Prescriptions For Happiness | ADHD and Marriage

The thinking of thoughts...

Submitted by c ur self on Sat, 12/31/2016 - 14:31

This little book is a positive assist and reinforcement to the road I've been traveling...

thanks for posting Delphine..:)

Welcome C...enjoy :)

Submitted by Delphine on Sat, 12/31/2016 - 19:27

Welcome C...enjoy :)

Delphine

Hey Delphine I've Missed Your Contributions!!

Submitted by kellyj on Sat, 12/31/2016 - 17:06

How are you? I have to say....I was glad to see more of your links like this which I have always appreciated. This one really helped me identify something that didn't realize exactly until I read it?

Actually, miracles

are normal everyday events

for people who skillfully use

these

principles

moment by moment

in their lives.

After all,

a miracle is something

you would like to have happened

that you didn’t expect

I've very much felt the same way but I realize....that these little miracles have stopped happening and I know why...but not how to get around it exactly?

Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes + fear = conditions = No No No No No No No No = no miracles

Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes + fear = conditions = No No No No No No No No = no miracle

Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes + fear = conditions = No No No No No No No No = no miracles

This is it Delphine. The fear and conditions filter = resistance or......NO I use to feel that my wife was controlling and now I am rethinking this lately? What feels controlling is this filter since it and impenetrable wall the you have to go around to get to the miracle but the problem is...the miracles happen in the moment and if everything is planned or being run through this filter....there is no spontaneity when all the oxygen is gone by the time you get there? Planning ( as my wife calls it ) is really trying to prevent things in the future from happening? Literally!! When you spend all your time trying to prevent things....you also prevent the miracles from happening as well? You can't plan Happiness.....Happiness just happens when you allow to in the moment? But if you are always trying to predict the worse from Happening ( as if it going to? )....the miracles stop along with this fear filter if you are trying to create the future....by using fear in order to do so and Yes....turns into No....which means.....No miracles? Conditions are road blocks that you need to go around each and every time you do anything? And unless the Yes...passes through this filter and actually makes it out the other side and it's still Yes rather than no? By the time you meet the conditions....the moment is gone?

I'm working hard on #3 as of right now but ....#1 and #2 have already been established by this filter and if I were to ask or demand anything right now ( sparingly only if I absolutely have to ) is remove this filter and let the miracles happen again? #3 I'm working hard to accomplish.....but to get to those miracles that I want...I'm going to have to get them by myself without my wife and make more time without here because if I do anything with it all all......this filter is the thing....that blocks the miracles and as long as I have to walk side by side with her in anything.....I will never see those miracles again I'm afraid since you can't plan for miracles....they just happen in the moment and if you hesitate....they're gone? Hesitation Kills..... as I've have heard from different sources but..... I didn't realize hesitation kills the miracles until just now? It's this fear and condition filter I think...is really the culprit? It controls my wife more than anything, but if I want those miracles with my wife....this filter has got to go otherwise...I will need to get them by myself and come back home and turn up the Love anyway? I realized....these are what I have been missing...and they are not something I am willing to live without?

Thanks again for sharing....don't be a stranger...I miss your input?

Hi J,

Submitted by Delphine on Sat, 12/31/2016 - 19:41

Hi J,

One of the passages in the book that made a big impression on me...he talks about accepting the unacceptable, and loving the unlovable. As it happens, there is someone in my life right now who is really challenging me on that. He doesn't have ADHD btw.

It sounds like you are having trouble accepting your wife's way of being, but if you are going to continue living with her, it's something you will have to do. Doesn't mean you can't ask for what you want. The author makes the point to ask in a non-attached manner, like you are asking them to pass the pepper. :)

I've posted this quote before here, think it bears re-posting:
https://www.pinterest.com/pin/96194142017497317/

"Get everyone else out of the equation" means just that--everyone, including your partner. If your happiness depends on her changing, that won't work.

I'm online less these days in general, but I'll try to drop in more often here. :)

Delphine

I Really Do, Value Your're Insight Delphine

Submitted by kellyj on Sun, 01/01/2017 - 03:27

When you check in.....I just wanted to say thanks. Thanks:)

PS People are people..and relationships are hard work. ( and a pain in the ass sometimes).....ADHD or not? Know what I mean? LOL

Giving Thanks A Retraaction of What I Said

Submitted by kellyj on Sun, 01/01/2017 - 10:40

Last night my own words came back to haunt me and I wanted to take a moment to give Thanks for the miracles I neglected to include in my statement that these little miracles are no longer happening? I realized....this is not true? I have had a number of these little gifts happen and received just from being here and a couple of the biggest gifts of Love I received have come through right here on this forum which are really quite amazingly BIG! How can I neglect to mention this? I have had some really ( almost too coincidental ) quite remarkable small events happen recently that could go quite un-noticed if it had not been from connecting them with the very things I have written here? Almost like as if.....all I had to do was say the word...and they just happened on their own and I have begun to notice them more and more as time goes on?

In all the struggles I have had in dealing with my wife's issues......I have really neglected to say that my issues and personal struggles have been resolving themselves at a record pace for myself personally and I do very much give thanks to the conduit for these blessings being this forum and my participation ( just being here and speaking my thoughts and feelings here and these little miracles ( and a couple big ones ) simply by having the opportunity to say some heart felt things that I've needing to say?

I also wanted to acknowledge that in respect to all my venting and a bit of an attitude to go along with it....has really been a healthy way to express what I have really had to bottle up...only because these things that need to be said....are not being side at home but not because I don't want or really need to...it's because of the Hatred and self loathing I feel coming from my wife and it's toxic effect on me?

Learning how to express this better ( not great but better )....has been a huge weight lifted from me which has allowed my feelings and emotions to come the surface and resolve them once and for all?

Being able to connect with God, my family and my past in a way ...in order to forgive them and understand them better.....has been a miricle by itself ( a HUGE ) one that I have to give Thanks for everyone who has helped me here.....by just allowing me to do so? Just having someone to bear witness to...and speak these things and say what I really feel.....has been one of the greatest gifts I have ever recieved....and I Thank everyone for helping and giving me this opportunity.

Thank you all.....and wising hope and peace in your hearts....(if not in your relationships lol ) for all those who have given me this miracle of Love...that I neglected to say?

Peace

Awesome friend:)

Submitted by c ur self on Sun, 01/01/2017 - 17:21

(Being able to connect with God, my family and my past in a way ...in order to forgive them and understand them better.....has been a miracle by itself ( a HUGE ) one that I have to give Thanks for everyone who has helped me here.....by just allowing me to do so? Just having someone to bear witness to...and speak these things and say what I really feel.....has been one of the greatest gifts I have ever received....and I Thank everyone for helping and giving me this opportunity.)

I agree; you said it so well...I too am thankful also for the little miracles of God's love and grace in my life....I do agree with you about relationships....It's not easy to accept them for what they are, and not want them to be grandioso!:)..It can feel so hopeless when there is no real way to communicate. (because of defensiveness and denial) One of the biggest miracles in my own life is being brought to this place Delphine was talking about....Just flat out working on myself period...(Got to find Peace for myself, with her or with out her) That little book she posted about happiness was amazingly right in line (in most ways) with where I feel lead to....When a person lives under a lot of stress from unhealthy family situations I think it's good to run it by someone...I've set up an appointment for myself next week w/ a counselor....Might as well let a Pro give me some tips on dealing with the best way to handle the over focus on what I wished was different:)...

Happy New Year J...

I agree with C, it is

Submitted by Delphine on Sun, 01/01/2017 - 17:45

I agree with C, it is important to be able to vent sometimes. Great post J.

I may be seeing a counselor myself soon.

Happy New Year, all :)

Delphine

Sometimes your mind would

Submitted by jennalemone on Sun, 01/01/2017 - 10:37

Sometimes your mind would rather prove itself right than let you be happy!

So true. And sometimes you feel like you want to be honest and be a "solver", so you go out of your way to delve into every nook and cranny of your dire situation making sure that all the dreary facts are out in the open (in your own mind) so that you can analyze the problem and sort it out. But your thinking and sorting and feeling doesn't get anywhere toward your peace of mind and joy. It makes you sit in your muck fidgeting to get out but staying in the muck of negativity....not giving you PERMISSION to get yourself unstuck.

Ferret Hunt Jenna

Submitted by kellyj on Sun, 01/01/2017 - 14:00

So true. No arguing that for sure. When I first came here, Melissa used the term or phrase...ferreting these things out...and I came up with "ferret hunting"...or going in you mind and routing out all those dearly nooks and cranny ( one more time!! LOL ) to make sure I wasn't missing anything on my end first......just to explore around a little and see what I could find? What I actually found in doing this....was more than I was actually looking for? Awareness of my mind.......the logical problem solver side....and my emotional feeling side....and putting these two together and seeing what I came up with?

What I came up with was peace of heart? One down.....one to go, as you say.....peace of mind and joy? LOL

That is a horse of a different color right there I think? But I also have this feeling that I will be able to resolve that as well given some time?

A side discovery which really hit me and I now clearly see and feel now in relationship to my wife?

There is such a thing as mirroring and this we all know and can at least understand as a concept at least....and in a healthy relationship between two people....this is the doorway in to having empathy and compassion? And even in the link that Delphine provided.....in talking about "Turning Up Your Love" I have made an interesting and actually useful discovery in sorting this all out?

In the time that my wife did go with me to therapy together ( which she decided to quit ) saying it wasn't doing any good? My T kept repeating the same thing to her specifically and giving her only two assignments to work on and think about?

1) Stop being negative

2) Stop disliking yourself so much

As far as #2 goes.....what I feel is hatred coming out....not just dislike? And when someone hates themselves so much...and they actually believe it so badly.....that no matter what you do....you can do no right since......if your are good to them and are actually giving to them in a Loving way.....they don't believe you and they feel they don't deserve it and throw it back in your face...instead of mirroring you and connecting with you?

And when you are angry or upset or even show any signs of "hating the things they do" ( not them ) ...they take this on as hating them as a person....and they dismiss and reject that...and throw that back in your face as well? I have come to realize...that my wife really does live in a rule based world inside her head....where permissions ....in order to do anything are needed and are always conditional? I got so tired of getting this thrown back ( either way ) in the form of these chastising moments....or simply refusing to accept or believing moments ( the good parts or any show of affection or Love I have tried to offer her ) are met with even hostility or suspicion....since she cannot accept them as any more than "judgements" or her but the only person in the room judging her....is her most of the time?

So in reality.....I realized.....all that comes back to me....in any way shape or form without this mirror and just this big reflective WALL ( that EVERYTHING ) just bounces back at you...no matter what you do? It's either....her own hatred of herself being thrown or lashing out at me? ( for what ever I did? ) Really....sometimes I have no idea what I did....and she certainly cannot tell me? All she can tell me......is all about me and what I do that is wrong?( pure hatred and negativity spewing...it's all it is )

Or.....how I don't agree with your feelings ( or opinions ) ...since......EVERYTHING IS A JUDGMENT with her and is conditional on something? Really? In that kind of.....real time play by play....thing she does at times....it's like she is sitting there....trying to identify what I am saying....by just spouting the words as she hears them back to me? I might say something about someone or something ...and out comes....."judgment" as her response? Like you pushed the button that said.....:"tell him what he is doing?".....and out it comes?

Or I hear other "descriptions"...of the things I say.....as I am doing them with this compulsive kind of blurting out....which she seeming has no control of? I finally got so tired of this....I finally said..."Tell me more about me? I am actually very interested in hearing more about me?" Which she totally didn't get... ( wooosh right over her head )...and just continued on anyway...and that's when I remembered what my T had said...that it's a "compulsion"....and instantaneous "reaction"...and then actually saying what that reaction is...."out loud?" ( ding light bulb )

I realized.....this wasn't mirroring me at all.....this was just "saying her feelings (which kind of sounds like an opinion but it's not? ) as she feels them ..by putting those "right back at me?" instead?

Nothing goes in at all? Period? Nothing good....nothing bad......nothing. Nothing goes into...or input....from me to her....and the only thing that comes back out....is Hate and negatively and actually.....judgment? She is just a walking talking "judgment" of herself....all day long so of course....everything sounds like judgment to her....because judgment is the only thing she knows or thinks about ever? It's like a garden hose of negativity....just spewing endlessly in a steady stream of judgment and self Hatred it literally is a Wall of Voodoo....coming straight back into my face and aimed and directed right at me? No matter what I do? All good....or ......All bad......and all bad is mostly....what I feel coming back from her and it's very very negative? Getting hosed down regularly with negative ooze....just makes me feel bad and that was the light bulb moment? "Wait a minute? I didn't feel bad a second ago? Holy Cow!!!" ( ding light bulb? ) It's not mine....it's hers!! And that...does not belong to me what so ever!!! I don't need to "feel bad"....just because my wife....is trying to dump her negative ( ooze on me ) by hosing me down...every time I try and connect with her? She doesn't want to connect....she wants to rid herself of hatred? That is the purpose...in which...I serve?

