This is NOT what I expected!

[InHisHands]

Thanks twist_of_fate. More great advice. I will get the book this weekend. In the meantime, I'm trying to work on some self-esteem issues that I think are at the root of all of this. I think I'm going to find an IC for me, I feel entirely out of control most of the time.

H just called and we were talking about my son and somehow the conversation turned to S acting tough out of fear. I said, "I think he's going to be like his mama and have to hit rock bottom ten or twenty times before he sees that HE's the problem." H said I'm too hard on myself. I told him I know and I'm changing that starting NOW (because this morning I realized that beating myself up for past mistakes always causes me to repeat them).

He said, "Just make sure you do it for the right reasons, for yourself, not for anyone else." Now, the out-of-control, overly-analytical part of me is telling myself that he's trying to tell me not to count on him. When I take, "don't change for anyone else" and add that to the comment last night about not relying on him for approval, to me it sounds like "Don't change for me cause I'm not planning on sticking around."

Do you see how psycho I've become? What he's saying is the right thing, it's the healthy thing, it's the best advice he could possibly give me . . . but it's not like him to be right and healthy and emotionally mature. It's like our roles are reversed and he's the clear-headed one now and I'm the psycho-freak. He's looking out for my well-being and I'm even finding hidden threats in that.

Don't worry, though. I'm not feeling as unstable today as I was yesterday, so I'm not going to ask him about what he meant. I'm going to choose to believe that he meant to help me grow into the person I'm trying to become for me. I'm going to choose to believe that he wants the REAL me, not the me that morphs into what other people want me to be. I'm going to choose to believe that he is speaking out of love for me.