Beckalee43

When my s/o and I first started our relationship we had a long discussion about his priorities in his life. 1st) Recovery, 2nd) Family, 3) his s/o. What is so nice about this is that he has priorities. He know's exactly what he has to do in order to keep a balance in his life.
However, Lately it seemed like things were thrown off kilt. He was going to his meetings going over his steps with his sponsor, but it just seemed like everything else was kind of suffering. Specifically our relationship.
Now, I can only imagine the responses that I can potentially get, but I'm not a needy, controlling person. Despite some skepticism from recovering addicts, I have been nothing but supportive. I thought it was very admirable of him to acknowledge that he wasn't progressing with his past sponsor so he reached out for help. Even now that he's attending meetings regularly and going to church, it's like his perspective on how he was living life before regularly attending meetings, had changed and developed more. If he's willing to share what took place in his meetings I'm always interested in hearing how his progress is going. We even started reading the al-anon book together and he shares his information with me or gives me his point of view.
I had debated back and forth about whether it was my place to say anything or not. I mean, really, who I am to say anything especially when it has the potential to sound completely selfish.
Friday drew that line for me. Because of the holiday he got out of work early, then at five he was catching a ride with his sponsor to his meeting. He called me before I had gotten into work and he told me that he was going to call me so we could make plans for this weekend. Only I never heard from him. the next morning when he didn't call me as usual I was worried. I called him and he sounded completely disorented. At this point I'm thinking what happened if something just snapped in him and he relapsed? These aweful things just kept coming into mind. I didn't question him about what happened to him I just wanted to know that he was ok.
After I got off the phone with him I kept thinking to myself how long would he have taken to call me? I had no idea what was even supposed to happen that day because he never called. I went to work upset about this whole situation.
After his meeting on Sunday, I picked him up and the whole ride back to my house I kept trying to rationalize with myself that I was over reacting that it was no big deal, but this nagging in my gut was telling me that I needed to say something otherwise this was just going to continue on.
We talked everything out and I told him that I felt like our relationship wasn't even on his list anymore. He began to try to blame that I had resentment towards his meetings, but I asked him how many times he could count on one hand that I had ever acted or said anything negative towards his meetings. He stopped and thought about it and couldn't come up with a single time. From now until only Lord knows when will I always continue to support his recovery, but I believe inorder to have a healthy relationship with anything/anyone you need to have balance.
He asked me a few questions and then launched into how he needed to be accountable for his actions. How all these other things such as work, meetings, calling his sponsor he was accountable for but we were no where in that sentence.
I said to him, "I think you have a difficult time accepting that some people do genuinely care about you."
He was looking at the ground when I said that to him and quickly picked his head up, looked at me and he said, "I do have difficulty with that."
I suggested that this was probably something that he should probably talk about with his sponsor. He got up from the chair pulled me up, hugged me , apologized to me and said that he would talk to his sponsor.
Today he just finished up changing the oil on one of the cars when his sponsor called him. A guy from the 3/4 home who has the same sponsor as my s/o relapsed last night. It was so sad to hear about it b/c it seemed like this time he was really serious about his recovery. My s/o filled his sponsor in and told him that the next time they met there were a few things that he wanted to go over with him.
I'm really gald that I decided not to hold back my feelings. I want my s/o to always know that I care about him and his recovery, but we still have to have an even balance. He has to get accustomed to the fact that now in his new journey in sobriety he's going to meet a lot of people a long the way that are going to care about him.

Ann

Becka, sometimes we codies can put all our energy into analyzing, watching, assessing and directing their recovery, I know I tried all that with my son.

The thing is, their recovery belongs to them, as does how they work their program and even their failures if they happen. When we try to direct what they should or should not do, we get in the way and distract them from doing what they really need to do.

What helped me was working my own recovery. Finding meetings about me and codependency and a sponsor who guided me through the steps and working my own program.

I know that I found I could not live in my son's addiction/recovery and my own recovery at the same time. As long as I stayed focused on me and my program I found that I grew and became stronger, I found my balance and that has helped me for many years now...no matter how my son's addiction/recovery/relapse has gone.

Hope you find your own program really soon. My guess is that you'll both be happier.

Hugs

sugarbear1

Focus on you. Working a program involves more than meetings and hanging with a sponsor. A call to my sponsor is better than a meeting and my "homework" (reading, meditation, writing, calling another) is also as important. In time, with your own growth, you'll intuitively know what to do. Best wishes to you!