But not anymore....in a moment of just saying what it felt like right back to her.....the term "emotional barfing"...just rolled right off my tongue? And then I realized....there is no logical side or thinking side of my wife's brain working? Ever? "I wonder"...."I wonder."...." I wonder"..."I wonder".....( her favorite words to say? If she couldn't say "I wonder"...she'd have absolutely nothing to say? ( ding light bulb ) There is no logic side working...and all it ever says ( and the words that come out of her mouth? ) like a broken record...that is "stuck"....."wondering?" But never "wants to know?" 24/7? "I wonder?" Duh!!! ( me here...Duh??lol )

It took me a while...but I have come to realize this...and I realized even though there is always two sides to every story....and there are two sides to every brain.....if one side...isn't working....the other side is the only one you hear from and what you "actually hear come out of her mouth)......what she is really feelings...but with no way to express them.....since the logic side needed to do this....is missing? And the thing my wife cannot see or hear herself doing....is telling me what she really feels about me......no matter what "else" she might say instead? Period? I believe her feelings.....more than I believe anything she says to the contrary and that makes it pretty clear....how she feels in respect to "telling me....all about me?" She really hasn't got a clue??( wooosh!! )

You have to have ....both......to actually "know what you are feeling and what your emotions are?". Your emotions and feelings....can't tell the difference....all by themselves? They need you...the thinking person....to do that for them and give them permission?

Which is always conditional...on the person standing in front of you? That is....if you allow it...only? The flip side to permission...is allowing it to happen? My wife needs NO permission from me....to hose me down with negative ooze....but, I don't have to allow it....as a condition even if she does? She needs no permission from anyone for the things she does.....but in the height of hypocrisy....she demands it from everyone else? There is something....majorly Fucked up wrong with her....and I don't need any more diagnosis to tell me that? It reminded me of my T as well.....telling me that her mother...."was Fucked up". That may not be professional "jargon".....but I understood that pretty easily and know what those two words put together mean? LOL But to say....."that ain't my problem...and at least can say with confidence....not any problem I have in the same way despite...all the real problems or issues I do own and have......that one.....ain't it exactly with me? This much is clear....if not for anything else?

This is absolutely true and this just happened to give you an example? My wife said she didn't believe me....when I was speaking and telling her the irrefutable undeniable "truth" about something...and she said...."I don't think you know....so I don't believe you and you're not the person who would know these things so why would I believe you?"

And I said "So if someone who knows these things would tell you this.....then you would believe them?"

And she said ( basically yes in more words )...which is a really interesting thing to hear and witness? The irrefutable undeniable "truth"....one...can't argue with? But you can...( quite conveniently ) choose not to believe the person saying it...and say you would, if it was someone else said it instead? Nice try...buck wheat? Fool me twice? ain't gonna happen!!

That....is a condition.....which is to say.....'the irrefutable universal Truth......is conditional or dependent on who says it? " And without the ability to have logic or reason.....one might not know.....the difference?

( Ding.....light bulb )

I'm not entirely Dim...you know? Ha!

PS There is no "Joy in Mud-ville"..inside my wife's brain and that much I do know without a shadow of a doubt. That is a judgment...just to be sure ;)

The dis-ease of negativity

Submitted by jennalemone on Sun, 01/01/2017 - 14:49

There was a spot on NPR last week that there are studies being done to see if the social environment we live in effects the physical attributes in the brain. It was saying something we sort of know as obvious....We tend to absorb and reflect the emotions and attitudes of those we spend time with. If you're hanging around negative people who complain and worry much of the time, then you are bound to catch their ailment.

Before I was married, I had a good outlook...VERY positive, active, healthy in mind, body and spirit. I would wake in the morning and with the equivalent song in my heart of "I feel pretty. I feel witty, I feel pretty and witty and gay. And I pity any girl who isn't me today. Lalalalalalalalala."

H had a rebellious "middle finger up at the world" attitude about life. He had high boundaries and a caustic vocabulary and stance to keep people at bay. I guess I saw that as a strength in a man when we were very young. He was Rebel Without a Cause and Alfred E Newman...."What me worry?" As years went on I realized that he was coping with a very small ego that needed to be soothed often....He was putting out there an air of "in your face - You won't tell me what to do." brassiness as a shield anad I became a willing and easy prey for him to practice his "armed and dangerous" attitude after he started isolating himself from the world. I even thought is was my duty as a wife to shield my children from his tantrums. I was an easy target and it was easy for him to deflate and conquer me...someone who, at heart, was devoted to him and family wellness.

I still have the lofty goals and high standards for myself as I did when I was young but I have spent my life in defense playing these silly (senseless to me) war games of control and pillage that H seems to have devoted his life to to protect his ego.....which, if you met him you would think was HUGE - the salesman with the dirty jokes and alcohol.

I have lost my very likable, self-confident self. If there was ever a lesson I will tell my children and grandchildren, it is to surround yourself with people who are positive and are going in a direction where you want to be going. And to not believe that you will be the shining star who will lead difficult people to a place where they will like themselves better and appreciate your good intentions.

Can you hitch your wagon to a shining star? Can you jump ship and land on a ship with pirates and fools? Sure. It happens.

You are the company you keep.

J, it seems that some day you will share the negative dis-ease of your wife in your core if she cannot find some happiness. It seems that she has contracted the disease of unhappiness and negativity from somewhere and needs a cure.

I have caught it. I don't know where I caught it. I don't know the cure. Trying alone seems to not be enough. I had been consistently subjected to new dis-ease.

Yep You Know It!!

Submitted by kellyj on Sun, 01/01/2017 - 17:19

And you can see it here as well as you said? This is my cycle. I wake up positive with a positive attitude? ( the norm for me ) Then at some point in time....I get ( hosed ) "Wait a minute? I didn't feel bad a second ago? Holy Cow!!!" ( ding light bulb? )

Ding is right!!! That is my daily cycle...and that is the struggle right there. When I put up the force field that allowed me to stay positive anyway....is when I knew I was going to be alright. It still needs some reenforcement but....my wife's negativity is all on her now. And she hates that!!

Or you might say....the joke is on you. lol ( not you Jenna.....you know what I mean? lol )

PS "You Fool...You're Jedi Mind Tricks don't work here" remembering that one from my T lol

Prototest Negativity

Submitted by kellyj on Sun, 01/15/2017 - 10:36

Jenna,

I cam back here because I realized the specific brand of negativity I have caught and it's called "Protest" negativity. My T mentioned this to me when he had seen my wife in private and all he said was the word negativity. I realized now specifically what it is? Protesting. Like taking up a cause and marching down the street with a bunch of protesters and I realized that my wife is the source but actually....it hit me when I heard her on the phone with some clients ( in the work she does as a Social Worker ) and listening to her field the "protests" of her clients on the phone as I heard her responding to them? And as I heard her...I heard myself in her voice as she had to sit and take it and take it....in the form of complaints and protests from the clients ( parents actually not the clients themselves ) giving her an earful of how they were dissatisfied from the entitlements they were getting for their special needs kids? I could even here the Charlie Brown...."wah wah...wah wah wah...wah wah wah wah wah.".....coming through the speaker as she sat and listened to them complain and belly ache that their kids weren't getting the care they thought they should be getting?

And yes...it's contagious and I do feel compassionate for her and her job....but at the same time...you don't get to come home and "kick the dog"..and take it out on your spouse which is exactly what she does? I can't even imagine doing what she does for a job and having to listen to that all day everyday.....but that is still not my problem if I am catching that via my wife and letting that change my good mood or attitude too?

Just thought I would mention it...and relay the source and this Protesting which is not the same as lobbying which would be a form of persuasion instead? I think entitlement is contagious too.....which seems to go hand in hand with Protesting? And with entitlement......you get egg roll too ie" protesting and negativity and a lot of complaining and unhappiness?

I will be keeping that in mind know which I do know when it started? It started when I left my job of 26 years and started working at home with only my wife to interact with? I wasn't this way nearly as much when I was talking to people all day long who were not Protesting all the time? I realized this is what my wife's entire family does when they got together with their mother leading the way on that one?

I just never realized exactly what to call it until know and until I heard the unmistakable wah wah wah.....coming through the phone and my wife was in the same portions I was...in trying to bring them down? She told me she is envious of me since I don't have to "work a 9 to 5 " now...which is why I think she thinks life is on the gravy train if you don't have to listen to people who complain all day long? I do wish she didn't have to do that but at the same time....not everyone is as effected by it as she is and I co think I know why? Not the best choice for a job but no one Loves everything about working....but you do have to take the good with the bad and not let it effect you? I've been working already for 21/2 hours this morning but such is life? Right?

Something to think about now...and make some changes? I don't no how to get rid of it or stop either...when you are immersed in it with no escape?

Jenna & J

Submitted by c ur self on Sun, 01/15/2017 - 17:44

Separating one's self from negativity in our relationships and life in general, is in my opinion another one of those Golden Nugget's of 'Living Well"

In taking myself apart with the "Why" question, I have identified my weaknesses in not being able to avoid this trap much of the time...But, then awareness is a huge part of the battle....

I, like J, have a hard time with not taking up the Protest Spirit..."Pointing things Out". I usually have a thankful spirit, but, I'm human also, and can complain from time to time, but, I am also conscience about Thankfulness or possessing a thankful spirit...I'm not a complainer by nature, especially about things I can do nothing about, such a politics (one vote) etc...Like you say here Jenna, victim hood, constant complaining, a poor me attitude is difficult to be around...It takes a high tolerance!..

The seemingly constant need for sympathy is a disease or at least it's a manifestation of deeper issues...

When a person is almost constant in their behaviors as a victim and even demonstrates signs of depression under normal life conditions, (mundane responsibilities) there is a problem...What is amazing to me about this type of mind is....This same person usually will express high energy and a bubbly attitude when the responsibilities of life (the mundane) is being cast aside (their norm) or swept under the rug for trivial things, and frivolity..."A mind that say's I must be entertained, and I must control how that is going to take place."

The key for me is recognition of this mindset, but most of all I must recognize my tendencies' when subjected to this constant unhealthy barrage, and deal with myself so as to not loose my thankfulness and be sucked into the Dysfunction of that mindset....

Like I have said here in the past, the less I enable, the more I restrain myself from Co-dependency, the more I stay aware of the contagion factor of victim hood, the more I work on my own mindset to accept, and not fall in the trap of "pointing things out, (Protesting)" or seek to change or control any other person (The critical death producing illusion) the more peace of mind I have, along with a healthy emotional state...

Thankfulness under any circumstance's!!!

Side Note:....I went to see a counselor last Monday...The counselor wanted to hear about my life...(already had the pre-questionnaire that covered a lot of stuff) so I talked :)...She said two things...You are aware, and you know what you need to do....And she also said this..."I think you need to grieve...She said she thought that I have not allowed myself to grieve about much of the trauma that's been in my life"...??? Been thinking about this one*...L.W., I'm going back in a month...We will see....She also asked me if some ONE BIG THING happened in my life that prompted me to call...I though a second and I said no it's just something I felt I needed at this point in my self awareness journey, an accountability sounding board......Then I said; "well maybe there was something"...Then I told her that I have adamantly with in my own spirit refused to ever consider leaving...But, I told her, I recently have come to the place that I'm fine with leaving. I love my wife, and want her to finish out her remaining days on this earth living as she feels is in her (eternal) best interest...as I feel for myself also. And for almost 9 years there has been no real and lasting peace in this relationship. Everything in life takes energy, and effort, and unless there is energy and effort put into honoring your spouse, and your vow's to them, then only one thing remains..."Abandonment"....And with our history, and our seemingly different priorities, I'm no longer hopeful...I know God is able, but, we must desire him and seek him out in this area of life, just as we do for the things we truly desire....Priorities meaning: (the things we give our time, attention, care, $ etc, too)....I turned 60 last week, and I know what it's like to be loved and desired....

My wife in my opinion, based on her daily words and deeds (the victim stance she displays concerning most area's of responsibility), is offended by being a wife...She know it, and she know's I feel this way, and she reads my posts anyway:)

Being a husband or wife (honoring one's vows) isn't desired by some people, and I'm not fighting against her reality any longer, i'm accepting it....

