Submitted by Standing on 07/17/2014.
Each time I visit this place, I wonder when or if I'll have anything to post on this forum about Hope.
Today, for the first time, seems that maybe there's a sproutling of non-negativity in me. Can't quite call it positivity yet, but close :)
For the past few days, I wrote myself onto the work schedule for regular hours and I have stuck to them!
This was a big Whoo Hoo, because I've been trained to feel duty-bound to be here at husband's shop every moment, at beck and call.
Today, I clocked out for lunch and... Left ! and... actually ate lunch!!
Oh, to be a separate individual, not carrying my husband's world on my shoulders. It's a step!
Good for you! Hope and doing
Submitted by PoisonIvy on
Good for you! Hope and doing things for oneself are important.
Standing..I like that
Submitted by dedelight4 on
Standing....I really like what you did. To some it may not seem like much, but nope, it can be quite a liberating thing. To not be bound to under treated ADHD seems like a very positive thing. I've been starting to do some of my own liberating things as well, and it feels good. I had to do a bunch of mental and emotional separation, not in a hateful way, but through information and knowing it is for my benefit. (as well as my husbands) I can't do hardly anything I used to do physically, which for me REALLY SUCKS, because I have always done "so much". To be almost completely house bound, is driving me nuts. But, I know I'm headed in a better direction. It's still scary at times, but I feel a tiny bit of strength each day, with each "new" thing I do. I wish you all the best. Kudos to you.
Thank you both!
Submitted by Standing on
Small victories
Submitted by Tired-to-my-bones on
I remember a long time ago talking to someone about 'small victories'. In my case it was simply pointing out that I had been shortchanged by a shopkeeper. I had found the courage to speak up instead of walking away, accepting my lot. We may put on brave faces but the slightest knock can undo the fragile balance. Each small victory adds up and helps to restore the sense of self. Well done Standing, you're on your way!
Thank you!
Submitted by Standing on
I needed to hear that today, Tired To My Bones. The brave face can forget how to receive comfort.
Also, I read your post of hope and had no words. Thank you for sharing that, too. You have made me realize just how fearful i have become - of hope itself! That is one internal battle I have no intention of losing!
I appreciate you!
Unexpected Places
Submitted by Standing on
Much has been written about acceptance.
My take-away from this has been:
1) I must accept my own limitations,
2) I must accept the limitations of others.
So I look at a simple definition of the verb Accept:
a) To consent to receive - i.e., She accepts the coat as a gift.
b) To believe or come to recognize (an opinion, explanation, etc.) as valid or correct.
And this is how I apply my newfound knowledge:
a) I choose to not accept - to outrightly reject - poor treatment from my spouse. I choose to not accept - to outrightly reject - his attempts to depersonalize me, to objectify me, to claim all of the benefits of marriage from me while offering me nothing in return but usury and scornful contempt. I will not allow this because life cannot be sustained under such conditions.
b) I choose to fully accept, to embrace and act upon that acceptance, and to proceed upon that acceptance as an established fact of life - that my spouse has proven to be incapable of forming a reciprocal human bond, such as is an absolute requirement in a healthy marriage.
One week without his constant self-centered, self-aggrandizing, self- serving Self in my home has purged my heart and mind of Any notion that there is Any thing I could Ever do to grow this into a genuine relationship. It has Only, Ever been about him. He showed me who he was and I kept refusing to accept that there wasn't more down in there someplace that My love could draw out and nurture.
Nope, not there. I accept it.
How to process the unexpected
Submitted by I'm So Exhausted on
Standing,
Ah, the meaning of words. I love understanding them. I enjoy learning how to apply them correctly in my expressions.
Unexpected - not likely to happen.
