Friday, July 8, 2016

Old Feelings, New Behaviors and Happy Anniversary

I am approaching my four year anniversary of recovery from co-dependency, co-addiction, and compulsive behaviors. I cannot believe how differently my life looks and feels today. I have such gratitude waking up with contentment and serenity. I have traveled a lot of miles along The Healing Lane, seeking and pushing forward, resting at times, and slowing the pace when needed.

It was July 14, 2012 – it’s amazing how certain dates are etched in our memories – when my transformation began. It is the day that my tolerance for my husband’s addictions and my co-dependent behaviors with it were confronted. Seventeen years earlier in July, however, is when I learned about his addiction when he disclosed to me why he had been so miserable and angry. It is one of the most painful moments I have experienced. It is this anniversary that has me thinking about and dealing with some feelings that I have avoided for quite a while.

There is an intensity to my feelings as I’m taken back to that summer evening in 1995. It is when I learned that my husband was addicted to pornography and that he had several compulsive sexual behaviors that made up his sexual life. Alongside this, however, was the awareness and painful realization that he was unable to have intimate sexual relations with me. It was a double-sided knife that bore into my core as I tried to understand that he had a whole sexual life apart from me while not participating in a sexual life with me. It was a lot to take in. Like bent over in gripping pain a lot. It wasn’t until I started recovery that I had terms for this. He is a sex addict that acts out by compulsively seeking sexual pleasure outside the relationship as well as acting in by compulsively avoiding sexual and emotional intimacy. The latter description is about sexual avoidance or sexual anorexia, both terms I have come to use about the disease that has affected me so greatly.

My therapy and recovery are about dealing with my behaviors and my disease. These have included many lessons on learning how to remain present when issues from my past, uncomfortable feelings, triggering episodes, and traumatic events surface. Letting go of my unhealthy coping behaviors such as compulsive eating, smoking, shopping, sex, or numbing (tv and computer), working, obsessive thinking, (the list goes on) has taken a lot of fortitude, honesty, and effort. I’m reminded when uncomfortable feelings or situations occur that simply staying sober is an accomplishment because I had become so accustomed to medicating away those feelings. Fortunately, I have been a good student and I have learned healthy behaviors and to stay present for myself.

This is why I think that when this memory of my husband’s disclosure surfaced recently, I could use the tools and experiences to help navigate through them without needing to use those outdated coping behaviors. In this case, it was that I was feeling again how alone I was having just heard his confession and with absolutely no understanding of these compulsive sexual behaviors. I felt completely and utterly rejected by my husband and yet there was an expectation to forgive him and to be supportive of his dealing with this issue. What I didn’t know is that this was a traumatic experience for me. My life completely changed in that moment. I was no longer in the dark; it was the passing of what remained of my innocence. The world of addiction and its devastating effects had now overtaken me and my life. Overwhelmed with feelings, thoughts, and expectations, I did what was natural to me: I rose to the challenge by becoming super-supportive and stuffing what I couldn’t process. I can see that how I reacted to the pressures, feelings, and circumstances reveals my issues.

I don’t actually remember much from the days that followed. As they re-surface, I am choosing to be understanding, compassionate, and loving to myself. I can accept that at that time that I acted in what I thought was in the best interest for my family. I did forgive him; I did support him; I did, in fact, do everything I knew to do to help him, be understanding, come to his aid, take the high road, travel the low road when it was needed, and to be the wife that stood by her addicted husband. I became a classic case of a co-dependent of a sex-addict. I really thought I was helping him and doing the right thing. And I really thought it would work.

My choice to stay in the marriage and to fight for our family, especially noting the impact to our young son, was honorable. Meanwhile I didn’t understand what was happening to me by not receiving the help that I needed. My husband’s issues were the focus and my job was to forgive and to find help for him. For eight years this is what I did. I sought out every program and possibility for help that I knew. Eventually I gave up. I was exhausted, had lost hope, and was filled with shame. I thought that I had failed by not being enough. Or too much. Whatever it was, it was partly my fault or maybe even mostly my fault. I was supposed to be able to save him. My guilt, shame, pain, anger, loneliness, and fear were more than I could handle and so another of my issues – medicating feelings instead of expressing them – took hold in increasingly harmful ways.