That was big news, brother

Submitted by NowOrNever (not verified) on Sun, 01/15/2017 - 20:32

I know you'll put it in God's hands, and wait on Him. There will be light.

I'm not surprised to hear about the grieving. A lot of us need that.

Peace in Christ, brother

Now

:)

Submitted by c ur self on Sun, 01/15/2017 - 22:24

Thank you...and ditto...

grieving

Submitted by Delphine on Mon, 01/16/2017 - 03:01

I say, go ahead and grieve if you really feel the need, but if not, then don't.

When I was in therapy, there was always a box of Kleenex by the chair I sat in. I never once used it. Not that I never cry. I cried

a ton when my nephew died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound. The shock and grief also emotionally excavated some stuff I had hidden from myself about

my growing-up years. Later in therapy I was reflecting on it all but didn't feel the need to emote about it. For that reason, therapist thought I

was suppressing my feelings. But I felt I had reached a place of understanding, if not total peace, with the past.

I think it is important to move through stuff, not stay stuck in sadness and grief for ever and ever. Anyway, as I said, follow your feelings, C, wherever they may lead you.

Delphine

Thank you Delphine:)

Submitted by c ur self on Mon, 01/16/2017 - 09:47

As I've grown in this life, I have suffered physically and emotionally. By my own hands, and by the hands of others....It has molded me into a person that see's life (in all things) from and eternal perspective....

When my spouse died in 2007 w/ cancer I had spent those final days lying beside her (at hospice) on a cot holding her hand through the rails of the bed....There was nothing she needed to say or I...We were at Peace...We new who was in control...We had given ourselves completely through the good and the bad....So when Jesus took her hand out of mine, I knew without a shadow of doubt she was home....

I grieved my way, I lost weight, I distractedly ran past my destination on occasion...But eventually the reality of God's call on my life to be productive in this life, loving and giving myself for the kingdom set in...I'm not my own!

I was feeling lonely one day, so I got all her pictures and lined them up along the fire place mantle...And started a fetal position pity party...Right in the middle of it someone knocked on the door...It was a acquaintance who stopped by to check on me....We set down at the table and he proceeded to talk to me....He had lost his wife in her early forties (cancer I think) a few years back, as we talked (I had snot everywhere LOL) it became apparent he was blaming God, and the spirit was telling me to comfort him, to love him...This type interruption happened both times I tried this...Needless to say my Father isn't going to let me forget who I belong too...I don't understand how he can love me ( a sinner) so much....But, I hope I never forget to be thankful...

Thank you for your encouragement!

I appreciate you....

That's a great story C about

Submitted by Delphine on Mon, 01/16/2017 - 15:39

That's a great story C about the guy who came by who had the same issue you did, having lost his wife to cancer. And that it happened both times you were all set to have a nice fetal position pity party. :D

I think helping others is the best way out of those kinds of feelings. Yes, of course your Father loves you completely. That's what real Fathers do!

I appreciate you, too. Keep on keeping on!

Delphine

Making Up and Joining in With You NON

Submitted by kellyj on Mon, 01/16/2017 - 13:46

I was thinking about what you said the other day....( feeling like I was telling you to Fuck Off ) and this made me feel bad. It was not what I wanted or was intending to do...but as I thought about this more....my intention was still honorable but done poorly and I was not seeing the big and over all picture at the time and focusing on the details. And I as was thinking about this more....I realized that a part of having ADHD is needing to focus on the details more which is part of the initial problem right from the get go? There is something good that came from that and even within what I was attempting to say...but hadn't come to any real conclusions yet until I tried in on my wife to see what would happen since....there is...and was....a problem ( a major one ) that has to do with this very thing and the very thing that C spelled out here in his response to me ( as I am also including in what I am saying here )...from some extremely relevant things I have learned over the years in my own therapists office...and it goes right back to being a victim in my past?

As said....a victim is going to be triggered by certain buzz words or certain ways of thinking about things ( from a particular perspective with all those perceptions in play? ) This is where the communication barrier comes into play....which will never be able to overcome if someone does not step in and change those perceptions first? This constant negativity and constant misinterpretation is highlighted by those very things right there? What lies beneath the communication then...is really at the source of the problem and beneath that at the core...is the victim mentality or "way of seeing things." Trying to "fix" this particular issue ( Victim Hood ) is actually a doable and fixable thing to fix...even if the ADHD itself....is not "fixable" in that regard?

So what is possible here ( I always ask myself first? )

Fixing ADHD? Or fixing this victim problem? That's kind of no brainer there and easy to identify what is possible in the first place? That's not saying that the "victim issue" is a cure all ...at all. It's saying it is the source for a lot of other things that fall beneath it...so it's a good place to start as just the first step or first thing to start working on...along with any specific things or details that you need to address as well? It is just ONE thing to work on....but and important one none the less? And as I have found out myself from just doing it...the grieving comes along with working on the victim issue and is in part....worked on simultaneously at the same time in stages as well? It all becomes part of the overall process that has to do with depression and hopelessness and without any power or control ( seemingly ) to do anything about it sometimes? When you reach the point where you say "can't "...first? Or say....."it's impossible and no hope so why even try"...that is the seeds of victim mentality which comes along with giving up and resigning yourself to be "doomed" for ever? When you start believing this yourself....or you start convincing yourself of those statements like "this is just who I am...I can't do anything about that?" Can't...no hope.....no power to change....depression and despair....all come with the territory along with all that negativity that follows?

Well first off....."this is just who I am"...is a false statement right there? ADHD is NOT...."who you are"....so you don't have to change "who you are" to fix the problems or do something about them? And just like I said....fixing ADHD is not what you are trying to do.....'fixing" what is possible and "fixable" is...what is possible and this victim thing is one of those things?

So I can speak about the process of how I learned how to do this in the order ( if I can remember now...don't hold me to this exactly lol ) in how I learned to do this and one of the big ones or first ones on the list ....is "magical thinking" right off the bat. So number one of the list for me was getting rid of the "magical thinking" and replace that with what is possible....and not thinking in terms of what is "Not Possible" in reality or "in the physical" aspects of this as said?

I realized this is where my entire premise was coming from the other day....without even realizing it since....I have adopted this strategy and have been applying it for so long.....it has now become and every day automatic process I go through to check myself make sure I've got any "Idealized" or "magical"...kind of thinking out of my repertoire and have actually formed a new set of "triggers" ( in a healthy way ) in spotting the red flags of this "idealized" ....or "magical" way of seeing things....in order to combat the effect of being a victim for a great deal of my own life ...in a new and better way of seeing things for me and me only more importantly?

This is actually what I can apologize to you for in the things I was attempting to say without understand exactly..."what I was saying" to you? Without any intention or awareness of this....I was disrespecting you and made you feel the way you ended up feeling from me not realizing this...and in that much I am sorry. Truly? You have helped me through so many difficult times here and have helped me through some really rough spots...that the last thing I wanted to do would be that so I wanted to make that up to you and retelling this in a different way? Hopefully a better way than I did before and include them into what I am saying?

What I have found that is absolutely true for me is....believing in the wrong things is the start or the beginning of this issue from the beginning. So making sure of what "You Believe" or in respect to this...."why" you believe it....is of critical importance to get yourself out of this mess...right from the get go or the first step in the process?

And in the physical sense....not the spiritual sense.....you better make sure what you believe is right or correct and accurate...or you will be running into the same problems as before? Something needs to change or happen first.....before you can stop being a victim anymore and this is step one as I said?

1) Get rid of "magical" and "idealized" thinking..and replace it with "insight based on reality"...just for a start? And in the same automatic way...I scan for these "Triggers"....I got triggered the other day ( and didn't realize it )...when I opened the web page that Zapp included and saw the word "ULTIMATE HUSBAND"... in big bold letters spanning across the entire top half of the screen? It was kind of hard to miss since it was in blazen letters like a banner and first thing you saw? That trigger my process right there when I saw "ultimate" as an more "idealized" way of applying that to the word Husband.....and I immediately went right into asking myself? "Self...is Ultimate a good way to see this...and if no....what would be a better way? Ultimate sounds very idealistic and appears to me as putting a grading system or value judgment in applying Ultimate as a goal here?

As if "Husbands" can be rated as "Ultimate, Excellent, Good, Average, Poor, and Bad"? And of course...is you do this with husbands....you'd have to do the same thing with "Wives" as well? "Uh oh."...as I would say. to myself.."that is already heading down the wrong road I want to be on? It's the same road that got me here and I need to get off this road and on a different one...right off the bat?"

So if you can see it for the reason of getting off the value judgment road....and the magical thinking road in terms of "ideals" or "idealized language. Then as a means to undo this victim thing..and do this another way...then I've got to change that to something else...and do this completely differently?

And in the way my T taught me how to do this...is to replace that with insight instead? Insightful thinking is all about reality and what is real based on the physical world...so the "spiritual world"...the language they use in it in those same "idealized" or somewhat "magical" or even within the idea of what a Miracle is as said...."walking on water"..."making bread and wine appear out of thin air" etc.....is not the way to get yourself out of being a victim if this was how you got there by trying to apply those ideas...to the ideas or things that have to do with the physical world we live in and interact in on a daily basis?

So if you can apply this for example...to "denial"...and approaching it that way? What is "denial" all about any way? Believing things about yourself and others...that is not true? So getting rid of anything that will not conrfuse things and are not specific...and not specifically related to reality in the physical....and getting rid of value judgments or "ratings peopple" or putting them into "positions" in your mind ( the compartmentalizing that happens in what the gentleman was actually referring to ) or the judging of others or yourself more importantly and seeing things as they really are....not...in what you imagine them to be? Then magical thinking and idealized thinking then...is the first thing that has got to go?

And in what I was actually believing in ...and what he was saying was that men tend to compartmentalize more than women inherently...and that is something that I believe is true which means....that men and women tend to process things differently..and with that process that is different.....comes what I am talking about? And I was am no different than any other man in that respect....but I also am extremely aware of the fact...that just telling someone ( or a man ) not to compartmentalize...is like saying..."stop being a man"...or...."stop having ADHD". All the wanting and wishing and just telling someone to stop...will do nothing more than make you want to give up...every time you try and fail and this comes right back to what I am saying?

In order not to be a victim. Then certain steps must be taken? And if denial is one them...then "magical thinking" and "idealized thinking"...is the first step in the process? Which in some ways that are extremely validating to me now? At just how well I can spot words like "Ultimate"..and immediately go...."no not for me...I've got to get off that road and get on a new one..and replace that with another way in order not to go back down the wrong road. ( Again )...which was the same one that got me there in the first place?

And in the same way I now do wo automatically now instead? It's not "Wrong"...or the "wrong road"...for everyone else? It's just not the best road for me to take...because of these pitfalls I want to avoid and trip over which get easily seeing things in same way...in the very same wat I am trying so hard to avoid in the first place?

The most important thing I can say here NON for me? If I know this helps me stay positive...and it helps me rid myself of any negativity or "magical thinking" or seeing things in an idealized way ( Grass in Greener.....Good, Bad, Better or Worse" type way of seeing people in general or even my wife or our relationship together? Then this is a good thing for me...and something I should be doing?

I can't speak for anyone else.....even if my wife in the habit of "speaking for me" for me...as often as she does? If I don't want to follow her straight down the wrong road for me...then I've got to take a different road that works and if it works...it works? Right? I mean.....correct? LOL ( humor there.....I know we are not talking about "right and wrong" here...just making sure? )

That road means:

1) Get rid of Magical and Idealized thinking and thinking of things in those terms?

2) Replace that with "insight" instead....and be able to identify the "triggers" or indicators or sign posts of the 'WRONG ROAD" in the same way?

3) Be aware of compartmentalizing...and know when and where you are doing it? Like it has said in other articles I have read up on this? Compartmentalizing is not a bad thing and as that web site said that men are kind of built this way to begin with? It can be a good thing...or a bad thing...but knowing "when"..and "when not to"...is more straight to the point of what he was saying?

4) Be specific...and use specific language so as not to be confusing especially on our accounts since we have so much difficulty with this more often than others in that respect?

Which brings me to something that just happened today with my wife and I...which has another issue that really came to a head and I saw clearly this morning when she in I ran into a tight spot...but I finally saw what it was and was able to get past this without a problem?

Of all things...it had to do with "time" or speaking in terms of "time frames"....or ..."specific time of day"? My wife was getting really frustrated ( as well as I ) in that she kepted saying "I told you clearly what I said!!! Are you just playing games with me?" Assuming I wasn't listening or somehow trying to be difficult? She kept repeating the same thing over and over and relating it something we were talking about...but within what she was saying....she was not being specific..and not realizing why?

