HKAngel24

So strange.
So much easier to manage the "focusing on me" when he is not in my presence.

Abf came to visit for my birthday. We had a nice time, but I was once again aware of the acute sensitivity and resentment going on under everything. Instead of enjoying his time I was analyzing every comment, pulling back and feeling resentful at all of the things he "wasnt" doing right. I realize that I am looking for an overabundance of affection and attention to serve as reassurance of his love and support. I look for him to "repair" the part of me that has been lost in all of this.

I know we are at two completely different places.
I have stood by him- he feels secure in our relationship. Why wouldn't he?
I, on the other hand, have suffered the other side of the coin- the deep betrayal and pain of the loss of trust so my defenses are constantly up.

During the visit I was not able to be myself or to detach. I personalized every behavior and comment or lack of behavior. I didn't feel lovable and began to believe that no one would want to stay with me just for being me because I am so needy and emotional and complex. I often feel like a child, stomping my feet and screaming for attention and wanting to unload the laundry list of how he has abandon me, betrayed me and done me wrong.

He expressed about how he was glad he didn't live here anymore and that he was cognizant of the fact that being here brought him down and brought back the old feelings of the urge to use. I personalized this and the same old panic began to arise in which I felt deeply disconnected from myself and dependent on him and his love.
The comment hurt me on a few levels- first that I was in this city and I saw his comment as wanting to be away from me. Secondly, I felt semi-resentful in regards to the fact that he CAN move and start over- I have another six months of school to go before I can begin to start some place else and that I must work with what I have now.
I know it is not wrong to want someone to love me, but managing the feelings of panic of rejection is difficult for me. It is a challenge comforting myself and replacing the negative thoughts with positive ones that remind me I am a person of worth and my life has limitless possibilities and beauty and that I have choices and I am a whole and worthwhile person just being me.

liesagain

Heather.......glad to see your post, I was just thinking about you a day or so ago..........wondered how you were doing.

Dont be so hard on yourself.........it takes time to learn to love yourself and you spend years developing the defenses and walls..........and even the insecurities
it takes time to relearn!!!
your doing a great job, your able to identify your issues thats progress>>>>>>>>>>.hang in there

kj21

Hi Heather, I too was glad to see your post. I was thinking of you the other day.
Is he planning to move back at some time? Or are you moving to him after school? do you think about just a clean break and moving forward without him?? Just curious, you seem very intellectual and you are beautiful, I hate read about how much he dictates your feelings. i know when you love someone you can't imagine life without him but I really hate to hear how he makes you feel (intentually or not).
sorry if I was too personal.

GiveLove

Heather,

hang in there. It's hard right after a visit. You've allowed yourself to get thrown back into high-level codependency. Give yourself some time to come down again. Separate, regroup, calm your mind.

As to his comment about the feelings about being back in your city -- about triggering the urges to use again -- I wish I could be sympathetic to you but I can't. I think you realize that he's just being honest about his feelings. Would you rather he lied, just to make you feel better? Would you rather he just quit the sober house and fly to your side, even if it means diving back into the hell of active addiction?

If my sister had been able to shake her city, get to a fresh place and a fresh start, I honestly believe she'd still be alive today. She was unable to do that, not just because of the usual inertia but also because her manipulative, codie husband guilt-tripped her mercilessly each time she started making concrete plans to do it....although they were both nurses, could've worked anywhere in the world, he said he'd divorce her before he'd live anywhere else. She went through rehab several times, and each time came home to "I hope you're happy - LOOK at all this work I've had to do while you were in there doing ceramics and talking to psychiatrists" Not letting her off the hook -- she was an addict, after all -- but what she really needed was to get the hell out of there, and she wasn't able to do that.

Do you love him? Or do you just love the feeling the relationship gives you? Is he a human being or is he simply a symbol that isn't behaving the way you need him to right now?

If you love this person and want him to survive, let him do what he needs to do. It's not all about us. Sorry to put it that way. Bad baggage on that topic, as you can see.

Hugs,
GL

BrokenBridges24

(((Heather))))

You are a bright, intellegent and beautiful woman. Go easy on yourself. You have been through a lot and it has been a very emotional experience. Don't second guess yourself. You have come too far to start doing that. Do not ever think you are unworthy or you will never find love or be loved the way you deserve. Because you will dear. Nothing is forever, good times or bad ones. You will be happy again. Just give it time and do not be discouraged. Your a very kind sweet loving person. Any one who knows you can see that and if they do not well that have lost so much in not taking the time to see you for who you are. Work the steps, be positive and please go easy on you. Take some time out for yourself today. Do something that makes you smile.

