Afraid of the dark

[Ste7e]

WOW V what an answer! Thank you so much for taking the time to get involved, this is the kind of insight I have been looking for. OK so WAW is where I started my journey, but the more I read about everything else and everyones sitchs over the last few months I started to question that. I am very happy to hear that neither my WAW of myself are MLC. The more informed I am the easier it is for me to move forward. There is a lot of love from my WAW to me (and me to her) and she is on a journey of her own which I hope will give her what she needs also. Obviously I wish we could be on this journey together but that is not in the cards. And her leaving was really the kick in the butt I needed to break out of my crippling depression and start to work on myself. We are both codependents and we were unitentionally wrecking havoc on one another because neither of us were working on ourselves. I can see I created a situation where I allowed her to enable me and she was more than willing to play that role. Not a healthy sitch.
It is interesting that you also bring up neglect as that is what my new Shrink said about my life, not just this R and the neglect is both internal and external. Let me give a little more background. I am an only child my parents D when I was 14, my F was the adult child of an alcoholic and though he didn't drink was a serial cheater, he had left a family to be with my M and is on W #3 now. My M also started having A in response. I was fully aware of all of this from childhood. Both were career obsessed and extremely intelligent PHD's. There was love for me but neglect. I ended up dropping out of school at 15 and living with friends at this young age and hanging out in Bars. I was a very hip little guy. My first R was for 5 years in my early 20's, after a couple years together I found out she was extremely sexually traumatized, she ended up becoming a heroine addict and we broke up. This really effected me and I began drinking heavily for 10 years. During this time I was a womanizing/cheating badass. I hung out with the toughest manly men I could find and played in bands alot of toxic masculinity. I ended up getting sober and in doing so neutered myself. I didn't want to be the bad guy I was anymore and became completely honest and loyal with everyone. I think I went too far with and really lost the balance of a necessary swagger because I was so afraid or guilty of who I once was. I some how managed to get two degrees through all this and had a career path I was going down. After my 1st year of sobriety I got in a 3 year relationship with a serious Alcoholic. She really abused me but I was addicted to the drama and her. I met my W immediately after this traumatic relationship and never dealt with what I had gone through. My W was amazing and my life instantly became good for 5 years. Then I burned out on job and found out about all the sick relatives who all ended up dying which just shot me into a very deep depression. Which culminated in my WAW departure.
So here I am now, I am currently seeing 2 shrinks, will eventually choose one. One is dealing with more childhood regression stuff and the other is more action oriented. This is helping me tremendously. As I said before I broke out of the depression. I have been going to Yoga 4-5 days a week and I have changed my diet (no sugar, no fried foods, portion control) I have lost 40 lbs in 3 months and am very close to my goal weight. I have been diligently working on creative projects. I have started playing shows again and am meeting with new guys to play with a couple times a week. Fixed my sleeping schedule. Going to 12 step meetings for dealing with alcoholics twice a week. Been reaching out to friends and hanging out alot. Been applying for jobs daily and going for interviews. And have been doing research on maybe starting a business with a couple friends. My GAL is seriously going to the point that my days a pretty filled. I also only watch an hour of tv at night now when I used to binge for 8 hours at a time. I have tackled almost all my 180's on my list. I also have read and ordered a bunch of books recommended on this forum.
Where I am at with my WAW at this point is that by going dark I have been able to focus on myself. She definately has the power to throw me for an emotional loop still and NC has helped to insulate me. I am learning detachment but it is very unnatural for me (probably everyone). I am still hopeful that WAW and I can Rec. and if she has been working on herself as much as I have and we can continue to do so there is hope. But I also know now that we will both be ok and even happy if that never happens. And yes I am willing to just be friends despite Sandi's advice. When WAW and I have spent time together in person over the last 3 months it has been good, we really do click as people which is what initally brought us together. I understand though that she is hesitant to trust my change is real (and it is just at the beginning for me too) because she saw me at my emotional worst.