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Hello my wise sisters,
Here’s the deal: I’m having a hard time focusing on taking care of myself. I keep worrying and wondering: is my marriage is going to survive? is my SAH ever going to get into recovery?, what effect is this having on the kids? – the usual worries.
How do you all keep your focus on yourself and keep your worries about the past and the future and others at bay? At times, I feel a little stuck. I could use some tips (besides a memory erase button, a bottle of wine and a quickie divorce) on how to focus on myself and get this SAH crap out of my mind?
Deb
After the bottle of wine, and the kids are safely in bed, write yourself a master list of things just for you. Each day pick one, two or three things and do them or schedule them. Make this a daily habit (but not the bottle of wine). Treat yourself like the amazing woman you are!
Hi Deb
I can relate – obsessive thinking, analysing about the future, the relationship, the kids & the SAH. It can drive you crazy.
Stuff that I am doing at the moment:
Journalling
Prayer – serenity prayer & gratitude
Meditation
12 step group & therapy
Exercise – vigorous if possible
Doing fun stuff with kids & friends, being with people who nuture you.Trying to remember I am not responsible for my SAH, what he does & how he feels, I am only responsible for me.
You are doing a great job hanging in there.
Tan xx
It’s still the first thing I think about when I wake up in the morning, and I think about it constantly UNLESS I’m in class or at the hospital, where I can concentrate on helping people who actually WANT help. Sad thing is, most of our SA’s have serious resources: money, family, home, job…and they STILL can’t get their shit together?! They are spoiled assholes with a sense of entitlement. Most of the people I work with have NOTHING, and they do a better job at recovery.
So true, March….and sad. My SAH’s insurance covers any intensive he would want to sign up for – yet he doesn’t want to do anything besides his weekly therapy session with a therapist who supposedly assures him that he isn’t a sex addict.
You all were all right about don’t hold my breath about the Hoffman intensive he was thinking about doing – he hasn’t mentioned it in the last few days. I think it’s dropped off his radar (sigh).
My SAH went to therapy today and sounds like he talked the whole time about his “bomber” dream and what that all meant. Yet the dream about how it’s only two simple steps to a saving our marriage was skipped over in favor of the bomber. Doesn’t surprise me. He sounds like he is seriously in love with his therapist. This is all so creepy.
Time for me to make that list every day NAP and Tanya – thanks for reminding about that.
I guess it’s just fear of the unknown that feeds my OCD. I seriously wish I could erase my memory of my SAH.
Deb
I think it would really help me if I got a full-time job that I really enjoyed (I’ve been a part-time realtor and au pair coordinator for the past 8 years but not really passionate about either now. I’ve done a lot of soul searching and I realize that my original path in life when I was in college (psychology) is my passion (kind of dawned on me as I read my 10th book on SA). I went down the business side of psychology (with consumer behavior and market research) in grad school but would love to go back to helping others (like March) but at the age of 51, I’m not sure how feasible that is. I’ve heard that addiction counseling takes less time/hours than a usual counseling degree (I have a BA in psychology but not counseling). Anyone know anything about that? I enjoy facilitating support groups (I did that for battered women and adult adoptees) – and have done that for years in the market research front (focus groups) for a living.
I think that studying or a job would help me focus on myself – but with four kids, I need to make $$, too. I think I need a career counselor….sorry to ramble.
Deb
Deb, can’t help you with the career counseling (could use some help in that department myself 😉 but I’ll throw this quote out there: “Don’t let the fear of the time it will take to accomplish something stand in the way of your doing it. The time will pass anyway; we might just as well put that passing time to the best possible use.” ~ Earl Nightingale
Diane has great suggestions on this topic.
I have drown myself in home improvement projects in the house.
But I’ve mostly abandoned my friends.
Sex addiction has been such a focus here for so long. It seems to leave me no energy for me.
I did start working out three times a week about a month ago. That is huge for me. I’ve never worked out in my life.
I bought a book on being a better mother. Thought maybe that is a good focus.
And I bought a study guide for the college entrance exams. I just need the motivation to open it!!!
Deb, you can become a certified addiction counselor in about a year, I think, but that’s all you can do and it doesn’t pay as well as a masters in clinical counseling. The masters has taken me 3 years. So what? I was going to be 49 anyway…with or without the degree.
Thanks March. I would do the master’s in counseling in a heartbeat (I love to study – already have a Master’s in Market Research), but sadly we live in the most expensive area of the nation (over the Golden Gate Bridge 10 minutes) and I need to make $$ along the way – so that might be difficult. We’ve thought about moving in the past, but right now the thought of another change in the midst of all this chaos probably isn’t a good thing.
Thanks Liza for the quote – I do feel that life is passing me by while I focus on this sicko who doesn’t want to get serious about working on himself (except analyzing his sicko bomber dream for an hour a week). Our marriage therapist says that I need to increase the temperature of the water around my husband……time to do that while I work on myself.
So right MARCH. Nothing we can do will change them, and most of them don’t even want to change. I guess if we are into pain, then we would continue living such a dysfunctional unhappy life-style. There is more to life than always living on the edge. I’m over the edge and feel so much better.
Remember, Deb, I filed for divorce, which SHOCKED my SA, who did not really think I’d go through with it. Only THEN, did he start focusing on more than mere sobriety. Sobriety (if he was sober), wasn’t enough. He was still a selfish, angry prick. After I filed, he admitted as much and started back into therapy and meetings. I followed all the way through with the divorce and now have half his retirement in the bank, custody of our daughter, and the house. We’re still living together, and I don’t know what the future holds. But I do know that if he messes up, that fat lady’s gonna sing, ’cause it’s all over but the crying, and my life has become one big cliche.
March-I didn’t realize you divorced and were still living together. Steve is going through the motions of wanting to recover, doing things to make it happen, but as I said in my last post he just can’t do it. I don’t think he ever thought I would do it either-thus the putting more effort into recovery.
I know he will never change-that is not even an issue anymore.
I am still up in the air on whether to continue the living arrangements. My mind will be made up by that by the time the divorce is final. At the rate my attorney is proceeding, it is anyone’s guess when that will be. I have contacted her by phone and E-mail X3, but she is slow as a snail in getting back to me. I am ready to tell her if she is too busy to handle this thing, then she needs to refer me to someone who can. Problem is, she has the Will, post-nump, exc., so would be starting all over with someone else.
Very frustrating. I want to get this thing over with before the annuity I am getting decreases in value. I also want it written in the divorce settlement that if it does, then Steve must draw from another annuity to make that $500.00/mo. happen. Right now he is aggreeable to that, but who knows if he will change his mind again.
My mindset is if I am divorced, I am free to do whatever I want and when I want. I know everything I have to know, so is really just a waiting game.
Hugs to you.
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