I'm sorry to hear your wife is acting out again.I think you are right,she is "running". Alcohol is her"coping mechanism". I just posted a message to you on Lee's thread.
Stay centered and strong for the children and realize your wifes behavior is not directed at you ,but is an inability to cope with her life.She definitey needs therapy and perhaps alcohol counseling. Have you been to Alanon?
You are doing wonderful things for the children...don't give up! Jenny
Jenny - Thanks for the encouragement! It's much needed at times like these. Great idea about al-anon, hadn't thought of it before, and it's probably just what I need. Thanks!!
My W's going to start treatment for prescription drug abuse very shortly. It's part of the deal for getting her other charges dropped. She had a very friendly Dr. who was very liberal with pain-killers and anxiety pills and whatever other kind of medications my W need to "help her cope with life". She went into a "don't-give-a-s**t" mode for quit a while, which helped to allow all these things to happen to our lives. She's taking way less now, and some of her withdrawal symptoms have been, well, let's just say, less than pleasant. And there's more serious work yet to come.
I don't know if you've ever seen the movie "When a man loves a woman" with Meg Ryan. It's about a "party girl", her family, and her treatment. It hit way close to home with my W, and for me. I have to keep a close check on any of my co-dependency issues, it's easy for them to rear their ugly head at me.
Thanks again for the al-anon tip. I'll take your advice on this! And thanks for the encouragement. I need it. I'll be hopping over to your thread shortly, sounds like you've got your hands pretty full, too!!
JJ
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Read your update. You are in my prayers. The running is tough. Al-anon is a great idea and I bet it would help you in unbelievable ways.
Drugs & alcohol and om seem to go together. My w was never much of a drinker, but I've been hearing more and more drinking stories from her lately. You're right, all theswe things are so much easier than stopping and looking inward for a while. My wife seems incapable of doing that.
JJ, Good Luck today! Hope the counseling session goes well. You are in a tough spot with your wife. You have to watch yourself so that you are not an enabler,but yet you are trying to save your marriage. Be careful in re to the letter as she may feel you are trying to control her. Yes I did see the movie and it was heartbreaking to watch.You need to get support for yourself while your wife is in treatment.Alanon among other types of therapy would be helpful. The kids would benefit, too. Addiction is a serious disease that effects the entire family.. Prayers and good wishes...Jenny
Good morning everyone! Thanks for your words of support and encouragement, and for your prayers. They are much needed and much appreciated at this time.
I've decided that I'm going to take a hard-line stance at the C session today, shake up the fence a bit. It doesn't seem like my "gentle" support of my W is producing the desired effects. I'll let her take the lead at first and see what she has to say. If it seems like we're just wasting our time, I'll steer the direction. I'm gonna let her know that I've been listening to her, have noticed how much she's been talking about just running away. That I want her to do just that. I want her to leave for awhile, go away, to do whatever it is she feels she needs to do. That I'll take care of things around the house until she can decide what direction she wants her life to head. That I don't want her to "try" to work on OR because it's something she feels she "should" do or "has" to do, but because it's something she "wants" to do. That I want her to be with me of her own free will, and don't want her to try to be someone she's not. That I want our M to not just survive, but to thrive, and under the current conditions, that won't happen.
I think I'll just drop it at that, and see where it goes from there. I want HER to bring up the om issue, and am not sure if I want to be the one to do it. I would really like to suggest she check in for an in-patient treatment program, but I don't know if that should come from me, either. I need to set some boundaries, tell her what I will accept for my own life without telling her what she should do with hers. Some of the things that are going on right now are just causing more damage to OR on a daily basis. After all, I'm just looking for progress, not perfection!!
Wish me luck!!
[This message has been edited by Jamesjohn (edited 09-10-2001).]
