Hi PF
Please stop blaming yourself for being you and trying to do everything right. No amount of wishing changes the past; we can only change what we do today. I cannot imagine living with a CG and not having ever pleaded, screamed, threatened, tried to understand, felt shame, disappointment, guilt and anger. We are not saints Peanut, the addiction is manipulative and cruel, it changes lives and can ruin them if it is allowed to do so.
It is that last line ‘if it is allowed to do so’ that I think makes us continue to struggle or change into people who go forward and make something good out of something bad. You are blaming yourself for being human – but you never stood a chance. My CG told me that what I had said and done made no difference to what he did and that will be the same for you. You didn’t make him gamble, you didn’t make him walk away without a decent explanation and you didn’t destroy your marriage.
Your husband’s addiction is claiming you every time you think that you are to blame and it is so important that you rise about this unwarranted opinion. I can’t tell you whether to hang on just in case and I cannot tell you to give up and walk away but I can tell you that ‘you’ and your life are very important.
You didn’t make a mistake sending him the message that you did – your husband made the mistake of not replying. He has run away Peanut and that is his mistake, not yours.
I don’t usually write about it but my first husband walked out when my 3 children were very small, never to return. I felt guilt and looked for what I had done wrong because I couldn’t see why he had chosen the path that he had. Sometimes Peanut we try and do everything right but we don’t see that the person we thought we knew is no longer walking on the same road – they have gone off on another path in the belief that the grass is greener on the other side. I felt as you are feeling now for quite a long time but it didn’t help, I learned to live one day at a time and try and make it good. 2 years later I met and married the most wonderful man who adopted my children and gave us such a wonderful life and happiness beyond anything I had ever thought possible. I firmly believe that because I had been hurt so badly, happiness when it came was so much sweeter.
I know I didn’t cause my first husband to leave, I know I did everything a good wife should do – he just wanted something different.
Eat a little of the things you like best Peanut and eat when you feel like it. Just for today look after yourself and do something that you enjoy. Don’t let the addiction of another take away all you pleasures in life. Get close to family and friends and tell them that you don’t need to hear opinions on your husband but you just want support for you. Allow them to care for you and gradually the pain will recede, if it couldn’t be so I wouldn’t be here.
I didn’t find one scrap of your post irritating and I hope you will keep writing.
I hope the following gives you some support
YESTERDAY, TODAY, AND TOMORROW.
There are two days in every week about which we should not worry: two days which should be kept free from fear and apprehension.
One of these days is yesterday with its mistakes and cares, its faults and blunders, its aches and pains. All the money in the world cannot bring back yesterday. Yesterday has passed forever beyond our control. We cannot undo a single act we performed. We cannot erase a single word we said. Yesterday is gone.
The other day we should not worry about is tomorrow with its possible adversities, its burdens, its large promise or poor performance. Tomorrow is also beyond our immediate control.
Tomorrow’s sun will rise, either in splendour or behind a mask of clouds – but it will rise. Until it does, we have no stake in tomorrow, for it is yet unborn.
This leaves only one day – TODAY. Any person can fight the battles of just one day. It is only when you and I add the burdens of these two awful eternities – yesterday and tomorrow – that we break down. It is not the experience of today that drives people mad – it is the remorse or bitterness of something which happened yesterday and the dread of what tomorrow may bring. Let us, therefore, LIVE BUT ONE DAY AT A TIME.
Look after yourself dear Peanut – you are special.
Velvet