tears now, scream at the plant, give yourself permission to feel and emote and be ok.

Hi Radiant,

This is what I would do. Write the letter. Address it to your HP. Burn it. That way you go through the thought process of writing it down and thinking through what has happened. Then you leave it with your HP to help you get healing and closure.

All the best to you each and every day!

Whoops Roxy! My internet kicked me out & lost my first note to you and my mind went back to Radiant and not Roxy! My apologies.

Thank you everyone for your wisdom. I still do on occasion wonder if I made the right decision but deep down I know I did what was best for me. I have fears about my future but I have a strong support system in my family, friends and workplace. I feel very blessed that way. Maybe once the divorce is final that will be where I can take a deep breath and just let it go once and for all knowing I am in control of my future from now on and I only need worry about taking care of myself. I feel sometimes I still need to find out who I am in this world.

For me, I found a sense of closure from my relationship with my abusive, addict ex to come when I learned enough and made enough changes in myself that I felt confident I'd never put myself in such a situation again.

I need closure, my closure is I will never get closure from someone in ******* denial about what they've done, ******* ******* can go to hell. I am so angry I could choke the son of a bitch. I am so pissed off that he can leave so much destruction and keep me in a state of distress for years and not bat an eyelid while he is out drinking and sleeping around and denying his life with me. I hope he disappears and leaves me alone for eternity. On a happier note I am glad that I am now aware that I will never get closure from an addict, finally I can breathe again and reflect on hOW crazy I've become and how much I've lost myself in this ******** that has become my life. :headbange

I agree with what everyone says you will never get closure from him as he doesn't recognise the part he has played as far as he sees it's all your fault!!! Write the letter to him but don't send it burn it that way you will have written everything down for yourself, who's to say he would read it anyway and it doesn't sound as though he would accept any of it. Give yourself closure and keep moving forward with your life.

I've been the guy on the other side of the issue. When I was married my now-ex-wife had a lot of issues and problems, and after the divorce I believed it was 95% her fault. But now 20 years later with almost 2 years of sobriety I can see that my drinking drove lots of the problems. I sure wouldn't have admitted it back then though.

Sooo relate to this even though I am female, but also the A in the relationship. Drinking became the excuse NOT to get real with myself, not to fully take on our issues. It never solved a darn thing at all. It never made me sit down and say "here, sit with me, listen to this audiobook on xyz I'm dealing with and hold me" rather I drank and distanced, and continued. What was the problem? I never once took personal accountability for my part and my drinking was driving A LOT of our problems.

Sorry to digress from the rest of the thread but just wanted to throw this in quickly while fresh on my mind.

Being right is not a great thing.

Doing right is.

Being right is your need for him to admit/agree/ accept what he has done.

Doing right is not giving a sh1t about being right, leaving a bad situation, and living your life to its ultimate happy fulfillment.

You have "done right". Forget about the other. Most often that comes in 9th step recovery if at all. As Myth pointed out above ^^^ for him it came 20 years later.

Thanks cookies and myth, it's nice to see how far you guys have come.. Well done!!!

Thank you so very much. It really means a lot to hear that. I have had therapists tell me (and I don't think I am overstating it) that I am neither a sociopath nor narcissistic. Maybe they are wrong and I'm just in denial but I'd like to think they are right. I wrote out a five page single sided essay over the weekend chronicaling my own addiction-I think it helped my s/o understand how it happened. It was not to excuse my behavior but at least understand it.

That said more stuff (admittedly writing is cheap therapy for me) as food for thought for whatever its not worth. I read this forum every day, almost every day since I got sober in fact. The anger and frustration and bitterness you and each and every person feels toward the addict is reasonable and understandable. I'm not sure that anyone would say that you don't have the right to feel the way you do. The hurts and betrayals will never go away, they are in fact unsolvable grief. How to live with that, accepting your feelings without it poisoning your own life and taking away joy and happiness is the trick of course.

A little story from my own life as an illustration. I'm "a woman of a certain age" so the events I will retell happened over thirty years ago. My own father was a rather distant man towards daughters and he turned into a raging alcoholic the last few years of his life. Due to a bad series of choices in his last few years he destroyed the family financially and during that time he drank a LOT of cheap gin. He unlike many alcoholics never hid it, don't think he likely ever would have denied his addiction. He was not physically abusive but he was one MEAN drunk. A few years into this rather nightmarish time in our lives when things were going from bad to worse he quit drinking quite suddenly, cold turkey in fact. He became the Dad I'd always wanted, kind and loving. Finances were still a disaster though and much damage had been done. Two and a half months later one day he took a gun to himself and ended his life leaving my Mom a single parent to three (I was a teenager, siblings are younger) and in a very precarious financial position.

I was very angry with Dad for many years. The emotional ups and downs, the finances, the meanness, and then ending it never facing the consequences head on. I was mad. I was sad. I was angry. I doubt most people would blame me. The thing was in the end that for better or for worse he WAS my Dad. Many in my family never have forgiven him. I found many many years later that my anger was merely hurting ME. He was dead. So at some point a switch flicked and I realized that while I would never forgive the pain that he had caused that I NEEDED to forgive him for my own peace of mind. I did a few years ago and it was a burden lifted.

Be angry if you want, few will fault you, but someday I hope you are able to make it through the woods and find some peace, if not forgiveness, peace.

Best,