Heartbroken and needing help!

[cat04]

Thanks Cat - you sound as if you have reached a peaceful point - I don't mean to pry but how long did it take you to reach this point?

Irish,

First off, you are not prying. I don't post here to hide MY story. My H's, well I don't always share a lot of details about him, unless it will help.

I am at a place of peace and happiness.

How long it took me to get here is a whole lot more complicated.

It wasn't like I woke up one day and was suddenly better.

My H has had two periods of crisis, one beginning in 98 ending in 2000 and then an attempt at rerearing it's ugly head in 03, which was nothing more than a bomb drop and then nothing. I thought that the years in between were pretty good.

This time, my bomb was in June 07. Followed by one in June/July 08. It was after the 08 bomb, that I wanted to commit suicide, I knew then and there, that something had to change within me.

It was a struggle, a ton of soul searching, a restructuring of my entire life.

It was a slow process. I went backwards many times. Got sucked back into the drama many times.

Somedays, I really wanted to take a step for me, and I treated and still treat it like a personal challenge. Other days, I had to force myself to even get out of bed. I don't have those anymore.

Goals were difficult for me. GAL activities were very difficult for me. More difficult than I will describe on here.

180's--felt phony. And forget acting as if. I suck at that.
Still.

Yes I am probably the world's worst DBer, in that if I analyzed every single thing and then tried to implement because it was a 180, a GAL activity, etc...I couldn't do it.

I knew I was tired of feeling like crap every day. I knew that I had to do something.

I began forcing myself to keep the house clean again, to work and work well even if I didn't want to. To look into my own mirror and see what was inside. (This was probably THE most important thing). I took my S everywhere he wanted to go and did all that I could with him. Slowly, I began to feel better. Which then spurned more living. And more feeling better. I began meeting people and making friends. And it just sort of snowballed into a life. Of my very own.

It is still a work in progress, but everyday, I wake up, I thank God for the blessings and the wonderful people He has brought, and continues to bring, into my life.

I am grateful to these boards, those that came before and shared their stories and wisdom, to those that still call bull on me when I need to hear it, those that extend their hands in friendship, and those that arrive, like you, and allow me to help in whatever way possible and remind me where I was and of how far I have come.

I learned the concepts of forgivness, gratitude, and unconditional love and what they look like to me. I learned that forgivness is a gift I give to myself and that the only way to love, is to do it without expecting anything in return.

I still have my days when I am cranky or I just want to throw my hands in the air and say F' it. But those days are few and far between now. Now, most days, if something crosses my path that I need to deal with, I am not afraid to look in the mirror and see what is there.

So that is probably not the answer you were expecting to hear, but it is the only one I can give you.

There is no cookie cutter solution to this, no do A and you will feel B way to walk this path.

It is as individual a journey as each of our S's crisis are.

You sound like you are headed in the right direction though. For you. And one step just leads to another and another.