Acceptance - it "is" and I only have power to change my response to it
Past events in life sometimes pop up rather unexpectedly. Such an event was used as an example this morning. Boundaries were being discussed, and my spouse was retelling how he and my brother adjusted the headlights of my car - this was premarital - and how I was upset because they did not ask me first. I am still trying to pull that memory back into focus. I only get specks and bits and pieces. So, OK. Yep. My brand new car. They thought they were being helpful. They didn't ask. What should be the learning curve - the objective. Did I over-react? From my spouse's retelling of it, I will say I did. I do not see this as black and white. There are lots of elements involved. And lots of personalities pulled into it. WAS the response irrational? For me, 30 some years ago, the basis was probably, "This is my brand new car. I am single. Ask me if you want to "help." Now, if I had been sinking in a lake - that is a different story - just jump right in. Working through what 'is' acceptable and was 'is not' has to be based on personal differences. That moment in time was a learning experience, rather than "I will never do anything for you again because you yelled at me." I would have hoped the lesson learned was "I better ask before I help."
Helping is the sunny side of controlling. It is all about the "motive" behind what is done. MY motive is for ME. How it is received will be the basis on whether I can understand if it was as good for the other person as it was for ME.
Huge. Big. Controlling. WILL having our finances in line reflect back to me that our marriage relationship is in line? I do not think so. Will selling the RV remove the pain of my spouses loss of his parents? I do not think so. Will having a tidy yard and clean house reflect back to me that my relationship with my spouse is tidy and clean? No. It will not. I could care less if we are rich or poor. {WELL honestly I wish I was rich :) } What I care about is being on the same page as my spouse regarding our spending. I could care less about a sink full of dirty dishes. What I care about is responsibility and accountability and shared carrying of the load. Will having a fence to put my spouses stuff behind fix his struggle with emotional attachment to objects? Not for him. It MIGHT bring me a little more room for MY accepting his struggle with the issue if it is not all over the place and in my face. It would symbolize both - some acceptance of my desire for tidy and my acceptance of his need for stuff.
He asked why we can't focus on my emotional over-reaction to everything. I explained that I think I do. I think it is the basis for being told that AT THIS TIME, "Liz isn't able to work on her side of things right now, so you're going to have to work on your side without her input." I DO acknowledge it. All the time. I am overwhelmed. I have so much responsibility on my plate, that my response to minor irritants is magnified. I am in such a heightened place of emotional stress, I am actually broken. And I am so overwhelmed, I am feeling as I am stuck, with no way out. The fight is gone out of Liz.
From all this, I will toss out most and I will just keep foremost in my brain the unexpected. Words from my spouse. "I am sorry I yelled at you in the yard about putting stuff in your space in the barn." I heard that apology. I heard him acknowledge my space in the barn. I head him acknowledge he stepped on my toes.
He apologized about Christmas Eve.
He apologized about our 25th anniversary.
He said so much more, that my brain could not contain and comprehend it all.
Then he said he was going outside to work in the yard.
A balm. A healing word. Something unexpected.
Liz
Liz
Submitted by Standing on
I am glad for you if you feel soothed.
My own view of apologies is that if they are not accompanied by repentance (a turn-around), then they are... well, you know.
My day was not conducive to positive affirmations. I worked. He was not supposed to be there. He was there. The new bookkeeper giggles at all of the appropriate times, but payroll is not done, so guess who gets to tell employees tomorrow that they will have to wait a day for their paychecks?
My time there is short. In fact, may be past - tense already.
Also, his new persona de jour seems to enjoy repeatedly telling anyone with ears that he drank too much expensive liquor last night.
Yes, definitely past tense.
Soothed with no resolve that it is a magic cure all
Submitted by I'm So Exhausted on
Standing,
I know so well all this overwhelming stuff.
I am in no means bowled over. I do see something there. A speck. A glimpse. Could it all be a response to my telling him my fight it gone? Maybe. I won't be lulled into complacency, and I will also take it for what it was worth.
Something different.
I could not respond as I myself was afraid to say to wrong thing. I will find the opportunity to let him know I heard him.
It take a first step to get going in the right direction. Time will tell if it was a ruse or a reality.
Liz
Surrender
Submitted by Standing on
I think you've got it, Liz. The problem is, he may have misinterpreted your statement that your fight is gone as a sign of weakness... a white flag..