7 in the morning....and 7 at night. That's 12 hours? But which 12 hours are you talking about? Is that 7am to7pm...during the day time hours? Or is that 7pm to 7am....during the night time hours? She just kept repeating.....7 in the morning and 7 at night is 12 hours...over and over.....and and the word "night" referes to the "time of day"....but not the range of 12 hours..and which one is night and which one is day?

And she was sure....so absolutely sure...that she was saying it in a way that I should absolutely know which 12 hours she was talking about...and could not understand how could not understand thisl...and was getting upset and irritated at me...as if I was trying to be difficult? And I kept saying the same thing to her....Night time...or day time?

And her reply was...."I told you that...why aren't you listening to me!!! Here...I will say it again...." ( NO!!! Please NO!!!!! LOL Not Again!!!! LOL )

And I finally figure this out by actually realizing what the problem was...and then I told her "You know....there is a reason why the military uses Zu Lu time and the 24 hour time system when communicating ...and this is it...for that very reason. The can only be one time frame you are talking about...and it very specific...with no confusion ever?

If you eliminating the possibility...of having two options when you speak or speaking in flowery, romanticized prose, with a lot of ambiguous language or language rich with symbolism or speaking in idealized ways in that respect...you eliminate the possibility of things being taken...more than one way...and with a person like myself with ADHD...and with my wife who struggles with the same issues/.....then eliminating those possibilities right from the start...is the way to work around this...and speaking effectively and precisely...with my wife especially now for her on my end is what I have found is the cure or way out of this for me?

And in the same way with this negatively issue as well.....what is really the most challenging thing for me of all that is specific to our relationship is? I have to be thinking of 2 people with these issues...and make sure I'm the one who is following my wife...so I can find a way to work around this communication issue in order to avoid conflict? I really have never been in this position before...in having to think about this 2 ways...with the 2 ways that are so remarkably different...but at the same time.....the same different from where I was....but not anymore?

If you wanted to make this any more complicated here just for me? I don't think that would be possible...out of everything that is possible......this one is it!! LOL

If I can say anything more to add to the other day....sometimes I don't no where I am in trying to keep track of this NON? My failure was really in that much...and nothing more than that?? If I thought I had made it out of the woods for myself....it doesn't do much good for someone else who is still in there..and I have to go back in to find them? As put? LOL

You and I are fine, J

Submitted by NowOrNever (not verified) on Mon, 01/16/2017 - 21:22

My best friends can tell me occasionally to f off...and I can tell them I see it differently from them..

..and you know, life goes on and here we all are.

So lose worry with me, OK.

J, no reason to go back to a subject that may have passed on downstream.

...but moving forward, into one of your subjects in your latest post:

7 in the morning....and 7 at night. That's 12 hours? But which 12 hours are you talking about? Is that 7am to7pm...during the day time hours? Or is that 7pm to 7am....during the night time hours? She just kept repeating.....7 in the morning and 7 at night is 12 hours...over and over.....and and the word "night" referes to the "time of day"....but not the range of 12 hours..and which one is night and which one is day?

And she was sure....so absolutely sure...that she was saying it in a way that I should absolutely know which 12 hours she was talking about...and could not understand how could not understand thisl...and was getting upset and irritated at me...as if I was trying to be difficult? And I kept saying the same thing to her....Night time...or day time?

........ahahahahahh. J this sounds like our house sometimes. I always remember that you wonder whether or not your wife has ADHD. Do you still think that? Well, if so that passage of yours reads like a classic piece from my husband who yes indeed, leaves out basic pieces of detail in what he says at times. Thinking that its obvious.. And I'm the one going what??? I truly wonder whether my husband sometimes knows that what's inside his head isnt also on the outside of it... But give her slack on this small wacko living stuff, J. I've caught myself leaving out pieces and presuming it was obvious, too, to which my husband ends up going what-what??? Some of this stuff is just humans

: )

yeh, get rid of the victim stuff... that's the bigger issue. You cant do that victime fumigating for her on her behalf. But you and I can always work on neither being the victim, nor the persecutor, nor the patsy...ourselves.

. Stay safe if you're up in that Northwest weather.

Now

The Perfect Storm is Coming

Submitted by kellyj on Tue, 01/17/2017 - 07:34

Stay safe if you're up in that Northwest weather.

It's coming. Check the news in the next day or so....this should prove to be???/ Interesting? lol Hopefully, no one gets injured? I haven't seen these conditions coming together since 1978...the last time we had these conditions all happening at once and it may be one of those times? Nothing like Gale winds and heavy warmer rain coming off the ocean....and deep frozen arctic air blasting up the Coumbia Gorge ( with high winds and a strong Easterly Flow ) coming from the opposite direction which makes possibly one of the biggest ice storms we've had in years? Major...as they are calling it? And with up to 8" of snow already on the ground in some areas....the flooding will be massive when it all melts and it should melt...all at once once the temps go over freezing for the first time in well over a week? Snow on the ground is one thing? Ice sickles extending from your gutters all the way to the ground is another thing entirely? Anyone into ice skating? LOL Last time this happened...I pulled out my Hockey skates and was skating down right down the middle of the roa( to get to the store ) and in and around the neighborhood just to give you and idea? 2" of solid ice covering the roadways in some places is both beautiful..and very dangerous with the added slap in the face...once it all melts all at once? At least I won't have to do much tree pruning this spring but there will be plenty of free firewood to be had you can count of it? yikes!! Duck and cover.....something wicked this way cometh? LOL We shall see? Sometimes they are wrong but you never know when they will be right either? And we are sitting right smack in the middle of these two gigantic systems colliding into each other? The last time this happened...the rivers nearly broke over the top of the barriers which came within a foot from doing so and right into the urban areas? I remember going to the sea wall in the after math once the sun broke...and watched the parade of lawn furniture, coolers, common back yard items and garden Gnomes passing by along with huge trees and logs in a massive collection of debris on it's way out to sea? And being a reformed "scrapper" ( as I have read here as well )...my entrepreneurial mind is already turning!!! LOL ( I'm already telling myself no...on that one...just to be sure? )

If anything...I will be ready to help with sand bags if it gets to that place again!!! For sure!!!! yikes!!! Lets hope it doesn't get to that place and they are wrong in the predictions but being as I am...and as I have spent so much time outdoors and get a sense from what I am seeing? This set of circumstances doesn't happen often..and when it does? This is what happens?

And whether my wife has turned a corner or decided to turn over a new leaf.....I have made a conscious decision to step up to the plate and do something about our situation?

One of the most useful things to help me see through this better was listening to Melissa in a recorded life session on a YouTube channel....talking about what happens to the brain of those of us with ADHD where the logic side of the brain gets "turned off"...as she said...during these high times of emotional liability or high times of emotions which of course...I am very familiar with?

Mentioning what I did about replacing unhealthy triggers with new healthy ones that tell me to stop and "think first....react second"....has allowed me not to react in the first place and this is a very tall order when there is PTSD involved? I really did come here to "fix this" over reacting and maintaining control during this moments and I think I might have finally found a way to do it...even if my temper gets compromised by someone doing the same thing with me? It has been the biggest challenge I have yet faced and I know this is what my wife is experiencing now....but not dealing with it well at all?

She seemingly has no control of this what so ever...and is in a perpetual state of "flight"....with the occasional outburst of fight...for so long now it is starting to take it's toll on her? I can see the depression sinking in and this is when I can do things to help ...both of us.....by doing what I can to help? And what that is taking shape in me doing proactively...is showing her....not telling her....that I mean it sincerely?

Opportunity when it knocks....is important to not let slide by? The snow and ice and being house bound and "stuck together non stop " can be either a blessing or a curse...and I choose "blessing" this time...and using that to my advantage? I am actively taking care of a lot of loose ends and minor annoyances that were not on my to do list...but am just voluntarily taking care of them right now and knocking as many of these down all at once in an effort to ease tensions and help my wife out and give her hope? She is so highly sensitive to these environmental issues...and being so visually impacted by "things"....out of place and not aligned perfectly ( as I have mentioned ) that getting the "microscope out"...and switching in my own "perfectionist detail mode" ...like I have to do with the work I do at times ( in the finishing aspects of an Art piece or project of this kind ) is proving to help which there is no way I could do before...if I myself was triggered and when into high alert status I Devcon 4 mode ) in preparedness / defensive mode" in always being on guard or walking on egg shells all the time? I have found...that that....just "sucks harder than anything"...I refuse to live that way!! No freaking way...will I live "that way"...ever again!!! That is where I get pissed.....but in a healthy way and I go into high production mode when that happens.

As C pointed out when his first wife passed from cancer....all those symptoms of losing weight and depression are very familiar too me now? No one wants these things to happen ( along with a major ice strom? )....but how we cope and how we manage it...has everything to do with this? If you always see what's coming up ahead of you as something you "can't handle" or tolerate? Then that's what it will be?

And if you can do the same in reverse of that...and see it than nothing more than life coming at you in all the variations and combinations of things that sometimes reach that Perfect Storm?

Once you been through it enough times to realize you're still here and breathing.....you do get better or get use to these moments and learn how to survive them but not just survive.....not let then stand in your way and to keep moving anyway? I do remember the Hockey Skates to get the store last time...and if I can only find where put mine...I think I'm pulling them out ahead of time ( now that I mentioned it ) and have them ready just in case? LOL It is a fond memory....of skating down the road and having the entire neighborhood all to myself? Aside from a couple of other creative souls out there doing the same thing as well? I've got a pair of old skis I can sacrifice if I have to as well!! LOL ( not free from rocks and gravel completely you know? LOL )

And that victim thing is insidious and catching as well? I've heard people say at times here on this forum "I'm not a victim"....or....."my husband is not a victim"...either way..but the problem with that thinking to start with...comes from not being one....and then not realizing you've become one...which is what I am fighting so hard against in myself from being that in the past?

The benefits of having gone through these "Storms"....is that you learn to weather them better and successfully and preparing for them ahead of time? Mentally? Worrying about them in fear or catastrophic and over reacting? ( building a wall of sand bags around your property )...only to find the the weather changed suddenly and what they "said was going to happen "....didn't? Is just as big a waste of time....as worrying about it and causing your nerves to "fry"?

I am believing or seeing the ADHD in my wife more and more...but the PTSD and all those triggers....are really what is the most problematic I think? My wife is.....'trigger happy" you might say....and that is the main source of conflict that I am learning how to navigate better? The one thing that doesn't work however?

Is two trigger happy people....living in the same environment?

All I can say about that? If I can do it...with PTSD, ADHD and emotional lability( and fight /flight response happening all at once in that Perfect Storm ) ?

Anyone can do it....no matter who you are and what your personal problems and issues are? The worst environment of all in that case if you....when you tell yourself...."I Can't"....or...."I Can't Take it anymore!! "

Like Yoda said to Luke Skywalker....."Always with you...with what cannot be done. ....Do...Or do Not. There is no try"

Skywalker.." I can't believe it!!"

Yoda "That is why you fail"

( mind over matter? I think that's what you call it? Will power, is not only good for being stubborn you know? lol )

https://youtu.be/7YkbgvRMpW0

As the hymn goes, "...Shelter from the Stormy Blast..."

Submitted by NowOrNever (not verified) on Tue, 01/17/2017 - 08:26

Stay safe. I have three relatives living in the Portland area, so I've been getting daily weather news. Lots of houseboundness up there. I hope you're not in a direct line of the Gorge. That thing is a sideways hurricane-funnel.

Much to read in your post. Yes, if the two of you are fast-flash labile, or can be, that's a real deal. I admire you for taking the lead and working on your own impulse in those situations, J. I'd get more into the details of what you wrote, but I so often like now, do mine on an Ipad, which gets balky if I try to copy and paste or reformat very much. I know you're an old pro at knowing your triggers. If my husband is tired or loaded with worry, or in the middle of doing something that he's got his attention sunk into, he can fast-flash react. So I'm sure that you're considering what your wife's and your special triggering conditions are, and sometimes not even trying to get into it if you yourself are for example, tired. But life indeed does have to go on when people are not in their best condition, or are occupied with something else. Tiptoeing around both her triggers and yours all the time would be too much tiptoeing, and trying to guess. That wouldnt be healthy. So I appreciate you working on your own lability. My husband works on his. I work on mine. Good luck to you, housebound as you are.

