I've always tried really hard to make everyone around me believe I'm OK, that I've got my shit together. Truth is I'm not OK. Never have been! I have a home, a job AND a business,a great teenage son who thinks his mom is the coolest, wonderful friends and a man in my life who is so supportive, non judgemental and my best friend. So, why do I feel like I'm a such a LOSER!
I remember I was the kid who never raised her hand in school for fear my answer might be wrong, and I couldnt' take the humilitation of that. I never asked and still don't ask questions because I guess if I do then people will think I'm stupid. When I make a mistake I try to figure out how to fix it before anyone "catches on". I won't even ask the man in my life how he wants something done that I'm helping him with, because I fear that maybe I'm supposed to already know! Once, we were cooking and I was cutting the onions, he wanted them smaller, it wasn't a big deal by any means, but I felt so STUPID and even a little embarrassed - how insane is that!!! Like a story in the Big Book, I'm wondering where my handbook is for my life. Others seem to have gotten theirs........ I hid everything I did growing up because you didn't talk about things in my house, good or bad. If you talked about the bad ones that meant they could be true and even worse if you talked about the good ones, at some point when you did make a mistake later, that good stuff was held against you. ...... I rarely got into trouble ( I was good at hiding things or doing it better next time, my mother called me sneaky) because I think, I felt my mother had enough on her, with my sister who was and still at age 45 IS a basketcase and now a crack head........ I was always told I "didn't need anyone" I was "independent". That word, independent, seems like a dirty word to me right now....... It's not a wonder I married the first druggie/drunk that came along and then proceeded to marry another one years later!! ........... When my parents divorced I was about 3 or 4, my mother had a 15 yr affair with a married man and for years I wondered if that man could possibly be my father. He loved me like a daughter and I loved him so very much, he passed away 3 yrs ago and I miss him terribly.... My mother wants to tell me what's wrong with my life and she can't fix her own. She doesn't understand that I am who I am, a drunk, because of the way our household was. It's not her fault, I know she did the best she knew how, we were always fed, clothed, warm, etc, and I love her for that BUT I feel like she could have done better. She would go off on weekends with this married man and leave me at home beginning about age 13 and I was supposed to stay in the house the whole weekend and just wait! She dated other men while involved with this guy and would have me lie to him about where she was! She tries to tell me now that the other men she dated were just friends and there was no need to "upset" her affair! And the woman wonders why I've been married and divorced twice and have NEVER been without a man in my life for any long period of time....... While in school my mother never asked if I had homework, if I'd done my homework, she just yelled if I brought home bad grades, it was always up to me to do the right thing. How's a kid supposed to know what is right unless the parent teaches them?! Hell, when I started high school I filled out all the necessary paperwork and signed her name, which meant any time I was absent, which was a lot, I just wrote my own excuse! If she'd ever actually signed anything back then I would have been in trouble for forgery for sure LOL !! .......... I moved out at 17. Actually she threw me out, my best friend of 25 yrs is a witness. Mom now tries to tell me she did not throw me out, that she begged me to come home, and that she sent me my child support from my dad every month until I was 18 -- ALL BIG FAT LIES!! ......... I read the story in the BB of the woman who after many years of sobriety still resented her mother and what she does/did is pray the things for her mother she wants for herself - happiness, good health, etc, so that is what I have been doing. It seems to be helping some. Telling this board is helping, too........... so thank you all, again for letting me share all this.....
Tune in next time............
hugs to you all.
Doll
-- Edited by Doll at 10:12, 2005-08-17
-- Edited by Doll at 10:20, 2005-08-17
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* We eventually realize that just as the pains of alcoholism had to come before sobriety, emotional turmoil comes before serenity. *
I was so grateful when i realized i am powerless not only over alcohol but other people, places and things.
how this program works...honesty..openmindedness and willingness.
I can relate to your story lots! i've never been ok either! and yes...normal people scare me:)
i'm ok today with knowing i may never be totally ok...progress not perfection. As long as i keep working on MYSELF, thats what matters.
I was also relieved to know that what others think of me is none of my business. If they think i'm stupid thats their stuff not mine.
I too pray for others what i would want for myself, through this process my resentments take on less weight. Some are sicker than others and don't have this program to teach them how to change, how to live, how to grow.
Forever in AA's debt.
Handbook for life?? i wish. All i can do is my best. Don't be so hard on yourself. Maybe a gratitude list of the qualities in yourself that have changed is in order.
the past is the past, we can't change it, just focus on Today, it's all we've got.
Hey Doll, Thanks for your honesty. Resentments are defintly something I, as an alcoholic cannot afford to hold on to, so I did and do a fourth step often, take personal inventory at the end of the night and pray for those who have offended me. A wise sponsor always reminded me that the house cleaning, the forgiveness was for me....not for the other person.Keep praying, someday, the wounds will heal.
