Falling apart
 

Missed my flight, lost my drivers license, my mother is becoming angry with my despair, I just don't want to keep going. If it weren't for my daughter I probably wouldn't. To go through this twice in one lifetime is more than I can handle. I will never be the same person again.

Hopelessness and despair are such awful awful feelings. I can hear and feel them from this post and I can only imagine the dark pain you feel. For whatever it is worth, I am learning and working on mindfulness meditation and specifically trying to feel my pain, and then try to wrap it with as much love and affection and compassion as possible, and when I can't envision that love in myself, I try to envision the love of others wrapping my pain and holding it.. like all the wonderful amazing people on this site who have so much compassion for how you feel. So great, you can reach out and post here. And sounds like your daughter is incredible importance and value to you, and that is HUGE. Sending and wishing you to flow through this pain and it shall not be so heavy soon. even when it feels so consuming now.

how about you take the rest of today and try to unwind a bit? sorry your mom isn't being supportive right now.....might be best to not keep going to that well?

you will be fine....and yes you will be different. that doesn't have to be a BAD thing......to grow and change. do something nice for yourself....take a bath, put on jammies, have some comfort food..........

Unfortunately, I'm booked to attend and speak at a conference in Las Vegas. Just trying my best to remember who I was before all this happened.

it wasn't THAT long ago aly......about a year right? you are still very much YOU.....just a bit dinged up.

i'm off to vegas in two weeks for a conference myself. not speaking tho......yah, no thanks. can i ask what you are presenting??

You are right, just wish I could return the experience and not have had it. It wasn't worth the very little good that came with it. I'm trying to keep reminding myself that I AM worthy of real love and kindness.

Speaking about...here comes the boring part...how to form a new securities sponsor, in other words form a company to sell securities to raise equity to buy commercial assets. And I have to introduce the guy that produced the documentary FrackNation for a general session.

Thanks for your continued support. I've just never struggled this hard to get past a relationship. I've even started actively online dating to try and force myself out of this rut but that may be hurting my ego in the process and making things worse.

darling....don't do the online experience with dating. Just don't. That placed drips with danger and disappointment.
You have a lot going on for you---and you certainly have the ability to meet people.
Work on yourself, first....and, when the time is right....they will appear....have faith.

dandylion

Lol....in economics....I could get as far as understanding barter.....then, I got as lost as a little girl in the forest.....

My therapist keeps pushing match.com. She's convinced I just need to get back out there ASAP. Al anon friends say the opposite. Therapist is worried that I spent 5 years getting over the last relationship and doesn't want me to do that again. Personally, I AM SCARED TO DEATH to ever open up to anyone ever again.

Oh, and I stunk at economics too!

NO to starting to DATE right now!! that is not the solution. trust me.

Trust me, I cancelled the subscription after a week but it lasts til the end of the month. Right now I have so much anger I can't imagine trying to show anyone love except my closest family.

you gotta show ALY a lot of LOVE first.........give yourself the luxury of TIME........get strong in YOU.

Thanks Anvil, but the problem is right now I'm very angry at myself and hating myself for allowing this to happen. My anger is multi directional. I flipped someone off in traffic the other day and then I look over and there is a child in the passenger seat. I wanted to cry. So ashamed of myself and I'm stuck in the pit of misery. My poor daughter has seen me sob and that's not good. I'm trying, every day. Today was sparked by seeing the mom is following the trashy replacement on Instagram. That set me off. And the trashy girl looks like a hooker in her cover picture. I know I know, I need to stop looking.

stop looking, book yourself a nice dinner in Vegas and some spa time while you are there, and know that you are still you and this will pass.

I know it doesn't feel like it at the moment, but it's true.
Hugs meanwhile :grouphug:

Sometimes relationships and events repeat themselves in our life so that we can learn the lesson. Keep telling yourself that this time will be different. Take the time you need for self reflection and show yourself some love and kindness. Time to forgive yourself. You did the best you could at the time, the relationship is in the past, but don't let it rob you of your future.
Maybe a break from social media too to kill the temptation to obsess over that which you have no control.
Today, take yourself by the hand, be your own bestfriend and take baby steps towards building the kind of life you want and being the person you want to be. Be patient, it will get better if you just keep on going.

Thank you. I finally made it to Vegas and it helps being somewhere different although this time last year I was here and he was calling me constantly because the relationship was new. The good ole days. I think I will always miss the good part of him, but for now I'm going to try to live in the moment instead of thinking about the past or future. Might only get me through a few hours and then have another valley but hopefully the valleys will become less deep and long soon. It's been a month now.

One time I got myself hooked into the claws of a sex addict. Addiction is addiction Aly, they are all the same though their dishes are different. My relationship mimicked the description of yours - we met and fireworks exploded. No more a perfect man for me had every existed. I found out about 2 or 3 months in what I was dealing with somewhat by accident. I believed him when he said I had CURED him. I believed everything he said while I sunk in the quicksand, and by the end of it a year and a half later he dumped me like I was a piece of trash on the floor of his car. By that time I didn't even resemble the person who met him, nor did he resemble the person who I fell in love with. I turned on myself for being a crying, whining, nag - weak. I looked for reasons to contact him, I obsessed over him, I cried endlessly, I called into work so I could sit at home and figure out how to get him back. I looked like hell. I didn't want to go anywhere unless it was with someone who was willing to talk about him and what he had done, and give me hope that our true love would conquer all (and they were becoming few people).

