Sungrl

It seems your husband is constantly spewing nonsense at you. I am afraid he has you so beat down and defeated that you don't even fight for yourself or your son anymore. Every time he does this you seem to turn it around and accept it because you feel you are at fault as well. Like you are saying "Well I'm not perfect either." You are not a selfish bullying drunk Liz. I have read some of your story and I feel this has gone on for years. Why do you continue to put yourself and your son through this? hugs, I feel so bad for you both.

amy55

There was a very good thread that was here a few weeks ago. I think it was an older one but it was bumped. Perhaps someone remembers it. It started out about al anon, and someone had posted in this thread that if a person is in an abusive situation, that al-anon might not be the best place to start. That perhaps some DV education should be done first, al anon second. Does anyone remember that thread? If someone does, perhaps you can provide a link to that thread.

I was in an abusive relationship. If I had gone to al anon before realizing what was going on in my marriage, I think alanon perhaps would have made me even more submissive. I was already doing a lot of the things alanon says, but I was doing it for the wrong reason. I was doing it out of fear.

Bullfrog

I too am glad I left before I started Al Anon.

amy55

I am not putting Alanon down at all. I was just thinking after I saw the thread that I saw how would I feel with alanon, and detachment, and just going about my own business. I was trying to do this. Then I go to alanon, and I'm doing it right !!!!!!!!!

I'm doing it right on paper, but not in my own life. I still keep trying to better myself and better myself, and to disengage, to detach, but I wasn't learning how to be "me". That part was already taken away from me.

I already felt like all of my escape routes were taken from me, I needed to learn a new way to survive.

Liz, I really do think that you should attend some DV meetings. I think you are alot like me. Just try anything to learn how to survive in a situation no one else could.

I see you so many times come here and you are putting yourself down, because you couldn't take that "blow" from him, and how you should be able to do that.

You don't have to. You don't have to keep changing yourself so that you can be around him.

I hate to do this, but what did he say about his son? It was like he needed to abuse him so that he can grow up. Or something like that.

amy55

Sometimes I seem to talk in circles. I try to input my own story into things, it's only because I hope that someone else might see a similarity.

I am going to be really "frank" here, and say, I think you may be using alanon as a way to continually blame yourself. That you aren't doing good enough. That you didn't walk away, but this time, you did and we should be happy that you did.

But what I am seeing is that you are accepting more abuse for you and your son.

amy55

I usually have more integrity then this. Perhaps I should be banned. Or perhaps you should put me on ignore.

Liz, I see so much of myself in you. I didn't want to listen to anything or believe anything. I lived in a fantasy world !!!!!!! Get my drift here?

I wanted to find anything or anyone to tell me how to make things better. I read a lot of books, I tried everything that they told me about what would make my life better.

It didn't.

I am not saying alanon is bad. I really am not saying that. I am saying that you may be so effed up in the head that you just want to find out things that are wrong with you so that you can fix them, because you might have finally realized you can't fix him.

So what exactly did you fix? You are giving him a bigger road to walk all over you, while he blames you, and you blame you because you might have gotten upset. So let's see, you run to alanon, you are not to be upset, you are to disengage, and detach. Well done. !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! So what did he get out of this? Oh, you are better tempered, and he can now push it a little further, see how you can disengage from that and detach from that?

I don't know Liz, what are you doing? I think you are using alanon against yourself.

The more I read about you, the more I see you becoming submissive and more submissive while you are feeling liking you are detaching.

Liz, we are a mixed group here, but we all have one thing in common here. We love you. We are alanon, we are DV, we are the, we don't even know trying to figure it out.

My intentions here are not to put down alanon, just to show sometimes it can be detrimental.

Liz (((((((((((((hugs))))))))))))


PS - going for that walk around the block again. And "no" that wasn't amends, it was looking for some more reason to attack you for, and telling you that he will keep doing it. And you sort of said OK, that it's OK that you abuse me and my son, because I didn't say anything. So will walk around the block several times tonight. May read here again, but will not respond.

NWGRITS

Shoot, Amy. You speak more eloquently when you're "triggered" than I do, and I haven't been banned yet. You are an incredibly valuable member of this community. Don't ever forget that.

amy55

I find myself unable to congrats on a new found way of submissiveness.

ShootingStar1

Amy, I think you are dead on. Liz, it is long past time to keep allowing yourself to make your husband the center of your thinking. That is what you are doing now, again. It is only different in that now your center is that he isn't drinking. Before it was that he was drinking.

No matter what you call it, how you describe his momentary state of being, you are still dancing around the same old maypole: him.

That is not detachment, and it isn't recovery. It is just yet another way to avoid the core question: what do you want to do with YOUR life?

ShootingStar1

amy55

Shooting Star, you put it so well. I remember reading and reading, and researching all things, but none of it was to make me better, it was all to accept him as he was. I couldn't.

Reading this is like reading about my life. A big trigger. I thought I was helping myself, but I wasn't. It was all about him. I needed to start making it about me and the life that I wanted to have, and not walk on eggshells anymore.

So yes, self-help books hurt me, alanon would have hurt me, therapists hurt me, why? Simply because I wasn't thinking about me, I was still trying to fix him, or try to figure out how to live with him.

There really was no way to do that. I tried them all.

PS- I don't want to hurt anyone here. Especially you Liz

lizatola

Amy! Thank you for all your thought and caring you put into your posts. I know you, and everyone else here, want the best for my son and for me. You actually gave me something to think about because I was really feeling conflicted about some of the stuff in Al Anon and how things were panning out. I didn't see the connection until you brought it up that maybe Al Anon was hurting me because it was giving me an excuse to stay put and just put up with poor behavior and excuses, etc. I plan on meditating on this and journaling about it for the next week or so. Thank you.