In my experience, the moment my "self" would re-emerge after such a course-change (and self emerging could be as simple as saying it's a gorgeous day when he declares it to be cold outdoors)... the cease fire ended.
All of it, bad - good - indifferent - is forever beyond reach, because it's an internal process of corrupted data.
+ Added on Monday morning...
I don't want to go back to work and hear more of him, see more of him. I don't want to know whether or not he has been drinking again. I think - he was never a drinker... but I had found plenty of empty bottles stashed over the past months, so maybe he'd been carrying on this way for ages. I don't want to hear him talking with people on the phone or interacting with them in person. I have no more space in my brain for this illusion he tries to create and blocking it all out is requiring more energy than I can muster on a Monday morning. Mostly !!! I do not like it that I am wondering: Is he really enjoying being away from me and free to indulge his Real self? I think that I could deal with that better than the alternative, which my heart believes is the truth - that he is sad and broken and so out of touch with/ defiant toward his own feelings that he will not face that pain and let it work a heart change in him. That is deeply sad, because a heart change is what is needed so desperately... an emptying of self (or perhaps more accurately said - an acknowledgement that self IS empty and needs to be filled with all that is good and pure, with Christ. The problem is not add or npd or unhealthy attachment, it is pride. God help him, I cannot.
The right answer is not always the correct answer
Submitted by I'm So Exhausted on
Standing,
I have been trying to focus on me. And work on boundaries - especially to understand them better. There are some days I can 'almost' flop down and cry in sheer and utter frustration. I want to do the right thing. Always have wanted to do the right thing. My internal heart, the part that directs who I am, will let me get away with nothing. I cannot bear to hear anyone say to me "Maybe counseling could help." Can any one else understand how frustrating it is to spend $$$ on counselors and books and seminars, for YEARS, and still have the suggestion that counseling is needed? Makes me want to spit! Makes me feel like I am a sucker. Makes me wonder if anyone at all knows the answer. Or is Liz just an easy mark? There is a gal who just can be convinced she is in need of help?
So, as I try, I wonder why "the answer" has just not been found yet. I can tell you what I dislike. I cannot tell you why I struggle with finding the answer of how to change it. I do NOT want to live a life that my mother-in-law had with my husband's Dad. His Dad could be a mean and ornery ol' son-of-a-gun who demanded perfection from everyone. Nothing was ever good enough. He needed everything to be his way. He ended up spending a lot of time in his workshop in his basement, as he said "biding my time till I die." How sad. Not what God wants from any of His children. I do not want to project that onto my spouse. But, darn it, I see it happening. I see my spouse getting angrier and angrier at everyone. And pulling away from everyone. I have stated here on this forum many times, I am afraid I have a self fulfilling prophesy. Each time I try to break away from that, each time I try a different avenue, try to replace unwanted behavior with something new . . . . . . I am now in the place of having my spouse sleeping alone, in another room. I am trying to focus on the positive aspects of it - not being woken up by snoring, or body twitching, or restless rolling and changing sleep positions. He did it out of anger and frustration at me. That does not feel nice - at all. Everyone just walking around, ignoring the awkwardness of it - like it is just invisible.
I will add a note of positive information - my spouse did agree to try meds for depression. From MY point of view, they are helping him - tremendously. He actually laughed while watching 'Everyone Loves Raymond'. Laughed out loud. Even made my son smile to hear his Dad laugh! My spouse is not slouched over, dragging his feet, and grumbling to himself. That is nice to see.
I have considered a million and one half things to untangle the huge mess I got going on. Looking forward with crystal clear clarity at options available to a 55 year old woman who had chained her hopes foolishly are quite harsh. MY choices are my own reality. I take full responsibility for what I did.
I am trying to jump start a career with 10 years to develop a retirement plan for age 65. I stare reality in the face and see my financial world wrapped up in a mess bigger than Mount Vesuvius. I realize that while I thought I was being faithful, I was in all reality attempting to fix and help someone who didn't want my help.