Yes, yes, stay away from the victim mentality. It takes some firmness of one's own mind to rest in remaining in your own state of mind and what you're doing, if someone else is tugging you toward an interaction in which the role cut out for you is victim, or persecutor, or patsy (supplier of the victim). I thought that article C posted about these matters some months ago was great. If I remember right, it showed signs that its author knew about game theory...meaning that most all of us, with the exception, I think it was Eric Berne wrote, saints...and by that he meant true saints, not just good people, or people who think they're more evolved than they really are, live in stories or dramas, that have assigned roles, and negotiate to get other people to act in the rest of the roles in the drama we have assigned ourselves. Ahaha if two people each are living in two different dramas! You're so right to stay away from participating in any role in a drama with a victim, persecutor, or Mr/Ms Fixit in it.

Fixit is not two couples each contributing help to each other, voluntarily, or both voluntarily working on common problems. Its a role in a power-over others triangle.

You wrote"Once you been through it enough times to realize you're still here and breathing.....you do get better or get use to these moments and learn how to survive them but not just survive.....not let then stand in your way and to keep moving anyway? "

: )

You remind me of a mantra I used to use, in bad times. I havent used it of late, but life being what it is over the long haul, I may have to haul it out again later. It went like this:

"Now, is this the worst thing you've lived through?

No.

What was worse than what you're going through now, and you made it through it?

That....that....and that.... and that...

And you made it through, with God's help?

Yes.

So you will make it through this. So, Now, what are you going to do here?"

: ) It's all learning curve, J, I agree with you there.

PS, People with ADHD are famous for being physically messy, but I've read a couple accounts by people with ADHD...both men, by the way, saying that they rigidly needd to keep things in strict order physically, or they felt like their universe was going chaotic. Like they were losing physical control, or ability to know where things were. Just saying.

Falling all over the problem....

Submitted by c ur self on Tue, 01/17/2017 - 10:29

(Is two trigger happy people....living in the same environment?)

Have you ever noticed how we can suffer, and search for answers and when the "Gold Nugget" is realized, we are like in shock? Because we knew it deep down all the time, but, was in denial of it, because we were helpless to make it happen, or felt like we were???

I can tell you that this statement of your's has been behind most all of our conflict....Why? Because I just have to say something!!! LOL So sad I am..LOL....

I need to continue to discipline myself in this area..."It is HUGE for peace and a healthy relationship....

I'm trying to not respond at all if she is rambling out instructions, or victim statements from another room... If I don't pitch in w/ words (Point it out) I can stay out of it....If she presses me, comes into my space with this stuff...I'm learning if I recognize it for what it is, stay calm and composed (not let anxiety build in me, but do my best to have empathy for her plight, it could be me) and just answer with this question..."Do you realize what your mind is doing to you right now??

And no matter what she says after that, even if I have to go for a walk, I sent the message she needed in a caring calm manner...That's all I can do....That's all I would want from her if I was suffering from unrealistic expectations of others and a victim mindset....

I am a firm believer, if I discipline myself in this area....She will not feel threatened by me...(feel accepted) which will enable growth, and create an atmosphere for healing. It also helps w/ accountability and can help snuff out blame and denial by limiting a victim's easy out, of relating all their problems to others...

Without ownership of our issues, none of us will ever move past them...

It can be so easy to forget (or worse; have no control over my mind:() who C is suppose to render harmless as a dove, in those anxious times...ouch! Proverbs 28:26....

My wife isn't my client...All I need is the power of Love! Corinthians 13-1-7.

What "living in an understanding way" with our wives is different for each us...

By God's great Grace, I am finally coming to a place of inner peace with it all...Just because a man (me) knows the way, doesn't mean he has the ability to make the journey!

Thanks J for this post it's great!

Be Safe!

Moving Target The Pendulum Swings C

Submitted by kellyj on Tue, 01/17/2017 - 12:02

"Do you realize what your mind is doing to you right now??

For me now....compared to my past...the answer is yes...even at times when I just simply forget to check in and take a closer look?

In my own personal assessment of myself and comparing what I hear others say at times right here on this forum? This is only my personal insight and not an opinion saying....I have absolutely no idea what is going on with others? But it is saying what I have found in myself...and laying that over what others say and making a guess....if I had to guess and nothing else? This is not very scientific or a verifiable way to knowing what is actually happening with other people here on the internet. But since we are here on the internet..and since we have no idea what is really going on without anything else to go off of? I think it's worth saying simply as means for someone to go..." mmm? I hadn't thought of that before?" So it's not a judgment or opinion...it's merely saying if "that was me....this is what that would mean?" Simply put?

I'll just make statements that will be self explanatory in order to do this?

As a victim who was abused by no fault of my own. It wasn't my fault...and I was not to blame for this? Therefore...someone has to be blamed for this...if it wasn't my fault?

( only if....you can only see two options to everything? When you realize this is a false statement and is totally not true? Now what? If you can't blame someone for the problems this caused you and all the pain and hurt that is still leftover in your memories ( and subconscious? ) Where can you go from here? No where...that's where? But need to find fault of blame..is still there anyway? And that need will eat you alive ( literally ) if you don't "un-stick yourself"...and remains stuck there...and wallow in it all your life. Not letting go of these things and always defaulting to finding "someone or something" you can blame....is the cause for victim mentality and never forgetting the past? Boy...I can tell you I see this in real time ...when my wife pulls the "laundry list out"...or as I use to call it....."the slate"...and that's when I will get that "blow by blow"...."play by play"....."play action rewind tape loop....when she gets angry with me? It's one this to reference something in the past to relate it to ( or connect it too something you are trying to explain or use as an example ). It's another thing when you get triggered...and then BAM!! Everything that you ever did ...or any mistake you have ever made in some way connected to the other person ...you know have to stand there and "relive this" for no other reason....than for them to make sure...who's fault it is....who needs to be blamed...and just how MUCH.....all of these things have caused such pain ( in that person ) and they will make sure you will feel it to! The persecutor .....making sure this happens!! Ouch!!! It's not good enough...that they tell you or express their pain that you caused them.....you need to "feel it"..and by golly...."I'm gonna make you feel it!!! "

And that list? It never gets shorter....that is a fact that never seems to vary or change? Is it...you got worse? Or is it.....the list only got longer? mmmmm???? Could it be...that the inability to forgive and forget....is the real problem here? ( yes lol ) Not saying it's easy....but also saying that this is the problem as well?

This one thing I can honestly say is not one of my issues....but boy howdy....I know where that came from in my wife..and that was her mother!! yikes! She as a professional "Blamer"...and you never met anyone who could do it better than her!! She had a laundry list that would fill an encyclopedia and then some. And she used it "freely"....all of the time!! Talk about 'negativity"...whew!!!! lol

Adderall ( or stimulants ) make me feel like a Zombie. This is purely speculative and up for controversy so I can only say again...what I think about a statement like this..and what that would be for me?

If you've lived your entire life....pendulum swinging from extreme highs...to extreme lows ( back and forth...back and forth ) Your moods....state of mind, temperament...is constantly changing. Constantly vacillating from one day or moment "Life is great!! I'm feel great. I'm excellent!! I wish this moment would last forever!! This the greatest moment in my life and it could be more perfect!! Everything is good....I'm great. You;re great and I Love you so much!! Why can we be like this....all the time!!! "

And then....some time later. "I hate you!! Life sucks. You suck. I suck. This sucks. I hate my life!! I hate myself!!! I hate everything!! Thank you very much!!"

That sounds like Bi-Polar....but here's how I can tell with it's not? Circumstances? If circumstance change...and that changes? Then is ain't Bi-Polar from how I understand it? If circumstances change...and those manic times of extreme highs....and then extreme lows....stays persistent no matter what happens? Then I'm thinking that sounds more like Bi-Polar to me...but none the less....diagnosis or not.....that's not what is causing this...and as I feel.....victim mentality and an engrained inability to "let go"...need to find fault or blame....instead of overcoming this need and realizing....there is no one to blame and there is no fault on anyones part....but now......what you with that need you have...and no place to put it?

Stop the pendulum you idiot!!! That's what I would say to myself in that case? That is NOT...the kind of "moving"....that I am talking about as "healthy" That....is an extreme reaction to your failure to maintain composure and your failing in being aware....that this is all in your head....and no where else? Is the room "spinning" ( and you are standing still ) when you get to drunk to stand up any more? There's you answer right there....and who's the one to blame on that one? LOL

My take on....I feel like a Zombie.....is not realizing that suddenly...the pendulum stopped...and those highs and lows are gone!! The lows you don't care about...but what about those Highs??? O dear...what's wrong....I'm not feeling those Highs anymore??? I want those highs and I'm not getting them!! Well this sucks and life sucks...when I can't get "off like that" any more?? I feel like a Zombie.....better quit taking it....because I want those Highs again?"

Really? Suit yourself. I personally can live without the Highs....and do without EVERYTHING ELSE THAT YOU DON'T GET WITH IT!!!!! I think that's a fair trade myself personally? Including the depression and all of those other.....Lovelies.....that you don't get either? I also will probably never get to ride in the Space Shuttle either...but I'm not going to lose any sleep over it? More to the point?

If you are not aware enough...that this is what is actually happening? Then you simply aren't aware of it.....which is where "I Feel Like a Zombie" comes from? In my opinion or thoughts about this...if it were me saying it? When you feel just Okay....in a steady non stop ...flat line...kind of way for the first time? It feels wrong....but that's what it's suppose to be like....you just don;t know that yet...until you stay on it long enough for the "Epiphany" to come? And if a person is constantly going on and off it...thinking this will help? It will only makes the pendulum swing bigger and harder than before...and you will get even "Higher"..and...."Lower" and then feel even ,more depressed than before? And the crazy thing is.....YOU...were the one who did that to yourself!!! ( you idiot ) If that was me talking to myself again...as I said before? In my mind...that's another case of saying...."you thought they said Trains....instead of Brains....when asked if you wanted any?" It that was me...because that was me...( before the Adderall )..and I...was that idiot? That is just plain old self sabotage...and nothing more than that?

But as I am saying this....there are other possibilities here too? I am only speaking from my own experience again and have nothing else to go off of...other than that?

And what about you? If you are trying to follow this..or are completing Hi Jacked ...by a person who is swinging wildly back and forth and is only in the middle for a moment..until it goes in either direction...depending on which way the pendulum is swinging? You're going right with them...and joining them in all that fun?

Suit yourself? I choose to pass....on that one myself personally? Saying...that problem is your's and your's alone...if you don't have the self discipline and control of your own emotions....and allow that person to Hi Jack you? Who's fault is that or who's to blame on that one? If your the one who follow's them down the rabbit hole emotionally....and jumps on that nightmare ride on the Roller Coaster from Hell? Why would anyone choose that? And what can YOU do it about it?( the obvious rhetorical question?)

hint: running away or leaving...if this is the only option is not one of the choices here..if you don't want to be a victim? If you can't do this for yourself that is...but in my mind ( if this is the only problem you face other "real life problems" with "real life consequences"...like losing your house or things of that nature?) Then in my mind, that is fixable.....and the only person who can fix that is you in this case? Just because Johnny...jumps off a cliff....doesn't mean you have to go with him? Does it? We aren't Lemmings you know? LOL Straight to the point?

And straight to the point I'm getting to as well in what you were saying too C....about "What "living in an understanding way" with our wives is different for each us..."

I think in some things...each and every person comes with their own "express warranty" as put? We all have are breaking points and no two people ar the same there for sure?

But in what you said as I mentioned earlier....if you are not even aware of this much just to start with..and are not keeping track of your own pendulum swinging...then it's pretty hard to call the kettle black...until you know just that much...right from the start? If your's is swinging back and forth constatnly.....then what can you say to another person...doing the same things as you?

No much? Turkey's butt. LOL

You make some great points here J

Submitted by c ur self on Tue, 01/17/2017 - 23:55

My difficulty w/ emotion has come from just what you said...Tracking the up and down emotions...When she is around just about anyone especially our 4 grown kids...She flips the switch into emotional high...Lets go go go....Lets do do do...Lets play play play....The grand children think's she is the best thing since sliced bread:) She's the playmate, and cookie maker...I'm just the taxi, cook, and clean up guy....But the moment it's just the two of us....It's..What was the old He Haw song??....Gloom despair and agony on me; deep dark depression excessive misery:(:(...Victim city...There is a reason for that, and it can play tricks with your mind and emotions when you are so opposite, and know life could be so much better if she would just trade the victim piece for Love and thankfulness!...Like we were saying earlier, it can be contagious...

9 years of pointing it out has only caused more division...I'm at the point where there isn't anything else left to say. When every attempt to discuss our relationship is met w/ blame and denial at some point even someone as hard headed as I am must learn!

