irisgardens

I wrote here a year ago.

My life was in shambles...I was stuck in Chile where I had followed my husband for our 'last chance' to make it and had lost all my money.

My daughter had relapsed as a heroin addict.

I was frustrated...I was at the end of my rope...I had no support.

Based on support her and another site...I got a job in the states, moved back and although my other adult children wouldn't let me stay, I figured out how to make it. I was hurt, angry and upset...I had never turned my back on a family member despite what was becoming clear were two generations of family who had turned their backs on me.

I found my daughter and tried to get her to do rehab and she wouldn't and there were another 6 mos of frustration and sick and more hardship and stress sick.

Then...something changed...I started to stand my ground for me...it was after Mother's day and I realized that my kids don't appreciate me and I have sacrificed so much for so little in that dysfunctional addicted families don't appreciate...they use.

I got a therapist...and poured out my woes as I have for so many years as I got myself into therapy...18 years of addicted kids and me standing in front of the trainwrecks of their lives on drugs, an alcoholic husband, alcoholic parents...and still trying to save others.

About 3 weeks ago I finally just got fed up and sick and tired enough to stop. I put my adult son in his place with plain talk...I have stopped telling people my woes and have chosen to only be with people who are good for me.

Last night I walked out at intermission of a dance show for my grandkids as I realized that the daughter who had me there has me there so that she can feel good about herself...and that nothing I have ever done has been for anybody but her.

I walked out because she never has looked at her own selfishness and the challenges she caused our family and takes no responsibility for her own younger sister being lost to addiction.

I realized that I am no longer willing or even capable of giving more to these people who have drained me dry and think only about themselves and their own lives.

The past 23 years have been spent in me working on myself...a child death...grief therapy and then opening into other stuff about parents...an older addicted daughter...Al Anon, tough love, etc. etc....a second addicted daughter...more al anon, more tough love...this time almost killed myself...woke up to the fact that I am an adult child...and all the stuff that goes with being manipulated and an enabler.

This daughter...well...she is in the court system and I am tough loving it again...and it is always hard. I have lived with the anger and blame of the second daughter and the lack of any kind of giving from the family...they couldn't move away faster...looking for the fun. Well, today I took a good step for myself. I will go to court for my daughter on Monday--she probably hasn't taken her steps...but I am stronger and I have and continue to take mine.

I can't waste any more of my life on these people who do not value nor care about more than what they want and what they need. I will be supporting her by sitting in court and praying that she be put in jail. I will be sitting there alone...but even if my family were with me...I would be alone...because they deny that anyone but me has the problem...they believe that I have been...fill in the blank. And I just stopped caring enough today to continue the drama. Freedom is remarkably drama free.

I wrote 3 emails today...one to her to tell her how it was for me to be in that recital and remember that when her younger sister was there she was lost to drugs and never cared (the dance co owners were two women who supported me in supporting her--it was 12 years ago)--and her sister was the same age as her two daughters are now...and she never ever showed that she cared...my daughter. She has never shown support and threw her sister away so that she could pretend to this stupid perfect life without ever caring what she has done to anyone around her. I told her I don't want to see her for a while. I have nothing left to give...may never have again.

I wrote to her older sister who has enabled and also used drugs and was planning to come live with me in my one bedroom apartment with her son--versus living with the above sister or brother where she has been fine since I hit bottom, lost everything and couldn't get one child to lift a finger...even to leaving me out of Thanksgiving...because I was supporting their sister (as I supported them before) and they didn't agree. I told her it was the wrong thing and that she needs to take responsibility for herself at age 35...I have been dealing with full on addiction since she was 16 and although she has turned her life around...I am not ready to take care of her again and have nothing for myself.

I wrote to their father who I finally drew a line in the sand around last year...who has simply never done what he was supposed to do to be a contributing husband but has expected me to do it all and then told other people how 'sick' I am from depression...sick and tired from being used up. I told him not to come home from Chile as I no longer believe in him and there is too much water under the bridge for me to ever believe in him or his promises again...what I know is that he will not keep a promise.

I am calm...and I am focused.

I am myself.

I may be 59 years old...but I have learned that no one will take care of me but me...and I am going to give what I have to me instead of all these needy people including parents who used me for my sweet and fabulous nature until I was used up and then discarded me...because I didn't have what they were attracted to in the first place...a source of what they wanted...not me...my energy.

I am starting my life over. It is good, it is scary, it is what has to happen...for whatever reason...today was the day for these steps.

It was so easy at the end of the day...all the drama, all the hardship, all the sacrifice...and at the end of the day...all I had to do was realize that there was nothing I could do to change anybody or anything...except to let it all go.

Vale

>>>>>>>who used me for my sweet and fabulous nature until I was used up and then discarded me...because I didn't have what they were attracted to in the first place...a source of what they wanted...not me...my energy.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Yup, there it is.

Welcome to the resistance.

59? Who cares!

The important thing is you did not expend every last ounce for ingrates....then die.

No.

[Two letters, one syllable, easy to pronounce.]

Ann

Amen, sister. Why is something so profoundly simple so hard to get through our heads.

It doesn't matter what other people do or don't do, when we are drained emotionally, physically, financially and spiritually from trying to help/save/change them to the extent that we have stopped caring for ourselves somewhere along the way, it is time to let go and move forward to beautiful new beginnings.

I wish you happier days ahead, a life free from anxiety, and inner peace like you have never known before.

Hugs

chicory

I wish you the best. You deserve to live YOUR life, and be as happy as you can be.
You unlocked the shackles and walked away. beautiful.