Working on acceptance and forgiveness

[AntoniaB]

Hey Cas, thanks for the advice. I saw my psychiatrist today and she said the same thing as you! She suggested writing things down and then tearing them up. Whether it's feelings of sadness, or anger, or disgust, whatever, write them down, read them, and then tear that into pieces. She said visually it will help to drive the point home that these things must be dealt with but then let go.

I only responded to him the following, that I deposited his check today, that I started the refinance and it would take 60 days or so, and that I packed up his video games and will put them in the shed where he can pick them up using a key I'll hide outside. I told him "let the cds go for now." I think sitting with him one on one dividing music, when so much of what we listened to had emotional connections, would be too hard, would open fresh wounds. So I am choosing to not deal with that now.

My psych. gave a bit of advice to me that I wonder if others here can use: it's the fine line between avoidance behaviors and detachment. She said it's good to detach from the spouse and to be working towards that goal, because we need to get on with our lives and not rely on even a bad connection with them to sustain us. She said until we can come to a point of emotional neutrality, where seeing them in person or talking via phone/email/text doesn't affect us one way or the other, that we should minimize contact to just essentials, essentials being legal issues or parenting issues. This is because it is counterproductive for us to keep getting sucked into conversations with them when things are as they are right now.

But another level of avoidance that she says is NOT good is when we are trying very hard to not "feel." I've been in that mode lately, where when I get sad or teary, I shut that off immediately. I distract myself so I don't cry, so it doesn't turn into full-blown sobs. And she said that is NOT good. That is actually something that impedes progress because it just pushes feelings down and they're only going to resurface down the road.

So she said to really embrace the sad moments or angry moments and meet them as "friends" and see them as moments that are a necessary part of healing. I just wanted to share that because maybe that will help some of you too :-)