JJ
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Didn't have a chance to let W take the lead yesterday. I was put on the spot, so I said what I was going to say. Was met with mostly defensive reactions, which is what I kinda expected. It started getting into a pissing match about details on specific incidents, and that's where the C stopped us. She noticed that we were just basically "exchanging data", and were getting nowhere. That's when the C decided to go over the results of our personality tests with us. She went over how W and I were almost totally opposite in some, maybe most, areas. The biggest, most important area was in the "Deciding" category, with W scoring VERY high in Feeling, and me scoring VERY high in thinking. Therein lays a lot of the communication issues. We don't always understand what motivates each other to make the decisions we do. Being totally opposite in this area can cause a lot of grief in a R. She wants us to both be more aware of what is motivating us to do the things we do, the decisions we each make. She emphasized to me quite a few times that W's not intentionally doing things to hurt me, she just doesn't always put a lot of thought into things. I'm not quite sure where I stand on this, and if this is something I can learn to live with, desensitize myself, if it's something W can and will work on, we can work on together, or what. I'll have to "think" about this one for awhile. We could easily "polarize" on this, with me being too stable, and her being too flighty, which is something I think may have happened in the past. We did both agree that when we put our heads together and search for solutions, we can come up with some pretty damn good stuff, better than either of us can do on our own.
C explained to me that I was in a crisis in the "perception" area, torn between being "sensing" and "intuitive". I'm having a hard time trusting, both people and the way I perceive what's going on around me. I guess this stems from my little world between torn apart, a lot of the things I depended on to be true being different from what they actually were. Something I have to work on.
The discussion of this led me into talking about my insecurities about om. How when W goes MIA, when she goes into her "secret life", my first reaction is that it's because of him. That even though W's assured me that they are through, I haven't worked all the way through this yet. The way she is, and the way she raised the kids, is that saying "I'm sorry" takes care of everything, and there's instant forgiveness. I often wish this was something that was inside me, but, at this time and under these circumstances, it's not. I guess believe in "penance", not necessarily punishment, but doing things to show how sorry you are, and truly doing your best to not do these things again. Maybe something else I need to work on.
Anyway, when the om subject was brought up, W shortly left to go to the restroom. C and I talked a bit, about how I don't trust, how I can usually feel when W's hiding something from me, and when I check it out, my suspicions are usually confirmed. This got into the chicken and the egg thing on the trust issues, am I betraying trust by checking, or is she betraying trust by lying. W walked back in the room shortly, and the C mentioned she wanted to talk to me more, alone, and scheduled an individual appointment for me next week. W got an odd, almost worried, look on her face about this.
W's been trying to be too "in tune" to my facial expressions when I talk, reading too much into my "thinking faces". She sees me being disgusted, disapproving, condencending, or whatever. No, I'm just thinking.
We never agreed on the issue of her checking in when she's going to be out all night. I guess this is just something I'll have to let go of again. She seems to think of this as a permission thing, a controlling thing, which is not my intention. But if she perceives it to be this way, then, to her, it is the truth.
Session ended weird, no hug or kiss. We went and had a drink afterwards, not much talk. She said she was "going through a lot of feelings". I left her shortly, went home, and cooked dinner for the kids. She was out all night again, but was home when I got out of the shower. Not a whole lot said, but not a hostile atmosphere, and got a couple of hugs and kisses goodbyes.
There's a lot we have to work on, both individually and together. I emphasized a few times that I'm still not totally sure things were guaranteed to work, that I, too, had some doubts. That maybe we weren't quite ready to work on OR until some other issues were addressed. I have been seeing a lot of the see-saw effect going on, and I am working too hard at times on the R, so, therefore, she doesn't have to. She brought up the fact of all the books I read, research I've done, and how it makes her feel guilty. I reassured her that I'm not doing this all for her and for OR, that I'm doing it for me. So THERE!
So now it's time to sit back and see what happens next. I may have done some back-sliding, only time will tell. Back to the do nothing, detach, pma, catching her doing things right, etc., etc., things that worked before. Wish me luck!
JJ
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Well, looks like things aren't TOO bad. This morning, she let me know what her schedule for the day was going to be. She also wanted me to look over a note that she was sending to the school about D. I texted her later, and thanked her for sharing that with me. That it meant a lot to me. That SHE means a lot to me. She wrote me back later saying "I respect your opinions more than you know!". Wrote her back thanking her, that I respect her's, too. That she teaches me many important things.
At least the lines of communication haven't been totally shut down. We'll see what happens from here.