I am thankful for the work I've done in trying ot understand her...It's has definitely been good for me...But, falling to the deception that I think because I do see a lot of what's happening with her that i can set down and have a positive impact on her with this information is fools gold for sure...

I can take every thing I've learned and wrap it in nice little box w/ red ribbon and throw it off the river bridge for all it's worth in attempting to share it w/ someone who lives completely incapable of owning their issues...Especially from her husband...

Maybe someday she will see the need to get some help...Maybe not...Maybe I will be here...Maybe not....I know one thing, I've done all I can do to bring awareness...Now it's just continue to monitor my own life daily...

Thanks for your post, I think you see it all pretty clearly...

C, I am where you are

Submitted by jennalemone on Wed, 01/18/2017 - 07:57

This was said so well it is poetry. You have nailed it with words. You have said what is in my heart with H. This acceptance and description of what happens and the grief of knowing that we are not in any way able to change something that makes us sad of the knowing of it.

Hi Jenna...It's common ground for so many of us....

Submitted by c ur self on Wed, 01/18/2017 - 15:36

The hardest thing about living w/ a victim is not becoming one yourself...It's not her fault that I keep finding her in front of her recorded tv programs and asking her to pause it...While I ask her if she is going to join in life w/ me....It's mine...It's my weakness, my inability to accept my fate with this person as my wife....

God loves me and HE will continue to sustain and bless me all of my days, he has filled me with Joy and Peace and all the fruit of his Spirit...

And that will never hinge on her choices or her acceptance of her Vow to be my wife....

I will continue to pray for her and by Grace, be kind to her....

But...I'm just done asking....

Quotes For the New Year

Submitted by kellyj on Sun, 01/01/2017 - 17:07

Some of my favorite quotes:

“The joy is in creating, not maintaining.” - Vince Lombardi

“One cannot simultaneously prevent and prepare for war.” - Albert Einstein

“Every act of creation is first of all an act of destruction.” - Picasso

“As long as you make an identity for yourself out of pain, you cannot be free of it.” - Eckhart Tolle

“Nationalism is an infantile disease. It is the measles of mankind. Never do anything against conscience — even if the state demands it.” - Albert Einstein

“If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster horses.” - Henry Ford

“Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn’t go away.” - Philip K. Dick

“In the sky, there is no distinction of east and west; people create distinctions out of their own minds and then believe them to be true.” - Buddha

“The purpose of abstraction is not to be vague, but to create a new semantic level in which one can be absolutely precise.” - Edsger Dijkstra

“If you don’t stick to your values when they’re being tested, they aren’t values. They’re hobbies.” - Jon Stewart

“We think we understand the rules when we become adults but what we really experience is a narrowing of the imagination.” - David Lynch

“Physics is like sex: sure, it may give some practical results, but that’s not why we do it.” - Richard P. Feynman

“If you never did, you should. These things are fun and fun is good.” - Dr Suess

“We are all born originals — why is it so many of us die copies?” - Edward Young

“If I try to be like him, who will be like me?” - Yiddish proverb

“The truth will set you free. But first, it will piss you off.” - Gloria Steinem

“It’s really hard to design products by focus groups. A lot of times, people don’t know what they want until you show it to them.” - Steve Jobs

“Most of the greatest evils that man has inflicted upon man have come through people feeling quite certain about something which, in fact, was false.” - Bertrand Russell

“Kiss slowly, laugh insanely, live truly, and forgive quickly.” - Paulo Coelho

“Seeking love keeps you from the awareness that you already are it.” - Byron Katie

“Everything is vague to a degree you do not realize till you have tried to make it precise.” - Bertrand Russell

“The truth that makes men free is for the most part the truth which men prefer not to hear.” - Herbert Agar

“Solving a problem simply means representing it so as to make the solution transparent.” - H.A. Simon

“Our listening creates a sanctuary for the homeless parts within another person.” - Rachel Naomi Remen

“When you listen generously to people they can hear the truth in themselves, often for the first time.” - Rachel Naomi Remen

“Fools ignore complexity. Pragmatists suffer it. Some can avoid it. Geniuses remove it” - Alan Perlis

“Simplicity is prerequisite for reliability.” - Edsger Dijkstra

“Do not be too moral. You may cheat yourself out of much of life. So aim above morality. Be not simply good; be good for something.” - Henry David Thoreau

“It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it.” - Aristotle

“A thought is harmless unless we believe it.” - Byron Katie

“The past has no power to stop you from being present now. Only your grievance about the past can do that.” - Eckhart Tolle

“In nature there are neither rewards nor punishments; there are consequences.” - Robert G. Ingersoll

“Live out of your imagination, not your history.” - Stephen Covey

“The secret to creative freedom is letting go of our habitual certainities.” - Deepak Chopra

“When you blame and criticize others, you are avoiding some truth about yourself.” - Deepak Chopra

“People never leave a sinking ship until they see the lights of another ship approaching.” - Buckminster Fuller

“The chief source of problems is solutions.” - Eric Sevareid

“The purpose of visualization is insight, not pictures.” - Ben Shneiderman

“I wake up every day both wanting to change the world and to have one heck of a good time. Sometimes this makes planning the day difficult.” - E.B. White

“We know what we are, but know not what we may be.” - William Shakespeare

“Too often we enjoy the comfort of opinion without the discomfort of thought.” - John F Kennedy

“Those who control their passions do so because their passions are weak enough to be controlled.” - William Blake

“In the absence of clearly-defined goals, we become loyal to performing daily trivia until we become enslaved by it.” - Robert Heinlein

“When your judgements parade as the truth, you deceive everyone, including yourself.” - Paul Ferrini

“When the solution is simple, God is answering.” - Albert Einstein

“Science is the belief in the ignorance of the experts” - Richard Feynman

“Things are only impossible until they’re not.” - Jean-Luc Picard

“The happiness of your life depends upon the quality of your thoughts.” - Marcus Aurelius

“They must find it hard to take Truth for authority who have so long mistaken Authority for Truth.” - Gerald Massey

“People who achieve access to the deepest roots of their freedom can completely change.” - Peter Koestenbaum

“It’s a healthy thing to hang a question mark on the things you have long taken for granted.” - Bertrand Russell

“People are not lazy. They simply have impotent goals that do not inspire them.” - Anthony Robbins

“Once we accept our limits, we go beyond them.” - Albert Einstein

“Your happiness depends on you alone.” - Aristotle

“In the most ordinary terms, egolessness is a flexible identity. It manifests as inquisitiveness, as adaptability, as humor, as playfulness.” - Pema Chödrön

“The most important thing in communication is to hear what is not being said.” - Peter Drucker

“Speak well of your enemies. After all you made them.” - Unknown

“Your problems are just old habit patterns, asking to be released.” - Karen Bell (KB, ktotheb)

“History doesn’t repeat itself, but it does tend to rhyme.” - Mark Twain

“Knowing pain is a very important ingredient of being there for another person.” - Pema Chödrön

“Making the simple complicated is commonplace; making the complicated simple, awesomely simple, that’s creativity.” - Charles Mingus (via Garr Reynolds)

“Every problem contains within itself the seeds of its own solution.” - Stanley Arnold

“Wise men speak because they have something to say; fools ( speak ) because they have to say something.” - Plato

“The man who never alters his opinion is like standing water, and breeds reptiles of the mind.” - William Blake

“To be wronged is nothing unless you continue to remember it.” - Confucius

“If you think you can do a thing or think you can’t do a thing, you’re right.” - Henry Ford

“Stress is caused by being ‘here’ but wanting to be ‘there’.” - Eckhart Tolle

"You can't get "there"...from "here"....but you can from "there". ( J lol )

“It is not that he is ignorant, it is that so much of what he knows is not true.” - Mark Twain

“Everything you want is just outside your comfort zone.” - Robert Allen

“He who experiences the unity of life, sees his own Self in all beings, and all beings in his own Self, and looks on everything with an impartial eye.” - Buddha

“The eye sees only what the mind is prepared to comprehend.” - Henri Bergson

“Beware of false knowledge; it is more dangerous than ignorance.” - George Bernard Shaw

“People who say it cannot be done should not interrupt those who are doing it.” - Chinese Proverb

“When facism comes to America it will be wrapped in the flag and carrying a cross.” - Sinclair Lewis

“If something is not beautiful, it is probably not true.” - John Keats

“Do not confuse your horizon with the edge of the world.” - Seb Paquet

“An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind.” - Gandhi

“Most conversations are simply monologues delivered in the presence of a witness.” - Margaret Millar

“At first people refuse to believe that a strange new thing can be done. Then they begin to hope it can be done. Then they see it can be done. Then it is done and all the world wonders why it was not done centuries ago.” - Frances Hodgson Burnett

“Assumptions are the termites of relationships.” - Henry Winkler

“Expect problems and eat them for breakfast.” - Alfred A. Montapert

“It is not the strongest of the species that survive, nor the most intelligent, but the one most responsive to change.” - Charles Darwin

“One must never lose time in vainly regretting the past nor complaining against the changes which cause us discomfort, for change is the very essence of life.” - Anatole France

“The first step toward change is acceptance. Once you accept yourself, you open the door to change. That’s all you have to do. Change is not something you do, it’s something you allow.” - Will Garcia

“If you are patient in one moment of anger, you will avoid one hundred days of sorrow.” - Chinese Proverb

“What we wish, that we readily believe.” - Demosthenes

“Nothing is easier than self-deceit. For what each man wishes, that he also believes to be true.” - Demosthenes

“Most writers regard truth as their most valuable possession, and therefore are economical in its use.” - Mark Twain

“There’s as much risk in doing nothing as in doing something.” - Trammel Crow

““Nothing worse could happen to one than to be completely understood.” - Carl Jung

“Noise proves nothing—often a hen who has merely laid an egg cackles as if she had laid an asteroid.” - Mark Twain

“Thank God I’m not a Jungian.” - Carl Jung

"Please accept my resignation. I don't want to belong to any club that will accept me as a member.” Groucho Marx

And last but not least ( probably my personal favorite...almost?? LOL )

"All things considered, I'd rather be living in Philadelphia." WC Fields ( written on his grave stone ;)

Your happiness depends on...

Submitted by Delphine on Sun, 01/01/2017 - 17:51

Thanks J, great quotes. This one pretty much sums up Prescriptions For Happiness:

“Your happiness depends on you alone.” - Aristotle

Yes, even (or especially) when in a difficult relationship.

Edit: I do understand though that we can't always be positive, and we don't need to be. What we do need is to love ourselves through it all.

Something from Anita Moorjani, who came back from a near-death experience:

"Prior to getting cancer, I’d spent a lifetime trying to be positive, always putting on a smiling face because I wanted to be liked. Whenever I felt a negative thought, I would quash it, never allowing people to see me as fearful.

So when my cancer showed up, I really could not understand how that could happen when I had always been such a positive person! I believed that my thoughts must have created the cancer, and so I would fear my thoughts.

And then I also feared the fear of my thoughts. I was drowning in a never-ending whirlpool of fear! But in the NDE, I realized that the key wasn’t being positive, it was being myself.

I didn’t need to eradicate all negative thoughts, I needed only to love myself for who I am, not for who others wanted me to be!

If only I had known that truth, I would never have feared my thoughts, because I would have realized that my thoughts are part of who I am.

Denying my negative emotions and believing that this negativity was wrong only exacerbated my problems."

Another that seems apropos:

"I’ve learned that the best way out of pain is to let go through it. That's where the real gold lies. This means first recognizing that the pain's there, and then accepting it. You acknowledge its presence and then allow yourself to truly feel it. You own it. Pain is never without gifts. Above all else, pain gives us the empathy to better understand others who are also going through loss, grief, and suffering. These experiences actually make us more human—and more divine."

Delphine .... Here's One For You

Submitted by kellyj on Mon, 01/02/2017 - 10:08

I woke up this morning ( as usual ) with my normal window ( of positive thought and ideas ).....which will disappear, rather quickly as it always does as I start my day and depending on my wife and what she does first thing when she wakes up after me which is always the case. Not because she's sleeps too much or is "sleeping in". It's because I get up before her on purpose...to have this time alone to be with myself and think about things which is my most creative time. Before the thinking part of my brain has chance to actually catch up!!! LOL When that happens....I'm "Hosed".....you might say? LOL

So for me.....,this is my miracle space or the space of time I can get my best ideas and most creative thoughts while I'm still in the zone...for the first 30 minutes of everyday....when I first open my eyes. It is a short lived window anyway....so I try and make the best of it? I'm a morning person....what can I say?

side note: People who are not....."morning people"......HATE THAT!!! LOL Nothing new under the sun there....and that ain't my problem either....but it's usually not a problem for them because I don't talk much during this time yet......I'm just not "GRUMPY"....like them!! And just to point out.....I'm not saying them ( in this case ) like people who are not morning people have some kind of a problem. It's only a problem for me.....when they try and make it mine and if I'm not saying a single word and keeping to myself....and that's somehow....still a problem for them...and therefore....becomes my problem......well then, that is "their" problem....and a problem for me? Which is exactly the problem for me ...that my wife presents to me everyday!!!