Not quite willing to throw it all away - as in house and property - yet not quite clear on how to make the RIGHT choices while stuck in deep crap is overwhelming. I had helpful suggestions coming at me full force from many places. All I can do is put one foot in front of the other, and not live in regrets but in full wisdom that my poor choices got me to where I am, and my good choices will get me, step by step, out of the mire.
I can see quite clearly the mountain of painfully wrong choices I have made. This bed that I have made, I will not just bail and run. I got to make wise choices, not ruin my own financial reputation. I kicked myself for quite a while. I tried being indifferent to things for quite a while. I cried for quite a while. I read so many self help books, and tried so many marriage counselors - it is just disheartening. I got not one more dollar I want to throw in the direction of any counselor. I have tried all can I can try.
This gal is not a victim. I just really get baffled at where to find the correct direction, as I have followed many a wrong one. Many many a wrong one.
I am working on a series of children's books. Aimed at 5 - 10 year olds. I am working on this AS I walk through the online writing class I mentioned, while figuring out my finances, and going to school, and trying to learn how to learn, and trying to finish up the Parent to Parent training - it is harsh.
My spouse's ADHD is NOT what is making a mess here. 5 attributes of it are hard to live with - procrastination, forgetfulness, poor time management, disorganization, trouble focusing. Dealing with life and developing strategies to cope because you didn't know, that is reality. Those I can accept - being mean and rude and unkind and controlled with anger - those are wrong.
I am under an inordinate amount of pressure and stress. My response to minor irritations are magnified.
Good things come to those who keep their noses to the grindstone. That is me.
So, I just signed up for 4 classes for Spring. If I keep at this pace, I will have my college degree by December 2015.
Liz
My Own Part
Submitted by Standing on
Liz, if I had not been faced with a future that was utterly and totally unacceptable to me, I would have made up my mind to stand strong in the midst. In fact, I had made up my mind and heart to do just that.
Actually, I am still standing strong in the midst... in the midst of legal separation which protects me from: not the chance that my spouse might fall, but the inescapable certainty that he will. History has proven the fact. Nothing has changed in him. Outward behavior fluctuates, but the inner man remains untouched. I pray for that change but am certain that my presence will not be the catalyst for it. My absence, however, may be a different matter.
Seems to me that we may place some artificial parameters around our own behavior which can prevent us from envisioning a hopeful future. I'm not depressed, but I don't have any big plans or goals, only small ones... to survive, to learn how to thrive... this is virgin ground for me. I feel that I cannot look to the future until the present is resolved. The only part of the present that I can resolve is My Own Part. I need to not feel guilty about enjoying my freedom and release from the burden of being responsible for The Outcome. I don't want freedom to go find another man. I want the man my spouse claimed to be. I have told him so. That's all I can do.
Your childrens' book series sounds like great fun and very promising! I would love to place my thoughts into a different atmosphere with something like that. Going to have to trust God to show me how, because I have alot of old thought ruts from dealing with disorder for so long... much longer than just this marriage. My creativity seems to be packaged in a locked, steel case, inside a concrete bunker, at the bottom of an ocean, surrounded by mines. Something's gotta blow.
And congratulations on being so near to receiving your degree! That is a prospect I should consider myself... not that far away from it... hmm... maybe I AM depressed. At least now that there's time and space here to consider options, I should find out what that would require for me. Thank you for the ideas and for inspiration!
People want to know, "What is your plan?" I am hoping that soon I can say something other than "To survive this."
Take good care of yourself. Sounds like you have done everything possible. Maybe the correct answer is to not do anything else at all.
Changes along the way
Submitted by I'm So Exhausted on
Standing,
I somehow feel I need to let my spouse know, in clear concise words, that the ADHD attributes are something I can and will learn to live with, but his rudeness and anger are not. Not so much as an ultimatum - even if he chooses to see it that way - but as a clear and definite boundary of how much more time I am willing to stay amidst this turmoil. He can choose to not want to see it, and I can choose to say I have had enough. Neither is right nor wrong. I just choose not be bullied into accepting poor behavior as good behavior,
I will live with a nice sleeping atmosphere, but it will be clearly labeled as such, and I will not pretend what he has done is OK.