[This message has been edited by Jamesjohn (edited 09-11-2001).]
JJ
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Hey JJ, wanted to check in and say I'm keeping updated with your thread.
You're right, mentally I think you and I are going through the same phase. We're getting to the point they reached, and then they gave up and left. Leaving us alone and we made the changes. I keep telling myself that I however have different tools and understanding than our spouses did and I know better than to have expectations and then just throw in the towel when things don't work exactly how or when I want them to. So do you.
That said, it's still gets damn old doesn't it. Sometimes I feel like the parent talking to a child with no concept of understanding all this. They're still learning. Just like we did.
But when do you give up, draw the boundries, say I'm not being cheated on anymore. This is not the life I want to live. I tried.
Well, W was gone again all night last. So was step-D. Didn't really bother me that much, step-S and I had a good evening together. It's almost better for us when nobody else is around. We watched movies and talked a lot. We talked about his mom's and my personality test results, and he agreed with the descriptions. I didn't try to contact W at all, either last night or the night before. S asked this morning if mom was home yet, told him no, mom's a little overwhelmed with stuff right now, and needs a little time on her own. He seemed to agree and understand this.
I DID see her this morning. I was running about 15 minutes late, and passed her on our road. It didn't look like she was going to stop, but I did so she did. I just had my smiley face on, looked happy. Said hi, don't mean to be rude, but I'm late, gotta go, bye. I'm sure she thought I was already gone, and would be able to avoid seeing me. OH WELL!!
I've decided to give her WAY lots of space. If she's not home tonite, I may spend some time getting the spare bedroom back in shape for her. I want her to get this out of her system one way or the other. She'll either really enjoy this lifestyle and decide to keep it, or soon tire of it and remember the good things about us being together.
You're right, Heidi, it DOES get damn old, and is like raising a teenager. That was one thing the C brought up to W about her being gone all night, how does she feel when D does it. OUCH!
There was another interesting part of the C session. W was complaining about my job, how I deserved things to be better, deserved a raise, a promotion, and other stuff that was unfair. She thought I deserved better and should move on. I told her that for me, no matter how crappy things were at work, it's been one of the few sources of stability in my life, and in that part it was good for me. She did have to agree it's been good for all of us that I stayed at my job. She's so very confused, so very impulsive, seems to hate my stability, sees it as almost too confining, yet depends on me to help stabilize her life. I guess this is the part where I really need to stay out of her crap, let her do what she wants, and let her feel some of the consequences. I thought she had already worked through this, but I guess not. Or maybe she just needs to remind herself of it every now and then.
I have to find the fine line between being supportive, and enabling. Not always easy, and, again, makes me wonder sometimes if it's all worth it. The only thing at this moment that's motivating me is the progress I'm seeing with step-S. He's come a long way, and he needs some support through this mess. It's almost like we're becoming teammates in living through the dramas of both his mother and his sister. We both see what's going on, and are trying very hard to stay out of it. Wish us luck!!
[This message has been edited by Jamesjohn (edited 09-12-2001).]
JJ
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Well, W showed up back at the house last night. She was kinda cranky, was tired, not all the chores had been done while she was gone, etc. I stayed outside for a while and did yard work. Later, S wanted some time with her, she was busy, so he and I played some cards. She thanked me for that this morning, took some pressure off of her. I wanted to keep her crankiness from affecting him. He's been doing so well. He's sick today, she thought it may be an affect of him being worried about her and I. I didn't tell her about how he's been waiting up for her every night.
Did my best acting-as-if, didn't talk at all about where she's been, what she's been doing. Things stayed rather pleasant for the evening, she started feeding off of my good mood.
I fell asleep while she took a shower. I woke up and saw her reading our love languages book (part of an ongoing homework assignment from the C). I didn't mention it to her at all. No hugs or I-love-you's between us, but she did hold my arm in her hand as she was falling asleep. Baby steps.
It's my night out tonite, going to an Ocktoberfest party with friends. An event we used to attend together. She called and left me a long v-mailed, wished me a good time, see you tonite. Very friendly.
I'm thinking I didn't totally blow her out of the water at the C session. She's still very confused, so I'll stay way backed off.
JJ
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