Wow, I go away for the weekend and figured I would be on page 5. I am glad to see that my views on my W issues are being validated.
Yes, yes she has spending issues/addiction. Someone else finally sees it too. Yes, yes she is not a "truly" happy person. She struggles with how she looks, her place in life, etc. She doesn't have any "real" friends. She has a mediocere R with her family. Her F died suddenly 6 mo ago tomorrow. I am just now really working at "supporting" correctly her many needs that are caused by her "difficulties". Yes, she has "issues". Judging it as an addiction would make it no easier for me to comprehend. People need to quit treating the syptoms and start treating the problem. Her "problem" is low self-esteem with a dash of depression. How she can solve it will be explained quite simply in the next paragraph.
Her view of her life has been getting better since I became more supportive (including supporting things I am dead against). I think the reason I get the "deal with it" line is because she is doing all that she "thinks" she can. She limits her potential by not giving full effort or by not completing a task. She must see it as better to have failed by not giving full effort and blaming it on that versus giving full effort and that not being good enough. I have recently brought this to her attention. I effectively said to quit leaving yourself an excuse for not succeeding instead of having no excuse for not succeeding. "If you have so many things going on in your life how are you going to do any of them well." This caused her to break into her "nothing is ever good enough for you" speech. I said, "No, that is not is it. No one could do all of the things you do, well." "You are not super-human." As our R gets stronger she can actually "hear" what I say instead of going on the defensive immediately.
I wish she was "closer" with her family or had a "best" friend other than me to help her through things. Similar to many other things I am involved in, I will probably have to handle this myself also. The saving grace is the increased respect I get from my W lately. This is causing a lot of things to improve slightly.
Great weekend on the lake for the whole family. We all skied and are not too sore today. I call that a success.