We all love you. (((Hugs)))
-Broken

HKAngel24

THANK YOU all SO SO much for your comments.
You have no idea how much I needed them now. Sometimes I need others words like a rubberband snapping around my wrist reminding me of my boundaries.

LiesAgain- thank you for your support it means so much.

Anvil- thank you for your share. It is so comforting to know others faulter and must talk themselves down, back into sanity and doing what takes care of them versus the inital fight-or-flight reaction that one often just goes with.

KJ- I'm not quite sure what the future holds. I don't seem to have enough belief in my own resilience today to begin to truly ponder what lies ahead for me. I've been trying to do one day at a time because the future scares me so much. I HATE that I have become so dependent like this and how my insecurity flares up when I interpret events or comments in a way that hits a sore spot within me.
I, too, want to move out of Philadelphia. Aside from him, I need a new start. I have lived here for almost 4 years and am ready for a change. I tend to need that often to renew myself. Maybe a new city- I don't know, but I know I need to go elsewhere.
We have discussed it minorly, but I am always afraid to think ahead.

GiveLove- Thank you for NOT sympathizing with me. You are entirely correct. I am acting like a big baby about all of this. I was reading something earlier in one of my Al-Anon books that lead me into seeing how much I am projecting my own lack of security in who I am, in the value I have as a person onto him- making it HIS responsibility to make me feel loved- to do both MY job and HIS job.
For the brief week and a half it lasted that I felt some sense of inner self security, self-esteem and worth, it was amazing. It brought me to a healthier level where I could interact with people and not personalize their behavior towards me. I walk around feeling damaged and inadequate and anything anyone says or does I use as evidence to reinforce the fact that I deserve this toxic shame- that who I am is wrong.
I use his impatience with my insecurity and lack of needing to constantly be sensitive to my feelings as ammunition to believe I am unlovable and should be rejected and that no one will ever want me.
The ?s you asked me- I don't know the answers too. I find so many of my fears and panic is genuine defense mechanisms that spring from dark places that have been following me since childhood. Circumstances can change but the feelings apply themselves regardless.

You said -If you love this person and want him to survive, let him do what he needs to do. It's not all about us.
This is right. Again, the babyish, not wanting to be abandon child in me wants to scream, "WHAT ABOUT ME?!" Because once more, I am expecting HIM to take responsibility for my emotional survival and security.

Definitely sitting on the pity pot.

I hate that during so much of this I have reverted to these childish ways of looking at the world, in which I am deeply insecure and fearful that I do not have choices and am trapped by my innate defectiveness.

I think it's been pointed out to me before that I am never happy- I feel loved, I fear he's relapsing. I think he's doing well in his recovery, I fear he doesn't love me. He's in Florida versus he may move home etc. Seems I am so afraid to be positive or even slightly happy for fear that it will be taken away or I need to be prepared for bad things.

As an adult I can honestly say that I do not want him to fly home. Funny you should say that though because before he left he told me that he thinks that I believe he has abandon me by going to Florida. THere is a part of me that overall feels sad, angry and hurt at the situation because I did begin to depend on him for things, emotionally esp, as well as companionship wise. I know that where he is at is the best thing for him, I just often feel I may be forgotten about or more importantly that it couldn't be possible for someone to love me being that far away from me.
I know he cannot come back here. But, I am able to recognize though that I do WANT him to feel a certain way about me. It's definitely not rational. I WANT him to miss me. We have already discussed that he will never move back to Philadelphia. He knows that it is not good for him and when I am dipping into the craziest recesses of my mind, I equate his unwillingness to consider that with his love for me- that if he REALLY loved me he would want to do anything for me. Again, expecting him to give me the love and security that must begin with me.


BrokenBridges-Thank you too for your kind words. People often remind me that happiness is a choice. I have struggled with being happy so much of my life- because I've always been dissatisfied with being me- being too needy and sensitive and feeling I'd always be rejected and needed to conceal it- that receiving love and validation from another for who I was, was what I searched for, longed for and sought out.
I was taught that my insecurities made me weak and that approval from others for the way I was lead to happiness.

Sorry for the novel, all and thank you again. I do need to recenter myself and allow so much of the negative chatter to just settle below the surface. It only serves to make me crazy overanalyzing- makes me obsess and that is my disease - taking me away from learning to love and take care of myself which is what Ineed to learn to do- even if I learn it again and again on a daily basis.

DoingWell

Hi Heather,
It sounds like you have great footage..your first line is very true for most of us having gone through this.. It is easier when they are not around. I found myself questioning my own recovery because I was doing so well.. (when he was not around or doing well) it's those set-backs that really jolted me to reality.

I hate sounding glum or pessimistic..but there are some things we cannot get past and you have to give yourself a break for those feelings. They are not unhealthy and they don't mean your not doing well.. they just are what they are.