Make no mistake about it, I will not just foolishly run away, but I will make it clear that I am working my way out - and if something happens along the way to make what we have a livable arrangement, than I will be open to that. No burnt bridges. No locking the door behind he and throwing out the key.
I will continue to detangle our finances from each other. I will cheer his successes as he restructures his billing schedules and increases his pricing to commensurate his experience and talent and 32 years of hard work.
I watched a dear man's heart turn hard. From unforgiveness, to rudeness, to holding grudges against his brothers and mine, This inability to be able to be around anyone who does not share his opinion is a harsh reality that I do not like. He had his own protective wrapping of what he thought his Christianity meant - protection from all wrong. He can't understand why he got cancer - (even thought it is gone, with no need for chemo nor radiation, nor anything other than removal of the tumor. ) Or why he struggled with problems with our church, or why "everyone" takes advantage of him, and rips him off, since he is such a nice guy and just so undeserving of what people have done to him.
I have grown a lot, became wiser than I was yesterday, last week, last month, last year, and at the beginning of my marriage. By all accounts for my own choices, what we have is no longer acceptable. The goal is shared responsibility, shared financial awareness, and determining together what each of us wants - and respecting that as the true being of the person we married. Even accepting the warts.
There is that fine line that is broken. He feels he is standing up for himself. I see a bully. I respect his choice to like who he has become. It is so different from the man I want to spend time with - a kind considerate loving forgiving man who cherishes his wife for who she is - not who he can make her be.
This is all really good for me.
And for you, "My creativity seems to be packaged in a locked, steel case, inside a concrete bunker, at the bottom of an ocean, surrounded by mines." Ta Da - you know where it is!!! Go get it back!!!!!!!!!!!
Liz
I have no idea whether this is a response or a rambling, but
Submitted by Standing on
From what I can tell, adhd is more than a set of attributes. I've read where you've itemized it in clear fashion: lateness, procrastination, etc. The thing is - I don't think it's that simple. However, I do understand your approach. I spelled the same out to my spouse. His angry outbursts did stop. He still did not value my view, or become able to meet me where I am on an emotional or spiritual level.. or mental, for that matter. because he still did not want to admit his own powerlessness over his condition, but yeah, at least I was not getting raged at. What he did was - grew extremely passive aggressive toward everyone else around him. Hence my departure from the job.
Maybe I will never know what it like to try to have a relationship with someone who is "just add or adhd". Maybe my spouse's narcissistic personality disorder is the primary blockage to his progress. But even in the case of the young woman with whom I used to work... sweet and loving as all get-out, but never learned to curb her tongue when it came to Not sharing other folks' personal info. Beyond that, she did not want to try to understand why that may be a problem. That's the thing... when the Wanna is absent, it's the end of the line. This girl learned to give away so much, to be extravagant to her friends (so what if it was on her father-in-law's credit card) ... so who could ask for anything more? If she asks you to accompany you to an event, it matters not how many times you've told her what you will and will not tolerate (not getting home till 2 am) .... don't go unless you're ready to be out till 3 am. It's simply a fact of life with her. But at least she won't rage at you. Just don't tell her anything you don't want to hear from the next stranger you meet :)
I read something this morning about depression. It was in with some writings by Richard Skerritt, whose stuff I do not wholeheartedly accept, but he's got some insight nonetheless.,, and he was, in part, quoting M. Scott Peck.
"Spirit/Mind - I go back again to Peck (p.169). He teaches that depression results from a disconnect between our conscious and our unconscious minds. I’ll take some liberty with this and put it another way. The problem is a disconnect between our spirit and our mind. Your spirit is you - it is the complete, full, good and healthy you. It is the vital energy that drives your life. It is the source of joy and inspiration. Your memory, on the other hand, is programmable. In an abusive relationship, it can become a garbage can stuffed full of thoughts that have been shoved in there by you and the people you’ve been around. And when I say garbage, for those of us in long term relationships with abusive partners, I mean garbage."