If I listed all the horrible things this man did or said my post would be 3 pages long. Yet I was willing to excuse the behavior to get back to the days when everything was wonderful, and he made me feel we would conquer the world. How sick is that and do you see that it is I who became the addict also? Do you see this behavior in yourself?

I did find out that he had his hooks in someone else (well, to be truthful there were many). She wasn't very attractive, and I obsessed over her and why he would be with her when he could be with me who was so much better. What I realized is that the person and whom they were with didn't really matter - he collected people similar to the way people collect shells on a beach. The natural progression of a relationship is for it to get deeper and more serious. At that point it would begin to hinder his addiction and the days were numbered. While he tried away to figure out how to keep me and continue screwing everything that moved, I was trying to figure out how to make him stop and end up with him.

I was with him for 18 months, 5 were good, 13 were horrific. Then I let him have 6 more of me while I cried and fell apart and he moved on as if I and "our love" had never existed. Guess what? Our love really never did exist. It was an obsession.

My healing began when I forgave myself for allowing him to treat me like dog sh!t on the bottom of his shoe. His actions were unforgivable, atrocious. And that was the man I wanted.......Really??? I wanted to marry him can you imagine? Saying I dodged a bullet really doesn't capture it. My advice is to start forgiving yourself for getting involved, ignoring red flags, accepting unacceptable behavior. You should of kicked him to the curb a myriad of times and you didn't. Its ok, you made a mistake. Next, start taking care of you. While you are there in Vegas don't sit in your hotel room lamenting over the alcoholic. Get out, go for a walk, Have a nice dinner, go to the spa. Go shopping, ride the ferris wheel, go see the fountain show at Bellagio. Stop handing over anymore of your life to this man. You will be surprised at how quickly the fog will lift when you put yourself first.

In all liklihood lurking below your Ex's addiction is a personality disorder or mental issue. Its very common. Likely there is much more here to deal with than you can imagine. As for the mother - you became close because you were her's sons savior and full time babysitter. The parents will generally always side with their kids, she is a classic enabler and codie and will most likely support ANYONE who is willing to step up and take the position of full-time handler (so SHE doesn't have to). She is a big part of the problem and in no way the solution, she was not your friend. had she been you would still be in contact and she would tell you to save yourself and forget her loser son.

You will get over this.

Hello Aly, so very sorry you are in such pain. Please, go easy on yourself. I expect nearly everyone on here has been in a relationship that started out awesome and ended up very, very hurtful.

I certainly was. It was a "soulmate" relationship. The sweet and passionate things he said absolutely melted me. Circumstance and distance prevented us from really being together for a time. However the time came when we *could've* been together and then he didn't want me. There was another woman. To say I was devastated is putting it mildly. I cried all day, every day for a long time.

My job kept me sane and I had family support, thank God. I was depressed to varying degrees for about two years.

Time heals, sweetheart, I know it's trite and a cliche but cliches exist because they are true. It's about 15 years since that guy broke my heart into a million pieces. I'm with a man who is at least a zillion times better.

My ex "soul mate" and I still have some sporadic, cordial contact. He would love to have me back. Ha ha ha ha ha! I wouldn't go back to him for a million bucks.

You'll get past this. You won't always feel so broken. I went to therapy because of that guy and although it took a couple of tries to find the right therapist, when I did he was very helpful. It's something to consider.

It'll get better! Much better.

Thanks to you all. Redatlanta, that's scary. I do believe my story is slightly different though and maybe I'm in denial but both my therapist and mother (who is a blunt no holds barred person) both believe he truly loved me and did his best to make a go of it, but just couldn't stave off the addiction. He kept telling me early on "I'm pushing you away because I know I'm starting to struggle and I need to protect you from me." Even in July he said "I'm protecting you and me from us." He also said early on that I needed to detach but then at times would beg me to please hang on. He was torn. He would wobble back and forth but often put his foot down and said he wanted to see me but that he couldn't cave in because he needed to protect me rather than think about what he wanted. This theme was until he really started spiraling fast and hard. That's when he turned mean. Before that he would just withdraw and come back every few weeks trying again. Finally in late July he made the bad turn. This was around the time his friendship started with the trashy girl according to mama bear. By mid August he was drinking all the time and he started calling me more and more. By September, he'd lost it all and became the threatening hostile nightmare. I don't "think" he's some bad person who was "collecting" me like a shell. Although don't get me wrong, I despise and almost hate him on some level at this point. I don't want him back, but like you I keep obsessing over whether the new girlfriend thing is true or not and if true why. My mind just wants understanding and closure. And my heart is suffering the most, from the betrayal. Not the loss, but the betrayal. The loss to the extent of the sweet guy I fell in love with who is no more. I don't think he or I have that "terminal uniqueness" that is mentioned in any sense. But, if you read posts from the other side (the A's forum), they aren't evil people (not saying you said that), and it's amazing how we are like two different nations at war with such different viewpoints and perspectives. Does that make sense or am I rambling? I do think that if he is seeing this girl it is different than my relationship with him because ours was born out of his fight to go clean and have a future and family with me. With this girl he is deep in the throes of his addiction and he's just clutching on because he's lost everything and she is all he can get now because I wouldn't help him. I expected him to face the consequences and solve it himself.

You are right about the mom though. She is a very SICK person, maybe more so than him. I have the biggest problem with her because she's not an alcoholic struggle with addiction. She just manipulated to manipulate and get what she wanted and she was in possession of all her faculties when doing so. I can say I HATE her for what she did and I hope she spends her retirement reaping karma rewards.

Thank you!!