Al-Anon this morning was priceless.
i have been simmering all week. It started out Wednesday when i watched my husband consume 7 bottles of wine with 6 guests. Just the following Monday i was so proud of myself for not stressing out.
Then there were 2 more parties after and then this weekend in Monterey where i watched 1 bottle and 2 half bottles get consumed.
I know that when he stepped out to let a crab go and i wondered if he had stopped into another restaurant to get a beer, i am officially back to obsessing about my husband's drinking. Time for another meeting.
But this morning, we did the 4th Step -- what better distraction from my qualifier than to do a full blown inventory about myself. i've done so well for the month of November with my busy speaking engagement schedule. So busy i hadn't had any time to monitor my husband's drinking. When my meeting-mates ask me, i proudly declare " i am too busy living my life to notice ".
But now that the frenzy has simmered down and the holiday parties are up, i am back to noticing the empty bottles and the dishwasher full of wine glasses.
I notice myself crabbier, and more impatient. More prone to pushing him away. All in the same breath, grateful and thankful that if this is the most it is -- it is great.
But as i rushed in this morning to sit at a meeting, i know it's exactly what i needed to hear:
• One woman's definition of impatience as the inability to believe that we won't be here forever.
As i was taking my 4th step inventory in the meeting, i realize impatience was at the top of my list. i just apologized on text to my husband for being impatient over the weekend. i am trying to own my "defects of character" and "promptly admit it and make amends".
i am learning to trust that as my daughter systematically reads in fetal position and my son burps out loud proudly and they both have atrocious table manners that somehow this is temporary and they will learn in time.
i am trusting that this hard, lonely stage in our marriage is just momentarily, and the tomorrow or maybe in the next second, things may change.
i realize a part of me is so adverse to change, that i am willing to sit here, set up camp and make this god-awful miserable place home, because it's too much work to entertain being fluid and flexible -- even if it's in a good way.
Yet i've been praying for change forever.
• One woman talked about how her sponsor got her to imagine her ailing mother wrapped in a blanket of her own Higher Power.
The part that struck me was "HER OWN" higher power. The one hysterical thing about 12-step is that you don't have to share God. Everyone has their own Higher Power. They define it their own way, they have different relationships with Him/Her. We don't share.
Which a part of me just loves. Which a part of me feels is Christianity anyway -- we all forge our own relationship with God. But i think we often forget, we think our loved ones have OUR God, relate to God OUR way, should see God OUR way.
So this morning, i wrapped my husband in a blanket of his OWN Higher Power, trusting that God loves Him, is desperately worrying about him the same way i do. Ok i edited the last bit.
•One woman talked about how she was mad at herself for marrying her qualifier.
That one hit a chord. i was just trying to figure out this morning why i always hit this wall of fear and incredulity every time i find out my husband drinks. It would be as obvious as if i found out he was Chinese. But i reel. i lose it. i lose it to panic and fear and shame and betrayal.
And i realize as this lady shared, a part of me still can't forgive myself for marrying this part of him. Or marrying him.
It's god-awful to admit, given i am a classic, text-book co-addict. But listening to this lady share and how she married not one for 4 alcoholics/addicts. It is just heartbreaking.
And i am trying to focus on the fact that his drinking has more to say about me than him. That somehow i would be a person that would end up with someone like that.
As if i wasn't an addict myself, or couldn't be one. As if there is a part of me that blames myself for his drinking.
But this morning, i am struck by how i can imagine a part of my husband realizing this blame i feel towards myself and him. How it must be hurtful. How it must be horrifying.
To not be loved and celebrated unconditionally. The way i feel he loves me, when i am not busy reeling from being abandoned by his silence.
• One other lady shared about how abandoned she feels by her husband who found recovery and now instead leaves the family to go to AA meetings instead of drinking or drugging.
A part of me laughs. An addict is an addict, and when you get sober, you just graduate to more acceptable addictions -- like meetings.
A part of me resonates with him as she insists that he is losing his family while helping the world -- sponsoring other men. i know i feel the same way with my husband's trips to Haiti and dad's mission trips at a time when his grandchildren are growing up right before his eyes.
i am reminded of a scene from a movie when Jim a famous missionary leaves his family to go evangelize the aborigines who eventually killed him. i remembered the tears in his young son's eyes who begged him not to go.
This estrangement, this ambition, this purpose and calling God puts on men's hearts -- it's just heart breaking. Don't tell me it's good.
It's another addiction. i've reconciled myself with the idea that in order for men to feel purposeful in the world, they need the support of women, and then they leave.
We are suppose to find support elsewhere.
But i sat there, eyes closed listening to each share. Thankful for a mindful, cost-free space to reflect and hear myself. And to hear my Higher Power speak to me, and tell me serenity is possible; to say the serenity prayer with a group of other people. To hear others struggle with addicts in their lives with grace and dignity.
i love my Redwood City Homegroup. i feel so loved and seen by them. i am finally staying back and talking to them. i got a number from a friend today. Grateful. Thankful. Loved.
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