In my life time of life times.....I have never seen anyone do....exactly what my wife does as her daily routine which at this point in time....I literally ignore her during the morning it is so bizarre and disruptive to witness or even be a part of?

She will wake up...and instantly "reacts"....to the slightest or tiniest "thing"....being out of place or not "right". The tiniest, tiniest little thing that she "sees" or "hears"....and annoyance, ( my coat sitting on the sofa from just having taken the dogs out to pee ).....and then now.....there is something to blame....for not feeling good when she wakes up...since she will always find something negative.....to validate and justify.....her already foul mood. It not that this happens sometimes. It's every single waking day....day after day.....week after week....etc etc. Which is so odd to me...since she already knows she has sleep problems ( worse I've ever seen with anyone ).....already knows she is not a morning person and rarely feels good when she wakes up....and already has experienced this everyday of her entire life (as far as I can tell? )....to not think that she's just like everyone else...and everyone else wakes up like her everyday....in a foul mood, depressed, reactive and volatile, and a complete "Grouch!!" This is my wife....when she first opens her eyes everyday that I have ever seen her.....moping, lathargic, Grouchy, negative, hypersensitive,unreasonable, reactively angry at anything in her envirnoment that is the slightest bit "a skew or out of "wack" " or not exactly and perfectly "right"...or "correct"...or PC....or anything way you want to describe it? "Correctness"....is what my wife "feels".....will make her mornings alright or at least she says it does....but I am not seeing it?

What I see....from the second her eyes open....is anguish, pain, suffering, depression, lethargy, ( lack of a good night sleep apparently ), and just looking like she is feeling "BAD"...as a simple way to describe her....from the second she opens her eyes? And the second second...after she opens her eyes....her eyes start looking for what is wrong so she can lash out..and take it out on...what ever that comes in range of her field of view? And if she can't find anything to validate how she feels being ANYTHING......aside from just the things I have witnessed and seen....she come looking for something...until she can find it? Just like the other morning when she threw my coat in my face from across the room...and then walking away in her usual...incoherent ( almost sub audible ) mumbling and incantations of gibberish and not making any sense what so ever?

This is my wife's "Miracle Space"....that time when you first open your eyes...and the non thinking part of your brain has yet to completely turn on yet and catch up to the "aware" part of the brain...that is "awake"...but not thinking yet? She doesn't always throw things or "lash out" at me....but many times she is in the kitchen...slamming doors in frustration over ...."something not being RIGHT!! GOD DAMN IT!!! IT"S NOT RIGHT!!!!! "

"It's not right! " If I had to come up....a quote...to define my wife as if she would have made a profound quote to give to the world.....that would be my wife's quote...if I had to "make one up" for her.

For the second she opens her eyes everyday and the first waking moment that she comes on line......"It's NOT RIGHT!!!!"....is the first thought in her head.....EVERYDAY.

side note: Attachment theory Aviodant / Dissmisve "the mother leaves the child for a time..and returns....but instead of the child reacting at first and then being relieved or showing sings of being comforted by the mothers return....the child is angry, and remains angry and inconsolable...even after the mother has returned and show no signs of leaving again?

The first...and last thought of each day from the moment she opens her eyes........"It's not RIGHT!!!".....and then she's angry and inconsolable...and there is nothing you can do to change this. Period. That is my wife.....the Army of One. The Army of One is the millions of angry thoughts and things she does to try and fix this on the outside....because she is not even aware of the ONE person on the inside ( the actual person she is ( or was back then )....saying it's "NOT RIGHT!! It's NOT Fair!!! I've Been WRONGED!!!" And to this day...going all the way back to when she was that infant or toddler or small child......she's still angry and inconsolible about that.....to this very day and will not accept the fact....that her mother failed her. Her mother did fail her.....but that wasn't her fault and that is what she cannot accept...and doesn't want to talk about because she is still reliving the same pain everyday....from what happened to her 60 years ago....and nothing has changed. It was not right then....and it's still not right. And it won't be right tomorrow or the next day either? It will NEVER be right....and it will ALWAYS be just like this....until she changes......NOT her environment...and that is the only way to fix this!! Period!!! From the inside out.....not the way she is going about it which is just the same inability to use logic and think....and work entirely off emotion. The same emotion she had when she was a child that is still saying and telling her the same thing to this day.

And so.....the second second thought of the day.....is looking for what isn't right....and then immediately without thinking ( there is no thinking here....just reacting to her emotions and feelings on a primitive level instinctively with no "thought" what so ever ) since there is not another solitary thought while she is still in that "semi conscious state" first thing each morning.

Then she instantly, with her first step out of bed.....goes about....trying to make everything "RIGHT" (unconsciously)....like the house is on fire....the world is coming to an end...and the apocalypse is nie? She starts slamming and cleaning, and picking things up, and throwing things, and ranting and complaining and barfing negativity everywhere during this process until she finally has her coffee...and then goes and sits alone and looking completely depressed and is usually so irritable that I dare not say a word to her?

Actually......why would I want to? That's a better question? And the answer there is.....I get up before her...and have this time alone...to enjoy in peace and solitude and "think" and create and take advantage of this gift each morning I get to have....and with purpose...and forethought with intention....get as far away from "THAT" ....as I possible can!!!! Yikes!!!

For me....being a morning person.....what this feels like to me?

Sitting on a beautiful...isolated tropical beach on some deserted desert island with a warm breeze blowing across my skin..and the sand is so soft it feels like flour between your toes? And there are palms trees swaying, and birds singing...and the water is a deep turquoise color...and everything is tranquil and serene?

Then off in the distance....you see a Sea Plane approaching and you get this ominous feeling like....something "wicked this way cometh?" LOL And the sea plane lands right off your beautiful island paradise beach....and a College Fraternity House on spring break...piles out of the plane...with a bunch of "Football Jocks"...."bouncing bimbo" cheerleaders..and a host of other half drunk and stoned party animals .."Invade" your beach complete with boom boxes with Hip-Hop blaring and start hauling out equiptment, ...changing the entire scenery all around and laying a huge carpet out as a dance floor over most of the sand between the trees and the ocean completely covering the beech and turning into a bar with a DJ, dance floor, mirror ball, and complete with bar tender. And you hear someone yell and complain "Jeese....this sand is getting all over everything....I wonder if we can get rid of it and and sweep it back into the ocean so it won't ruin our electronic equiptment and get all over the dance floor? Then , the Frat House president comes over and says...."Hey...your in our spot....you can stay if you like but your gonna have to move over behind the outhouse which is the only spot big enough to put your lounge chair? Hey boys....help the man move....he's in our way!!!!" And the Biggest dumbest looking line backer Frat boys come over and look at you with the stink eye and say "you heard the man.....shag your sorry ass!!!! "

This is my experience....every day with my wife. She is the Army of One....Hell bent of destruction from the second she opens her eyes. "Search..and ....Destroy!!!! "LOL And so when my wife opens her eyes.....my miracle space time is done. Whether I like it or not?

So from this little picture I've painted for you...while using my miracle space this morning...I cam up with this quote for you Delphine......as a gift to go along with your handle. It just came to me...and popped into my head...so I figured, use it or lose it....here you go!! LOL

"Truth and Reality....is never what we want, but we always have to accept it....whether we like it or not?" jjamieson

"Search and Destroy" ( "Army of One" ..my made up name for my Grandmother...apply applies to anyone who fits this description ) https://youtu.be/0vnwSVTOnqQ

Good writing, J

Submitted by jennalemone on Mon, 01/02/2017 - 11:58

I enjoyed this romp through your morning scene with the plane of doom descending upon your serene beach. Good writing is when the reader can identify with the imagery. I can identify with the entire story. On both sides of the narrative. And it made me laugh out loud....so familiar it was.

I identify with your wife's early morning feeling that "Things are not right". "Something must be corrected" mindset.

And I identify with your feeling the impending doom of something or someone ruining my picnic of peace.

It was very good writing. Thanks.

Here is how it goes in my day:

Submitted by jennalemone on Mon, 01/02/2017 - 12:37

My eyes open. I have had a dream that H is loudly disdaining my mere presence while he plays with and is making out with another woman in front of me, with his very strong belief that I should not be upset and that he is doing nothing wrong. Happens often in my dreams. H was a traveling salesman.

I wake to the feeling of "Oh no. This is my Life now." I feel old and tired and not up to the game of life and challenge and adventure but I am too antsy to accept and rest and be calm. There must be SOMETHING that I have some control of or ownership of or that I can have some impact on. I do my hygiene list and then sit at my computer, looking for answers about why I feel alone and desperate for solution to this uneasy feeling of "something is not right". I feel like I am hurling out into space and no one notices I am missing. Like the movie "Bread and Tulips". The heroine is left behind on a family vacation at a tourist stop and no one notices....not children or husband... that she didn't get back on the bus. So involved with their own lives. Even though her entire life was devoted to THEIR well-being. I am not of any substance. I drift through the day wondering what "work" I can do to be of service, of consequence, and realize that all I do is exist, trying to find diversions (mostly work), or some sort of fulfillment. I think of things H has said to me that clang in my subconcious mind: "I don't have to make any money because I don't spend any money" and "What did you EVER do for ME?" And then my motivation/inspiration to care and love and work are diminished in this house. Words so thoughtlessly said that remain inside of my ears. He does not hear or heed my words. He does not believe I should be upset and that he is doing nothing wrong.

Radical Doubt and Fear

Submitted by kellyj on Mon, 01/02/2017 - 11:14

Requires radical acceptance. Like you said Delphine....acceptance is the doorway and key. But you still have to wak through it once the door is open to get there. "There"...in this case...is not a "Place" or location outside of us...it's inside of us? You've got to dig down deep..and find that switch...and filp it back to positive again as many times as it takes. It's never that we like it....but it does get easier with practice.

Always....Be Ready to Walk Away From Anything

Submitted by kellyj on Mon, 01/02/2017 - 15:33

My therapist put that one on me years ago....and it's taken this long to understand why this is the one of the key elements to being happy.

Today....my wife said she is leaving but this time...she is following through and is already 100 miles ahead of me...and started out saying the word "we".

"We"...didn't decide to call it quits. She did.

"We"....didn't have this already processed and thought about ( as she said for a very long time )

"We".....didn't talk this over and arrive at this decision together and come to this conclusion

"We"......didn't decide that this is what "we" wanted

"We".......don't have unresolved anger issues and issues that stem from ( her anger and inability to control her emotions ) As I said....I stopped...quite a while ago. Actually stopped reacting or spontaneously combusting after my fuse had reached the end and then I would blow up? I came here...to do this very thing? Find out why or what ...I was so angry about.

What I finally discovered....was this Co-Depnedence relationship....and this Dependency issue that my wife suffers from....is what was making me angry?

Co-Dependence is based upon assumption and nothing else. And within those assumptions...come expectations. And within those expectations.....come disappointment, heart ache, regret, anger, disillusionment, hostility, fighting, boundary issues, conflict, unresolved hurt and disagreement, hatred and most of all...........discontent and un-happiness.

As my therapist has taught me....through years of seeing him......there is another way. A better way....that non of these things will exist ever...and not stand in the way of Happiness.

So if I were to blame anything...on the failure of our relationship ( this time around )....I blame Co-Dependence....and nothing else. My wife has co-dependency issues...and I simply do not...anymore?

I see a problem with a situation....and see all the ways to work around the problem...and continue to do that thing anyway and always see the ways it will work.

My wife sees a situation....and sees all the ways that it will never work.

I say Yes...as my first answer to anything. And once I tied it...seen it will not work and have tried it long enough...to find every possible ways it won't work first....before I say No. But I can see if something will work or not.....usually at that time? Most of the time anyway...if I was just doing it for myself.

My wife says No....as her first answer to anything. A put conditions and contingencies on everything ...to the point that there are so few options left once she does that...that the answer is usually No.

