I check in often too, as I also feel the same way, I don't have much to offer to too many people. Yes, as always, there is good advise here, and often I do need the help to look at things in a different light.
Dick, like your ex, is still way out there, although there are times when I wonder if he's always been out there, yet I just ignored or denied (to myself) what I saw, you know, just made up excuses for him..... which, I know I did a lot of explaining about his actions, for a long time.
I know I wore some heavy duty rose colored glasses for a long while, used justification to help me ignore some of the more painful things I experienced, and often blamed myself for things that weren't entirely my fault.
All of this put together, along with nearly 6 years of on again, off again counseling, has me wondering if old Dick has always been near the "deep end" all along.
I see now, I was pretty co-dependent within my own ways, some of it came naturally, or I had learned growing up, while I know I also developed a few new ways while married to Dick..... and no, he's not responsible for the way I acted, for that was my own doing.... so, I don't blame him at all, he was just being himself, I became my own adaptation... LOL. I did have choices all along, like, oh, leaving.... but I chose to stay, using such excuses "for the sake of the children" which became one of my favorites, I didn't want them coming from a broken home.... and now look at them, they really don't even have a home.
I realize this is a mess I helped create. I just wish there was something I could do to ease the children's pain. Oh, sure, I can ease my own pain by saying "they too have grown, have become more emotionally aware" or even use "The children are resilient....." and soothe my soul my telling myself they will become stronger because of it....
Oh, how I hate to hear that statement "children are resilient" if it was truly so, why do we have so many messed up adults, and this website is just proof that children really aren't so resilient, as we all would like to think. What children do, just as I did as a child, is focus on the future, and believe things will be better once they become adults.... they put their pain, their fears in the back of their minds, they muster through those awful days, with a faith that some how, some way, when they become adults, they will have enough control in their lives to soothe their childhood memories of what they had to endure.
To know that my goal was to raise my children with as much emotional health as I could learn prior to their birth, and through out their many different stages of life, that I went so far to read, digest, and envelop everything I could learn, so they could have the best childhood someone like me, could give them, and to see what has happened to my hopes and dreams, the pain I have caused them, because of my own inabilities, has left me devistated. I am a failure......
Jeremiah 29:11 For I know the plans I have for you.........