I know differently now. His shame is not mine to carry; I have my own around abandoning myself and for the compulsive behaviors I have engaged in to medicate away my pain. I can honor myself by allowing stuffed feelings to surface and be expressed. I can forgive myself for not putting myself as a priority, for falling into the depression that nearly swallowed me up, and for becoming morbidly obese.

What I seek today it to be present for myself as I allow those really intense feelings to surface. I cry. I breathe and follow the paths of sensation in my body. I speak kindly and lovingly to myself. I repeat affirmations of my value and worthiness. I reach out to friends. I reach for God. I turn inward and access peace, serenity, and joy. I continue working the Twelve Steps. I am alone and yet, I am never alone.

This anniversary is a celebration. It is a reminder of what has changed in four years – in 21 years! – and the marvelous journey of The Healing Lane. 

Monday, March 21, 2016

Must be a Family Thing: Having awareness and compassion in patterns of behavior

There is an added gift of awareness when family visit. Common patterns of behavior become evident, and with it the opportunity to shift or change. I haven’t always considered this awareness a gift. In fact, it used to be triggering and upsetting when I would see these patterns because I was reminded of my own shortcomings. I hadn’t accepted my imperfections so to look at my character defects was to see faults and flaws. Recovery brings acceptance of my present and past, with it compassion for myself about things I didn’t know.

This past week my brother and nephew have been visiting me in my home.  The home I now reside in solely with my two cats. I’ve done quite a bit of work to appreciate my own good company and the freedom that comes with living alone. I welcomed their visit as it has been a great blessing to me to be the recipient of their kindness, consideration, and generosity. I will miss them when they return to their home in the Midwest tomorrow. As guests go, they are truly delightful. And as guests go, that doesn’t mean there aren’t some adjustments.

Several nights this week we have watched a TV program or movie before going to bed. When the program is over, my brother stands up, says good night, and heads to bed – leaving behind his beverage container or glass, and possibly shoes or a dish as well.  I recall that my father and mother had this same behavior, although my mother was less apt to be watching TV so I haven’t associated this with her for the most part. My younger brother also has this same habit. I’m remembering heated discussions with my husband (now ex-husband) about this same habit which was very irritating to him. It just hadn’t been a practice of mine to take my glass to the kitchen and put it in the dishwasher before I went to bed. It was, however, the standard in his family, and I soon learned to make this a practice in my own home (and when I’m a guest at others’).

It occurred to me today that something that has become simple and clear to me as responsible, respectable behavior is likely not clear to my brother.  He is merely behaving in the fashion that was modeled to him and which is just normal behavior. Most certainly I have choices about this; I know I can ask him to put his glass in the dishwasher before going to bed. This lesson isn’t about boundaries. It’s about what has been modeled and what becomes normal.

This awareness about bedtime behavior has prompted my thinking about the patterns of thinking and behaving, too. There are many family patterns that come to mind. It is standard for members of my family to volunteer and to serve others. It is common within my family to want to understand the motives behind things – we call it “getting to the bottom of things”. We are problem-solvers and communicators. There is a long list of attributes. What I can also see are the traits not so favorable. Things like being critical, procrastinating, collecting material excess, people-pleasing, and overeating. There are others. It really doesn’t matter whether it is not cleaning up after myself when I go to bed or care taking others in my co-dependency. Both of these, for instance, were no longer behaviors I wanted to continue.

Recovery has helped me to see that it isn’t so much about assigning good and bad to my thoughts, feelings, and behaviors, but rather it is about seeing the gift in learning why I do certain things and that I have choices as to whether I want to continue doing them or not. Once I have identified those character defects and become willing to have God remove them, I have a loving God to lift those shortcomings as He sees fit including when He sees fit. To help me even further, I have self-compassion while knowing that I may just be doing what was considered “normal” behavior. I don’t have to blame myself, my parents, my family, the system, or anyone or anything else for my behaviors. I believe that is my part in choosing serenity.