That was a good response. Couple of things come to mind while reading it. You and I agree she needs therapy with people who understand her and yes she’s got that therapist chip on her shoulder about ‘I know what I need to do” thing. But you’re absolutely right, I don’t know if it’s a matter of her not knowing how to put into action what she knows she needs to do, or if it’s some sort of motivator/want to/will/decision/something…I’m not sure. I know you’re right, abstinence and recovery are not the same thing. However, you can’t have recovery if you aren’t abstinent.
Today is the big test. She is in the area where the casino is right as I’m typing this. Her meeting should be over with here soon. She just pinged me and sent me her location (something she chose to do, not because I asked her to). So I know she’s not at the casino right now. The question will be in a few minutes when her meeting is over and she’s supposed to call me before leaving the parking lot will be the true test. So I wait with baited breath hoping that at least for today on a day that is her biggest trigger and challenge, that she will choose to follow through on what she said.
She’s been working hard the last 48 hours to tell herself over and over, “I”m not going, get in the car, call home, and leave. I’m not going….” She’s been planting that seed in her head and from what she told me this morning before she left the house, what normally would happen is that she would already be starting with the excitement of going to the casino, and she would already in her head be there, but this morning she said she doesn’t feel that way. So hopefully she’ll be able to carry through with it.
I also agree with you that I have no intention on giving her my screen name so she can go look at my posts in the forums. I don’t want her reading my stuff. It’s one thing for me to talk about the support I’m getting from in here, and even talk a little bit about what I might be feeling/expressing on this site because that I can filter without giving away too much and it’s good for our relationship to at least share some of this. On the other hand I totally agree with you, I’m here to get the support I need and if she chooses to join the site as well, we need to keep our individual activities on here totally separate. I shouldn’t be reading her stuff (and she shouldn’t be giving me her screen name) and she shouldn’t be reading my stuff. We can talk generally speaking about together if we feel so inclined, but not in detail. I want to focus on me while I’m in here and she focus on herself while she’s in here.
I feel even a measure of relief from my emotions just by the few days I’ve been on here and talking to people. It’s hard to hold all that raw emotion inside so that you don’t blow up at your partner and puke all your emotional baggage on them. It doesn’t help the situation anyway.
So….i’m going to allow her the freedom to fight this addiction on her own. I’ve already started. This morning while she was on her way to her meeting, she called me, and asked me if I wanted her to send me the location of where she was at when she got to work. I told her that if she felt like that was the right thing to do, then by all means do it, but i wasn’t asking her too, nor was I going to babysit or be her policeman. She replied back that she would be doing for herself and for accountability. I said that’s completely up to you. She just sent me her location about 10 minutes ago all on her own. I never brought it up again.
So hopefully these are all positive steps. We had a good long talk about this and some other relationship thigns last night and one of the things I told her was that that its great that she’s making these steps, but in order for my belief and trust in her word to come back it’s going to take her holding to her word consistently, every time, over a long period of time. It’s not just a one time thing and boom the trust is back. she agreed and understood that. So I’m just trying my best to get out of the way and let her be the one coming up with solutions. Me, I’m just trying to keep my own emotions in check and I’m really fighting that thing inside of me that wants to fix it all but knows I can’t! That’s probably the hardest thing a F&F person can do. So I read and re-read, and re-read over again the serenity prayer. Knowing that in this particular case, I cannot change this thing. I just need to let God work his work in her and I’ll sit back and be patient.
So that’s where I am today.
Onajourney