Moving past the WAW-MCL to a stronger me

[Davide]

I ask this question to myself now - 'Why am I letting this happen to me?" instead of "why is this happening to me?". I know that I have agency and control and I can manipulate my contexts to a certain extent to get better outcomes.

I think this is really the crux of the matter. It is all about taking charge and personal responsibility for the things that we can control in this life. Making attitudinal shifts and doing the hard work that is personal reflection are two of those things. Often times we cant control the situations we are put in or the way that other people interact or treat us. We can only control our response and the way that we mentally frame it.

I was never under the illusion that I had a lot of control over outside things in my life. When I was an adolescent my younger brother passed away after a long illness and I forever carried with me the lesson that as much as you might wish for something to happen (or not happen) you cant control such things. Bad [censored] happens to good people. I learned that all my love, prayers, hopes arent going to change the world around me. Unfortunately, I think that led me into fatalistic thinking as well. I gave up too much control. I lost sight of those things that I could control and I definitely fell into the victim mentality.

That played itself out again with the BD. How could this happen to me? Why do I deserve this... all the typical stuff that us LBSers feel in those beginning moments. In this situation it is really easy to feel like the victim. Easy but not helpful.

I am moving out of that now, and I am a better person for doing so. I still have my moments of self-pity, but I no longer allow myself to wallow in them. There is too much life to be living.

Steve, Good to hear. Like I said, I think I am making progress. My W has never been overtly cruel or crazy or any of that stuff either. Her coldness is more just in that everything she says is clearly just showing that the only thing important to her right now is herself and her own happiness. I'll get there, and I'll keep working on it.