I think the same applies to anger. When a person's spirit (including God-given conscience) does not match up with what that person keeps trying to convince himself of in his mind, he is going to be angry. It can't be his problem/issue/fault/responsibility... it's all those other folks who failed to make him feel like a shining star. Grrr @ them!
Someone whose mind has been stuffed, through abusive relationships, with negative, untrue thoughts about himself will release tears when hearing the affirmation which his spirit knows is true - No, you really did mean well, you are a loving person, stuff like that.
So what happens in the reverse - to someone whose spirit knows that he has not measured up, that he has not followed through on his pledges, that he has failed to take measures to guard his family from harm... when his mind keeps telling him that he's all that and a bag of chips? Look out. The birth of a narcissist.
Just some random thoughts.
Designing some scuba gear to reach that underwater lockbox :)
To clarify, you are so correct
Submitted by I'm So Exhausted on
Standing,
To clarify, I believe they are the "top" five negative attributes that are part and parcel to ADHD. They in no way cover everything.
It is just my own way of separating out the poor behavior. If my spouse is late, it could be attributed to his ADHD. If he yells at me for being flustered that we are now going to be late toa party, due to his tardiness, that yelling is poor behavior. I am sorting through what of my spouse's behavior can be attributed to ADHD and what should not. Many of the things my spouse does are just poor behavior that he has been getting away with for years. I over looked it. I never called him on it. Now I am.
My spouse's behavior has always been very passive aggressive. He was forced "to be nice to his cousins" even when they were not nice to him. "Good Catholic boys turn the other cheek." "You have to be KIND." He has a very distorted view of what KIND means. It means 'intent' too. Not just "how it looks on the outside." He can choose to make better choices now. He may have had a poor start, but it is not an excuse to remain that way.
Designing some scuba gear to reach that underwater lockbox :) Good for you! You go girl!
I am changing my behaviors and responses. If nothing comes back, then I will know with contentment that I really did all I could do, and my choice is to move towards joy and happiness. With my spouse will be ideal. Without him will be my second choice if necessary for my own peace of mind..
Liz
Makes sense to me, Liz
Submitted by Standing on
You're absolutely right. The intent to be kind is one thing; priding ones self on appearing to be kind is another matter entirely. It's the same here... he wants people to appear to highly esteem him, regardless of whether his behavior warrants such favor. I never called my spouse on it, either. Not unless it became bullying, specifically of my son. I did often try to instruct him re: what most people look for in an exchange/interaction... some mutuality. That fell on deaf ears and always came back to: but I Did this or I Did that. Seems he thinks he must buy people and he only does that if they have something he wants... even if that something is only admiration. He can appear sentimental in an odd way. Once a guy we barely knew came to his business and said his house had burned. Spouse wrote him a large check. Impulse. A man he's known for years joins him in his business and does his level best to make sense of chaos, is disrespected at every turn and - when he leaves to have much needed surgery - spouse did not so much as check on his welfare afterward.
There's another component to this, as well... that is - a person who denies his "dark" side, his less honorable motivations and not so sparkly feelings and thoughts. Spouse does this in a big way and when His Own Actions make that dark side abundantly clear, he is mad at everyone besides himself. At this very moment, I am his living object lesson in how he devalues a person who is no longer useful to him. I have no doubt that he sees it. I also have no doubt that it is completely my fault. If only I would... be just like him. Not happenin.
So here I sit, relishing the peace and trying to remain calm while piecing together all the odd bits of my past 34 years, which is when I began "getting married" in order to define myself :)
It's been so long since I even gave myself the leeway to consider what I may like to fix to eat or watch on tv or whatever that each little decision feels momentous haha. He had me trained to hand him the remote control whenever he was in the vicinity. He hated that, too. He wanted our "life" to have the appearance of sharing, regardless of the truth. It was always, in all ways, about him. I don't want to choose to make it all about me. I do want to at least remember that I have choices and give a speck of attention to what I might actually prefer :) And then SIT IN PEACE AND ENJOY IT! Yes. I yelled that. Thanks for the visit, Liz. Helps!!