On the flip side of No....and Yes being the answer......she almost never accounts for the real life contingencies and conditions imposed on her by her environment or other people...and then gets angry or upset....when people disappoint her since....she expects.........( somehow by magic )....that the world will conform to her as she goes along...without having to say what she expects or without expecting things to go wrong...as if somehow....that would ever happen? If one thing goes wrong....she comes unglued and cannot cope or deal with a situation that has any problems what so ever....as if that is even possible? And because she works off this assumption ( as if there will never be a problem and everyone is working off this same assumption....that when there is a problem ...that a problem. She won't say yes unless she believes there won't be one...and when there is one....that is a problem in itself.

The problem is...the problem in itself.....and not understanding that there is no such thing...as no problems ever? She assumes there will be no problems...and then when there is one....that's a problem and she cannot move past this since.....Problems themselves....are unacceptable which is the definition of insanity right there? To believe...there will never be a problem...IS THE PROBLEM....simply put. That sums it up right there...and everything else just fits right into what she believes which is why in her mind.......EVERYTHING IS A PROBLEM including me. Absolutely no allowance or tolerance for anything: being wrong, going wrong, happening unexpected or existing that imposes any kind of discomfort or being out of place and not exactly as...it's suppose to be....is a problem. That there is no solution or answer for ever. Any problem....is all ready.....one too many for my wife...and she cannot tolerate it...or accept it....which is impossible.....and why she fails. One problem...is already a failure......Game over. End of discussion?

Or when the problems actually do occur as you can always expect they will.... that there will be no problems...and because she has not thought this through enough and actually used her head to consider all the multitude of possible things that will and do go wrong ahead of time...and believes she can just control everyone and her environment to the point that there will be no problem ( what she believes ) and since in reality.... she has no control over anyone or what anyone else does ever....or even considers this in the first place....in doing anything in first place...without someone else....doing all of this for her....so she won't have to think about it ahead of time.

The glass is always half empty..and getting emptier as time goes on and she is running out of time. Actually...that I know see what my wife with a different set or eyes....is glass is empty to start with not even half full as I first believed or as she would tell me? You can't squeeze blood from a turnip...and you can't something from nothing? If there is nothing in the glass to start with...it has to come from somewhere?

"If there is nothing in the glass to start with...it has to come from somewhere?" This right here...is the reason for Co-dependence right there. Nothing in the glass...nothing up my sleeve....nothing from nothing means nothing? Poof. Still nothing? And where does that something come from? The other person always. To something from nothing...means, you have to get it...from someone else? Not that hard to figure out?

The problem is.....that person...is taking from the other person....since they've got something you want...and have nothing to give in exchange ( depending on what that is? )

For someone...who has lived their entire life as a Victim...and the first and last thought of everyday says......"It's Not Right!!! It's not Fair!!!! I've been wronged!!! And world owes me!! You owe me!! But yet....has nothing to give since their glass is empty right from the start." You can itemize this out too in terms of assets and debts. Money, personal wealth and tangible objects and objects of intrinsic value, skills, sex, houses, cars, chores and doing things for others or them....the list goes on and on?

So if one person has more total assets including everything they have to offer ...into a relationship total of all non-tangle...and tangible items and services including money or personal wealth including earning potential.......when it boils right down to it.....the person who has more to offer and give more to start.....is going to be disadvantaged compared to the person who has less to offer total of all assets and contributions combined not just the selected few they have to offer if you are trying to keep track of everything and coming out equal? And the only way to prevent this...is to start out equal in everything first...and maintain the same status...throughout the relationship. If it starts out equally...and stays equally...and remains equal throughout the relationship ( IN ALL THINGS ) across the board? No problems ever and no co-dependency? Piece of cake? Right? No so fast?

What if...you have a glass is half empty person ( a negative person ) and their glass is always getting emptier who is with a glass is half full person...who's glass is always getting fuller? The glass is half empty person....can never be satisfied....and the glass is half full person...will always been taken from...the fruits and efforts of everything they do? The negative drain...on the positive person will cause the positive person to always be losing and sinking with the ship? And the negative person...who is always sinking...will be angry that the positive person is not doing more to save (US)???

Save US??? Like (WE) ? "Who's this We......You Got a Turd in Your Pocket?"

There is NO "WE" here....there is only ...."You"....and ....."Me"? Anything outside of You...and.....Me......ever in my mind.....IS.....the definition of co-dependence right there?

And as I sat and listened to my wife tell me she's leaving. "I"....as in "Me"......will be no worse...or no better off...than if she stayed as far as Me goes? I will not be richer or poorer...I will not owe or be in debt......I will be no worse off than the day I met her.....because I listened to my T's advise.

Always...be ready....to walk away....from any situation. THAT...IS THE PRIMARY GOAL......in life...no matter what? Failure...to do this on your part...and assuming than you can predict the future...is failure in responsibility to yourself....to do this? That is 100%......each and every person reasonability...to account for the future and any unforeseen problems...in advance..and not expect anyone to take care of them...or be dependent on anyone...to survive and get 100% all of your needs met.....100% of the time.....each and every day of your life...and need no one to do anything for you?

Then you are still operating...like you are a child....and expecting your parents...your wife or husband...or anyone else...to do anything ever ( for you )...if you can't do EVERYTHING YOU NEED...ALL THE TIME....EVERY SINGLE DAY OF YOUR LIFE....ON YOUR OWN.........without depending on someone else to do....or give.....or take care of......or fix.....or problem solve.....or ANYTHING.....BY YOURSELF....ALONE....WITHOUT ANYONE THERE....AS IF YOU LIVED ON A DESERTED ISLAND BY YOURSELF......

If you can't walk away from any situation....right now this very minute....free of will and choice......and not be alright or have a need to for someone to fill in some part of what it takes to live and survive and thrive in this world alone........then you're a victim or co-dependent at the very least....to have someone else fill in what is missing for you...then you are a dependent....just like a child.

The litmus test...for co-dependence....is being to walk away from any and all situations....in the moment and be prepared for anything to happen....that will be the day...you grow up..and leave home for the first time in your life..and not one second before that. If you can't do it.....then you're not there yet. End of story?

And if you fail this test......there may be a lot of legitimate reasons why this is.......or how you got here......but you walked through that door....all by yourself.....no one made you do it......and that is reality. Either your a victim.....or you aren't one? 100%.....means........100%....and there is not half way or part way.....when it comes to either taking....or rejecting...your own personal responsibility...for anything. Period. End of story.

“If you don’t stick to your values when they’re being tested, they aren’t values. They’re hobbies.” - Jon Stewart

That's what I'm talking about...right there. No half way. And no playing both sides of the fence. All or nothing? All in...or all ....out. Either you feed the kitty...or you don't get to play?

And beggars...can't be choosers...as they say?

PS I just realized this now after the fact. I Loved my wife...when we moved into with each other. And I Love her more now than I did before even after she is leaving? I am still a relatively Happy person....even if I feel sad and all the things one would expect to feel ....that our relationship is coming to an end? Her choice...not mine....but I am still the same and remain the same....and haven't changed except having more Love...not less....for my wife when we first started. That's the only change that has occurred with me...in the time we have been together. That is a win / win situation.....right there. And that makes me Happy.

So J, she is really following

Submitted by Delphine on Mon, 01/02/2017 - 15:36

So J, she is really following through on leaving, as you say? Where is she going?

I don't know if there is no "we" in your relationship. You wouldn't be together in the first place if there wasn't something of you in her and vice versa.

Or that we should never ask for anything. "Ask for what you want, but don't demand it."

If she really follows through and leaves...isn't that on some level, what you wanted also? Even if you still love her.

Delphine

Responsibility

Submitted by kellyj on Mon, 01/02/2017 - 18:14

There are two things that cannot be changed in our situation and one that can?

Her anger...can be changed if she wants to bad enough. That is one thing that can change? But behind her anger...there are more than a just a few things that go into it..and two of those are not things I have any control of?

1. The amount of things that have had on my plate before I ever met her that are still being worked on and corrected in the aftermath of a life changing event that was not of my doing. Much of this was taken care of before I even began to entertain having a relationship with anyone but when it comes to the things directly related to the physical environment and obligations I had and still have in fixing these fixable problems ie: starting out behind the 8 Ball as far as recovering from what others had done previously to my property and the aftermath of this ( renters destroying and leaving a mess for me to fix and repair )....and not having the money to hire out help....left me to do this by myself and to a certain degree, I had not planned to do this any faster than I could on my own anyway? We started out.....right in the middle of this..and a partial project that was halted do to circumstances and taking a huge financial hit. Nothing I can do about that other than to complete this but this has been a huge undertaking to do alone without the funds to hire out which was never the plan anyway. I have never stopped working on this and have in fact....increased the time, energy and effort to complete this to the point of exhaustion and burn out in an effort to make this happen faster...than was ever in my original intention in the first place? I did this on my wifes account and for no other reason? Otherwise...I would have done this entirely differently and finished this as I had originally intended in the first place? I made a radical shift in my plans and scrambled the original plan into pieces and have been trying to put them back together as best I can...to the best of my ability. Like I said....to the point of exhaustion and diminishing returns all having a negative effect on my health and well being.

So between these two constraints ( time and money )......and this previously started major project that I have to complete in that ...I have a responsibility to my neighbors and to myself to follow through and I have no choices there? The problem there is......something happened that no one could predict or account for ahead of time?

I have lived in the same house for almost 30 years..and during that time mine and my neighbors property have been the same for almost 100 years. That is....my house and all the adjacent houses actually belonged to a family who owned the farm that our properties all joined together as being part of one big farm? Mine house...was actually the original farm house ( that you never know to look at now....many, many remodels and upgrades along the way by all owners including me to the point that it's looks like a new modern home for the most part with an older style that is all original? And the back of all 6 lots use to be one...with one other older farmstead property adjacent to the 6 that are now 6 different homes including mine. The adjacent property to mine just flowed into one big park like setting in the back.....( 4 acres of open grass or park ) that we all share in that there are no fences dividing the properties.

That is....until just 2 years ago just before my wife moved in with me? The owner next door died..and his family sold the property to a developer and suddenly, over night..the open field is being devoped with 2 giant....( and rather expensive ) new homes being built and I'm getting notices ( by complaint for the builder )...that the project which was not bothering anyone and no can see....now is going to the main view...out of these two new house back yards and windows....looking directly at my unfinished project. So now...I have an inspector come and look at what no one could see before..and telling me I have to finish ( in fear of this lowering the new homes value for resale )...and given a dead line that I cannot negotiate? None of my neighbors ( for the past 28 years ) cared or had a problem and it really wasn't a problem...it was to raise the property value so the builder could make more money and I was being forced to do this....for no other reason or pay a huge fine? Nice huh? The builder could care less.....he wasn't going to live there. Almighty dollar strikes again.....and I got hit out of no where after almost 28 years of the next door lot being vacant and a field of grass?

The hoops I had to jump through and the amount of sweat and labor and cost I had to do ....just to make this guy a buck...nearly killed me....and I got nothing for it ...other than just getting done what I had planned at a pace that was trying to match...and entire construction crew or builders in order to finish by the time the houses were put on the market?

And there was literally no more I could do....other than do what I did....at a cost to everyone involved which included my wife? This is where...I really found out just how much...my ADHD really effected me or not? If there was a test to see how far I could go until I broke....that one was hit...and I hit that wall and had nothing left to give?

So when it comes to my wife in all of this. This was not her fault and I compeltely understand how much she had to compromise during that time and I am still not completely done but...the houses next door just sold...so that pressure is no longer there anymore.

But even if the pressure isn't there....the cost to me and my physical and emotional state from the effect this had....is still being felt and I am no longer willing to work at a pace...that was beyond what I even thought possible....right from the get go? It wasn't possible....but I did it anyway and survived not getting fined simply because they saw how much I did and how much I had to do..and I was able to do the most important parts in order for the houses to sell for what the builder wanted for them? If that had become an issue for the builder....the county and powers that be....would not have been very forgiving as much as they were ( not 100% complete but almost )

This effected every aspect of our relationship in respect to time, energy, exhaustion, and ability and it came to a place...where when you have given it your all...and you got nothing left to give....you have to accept that sometimes your best...is just not going to good enough and willing to accept that no one is required to give that to you...unless they are willing but with no expectation?

When your best...is not good enough...and anyone needs more than that....you have to be understanding enough to know that time has run out on the clock...if the other person cannot wait and this is effecting them too much to deal with? It is no ones fault...and there is no guarantees when you yourself find this unacceptable too....but the deadline imposed....is sooner than is physically and emotionally possible unless the goal..is to simple finish..and fall over dead tomorrow for all others who are concerned?

This has nothing to do with routines, daily house chores and habits or anything of that nature? This was and still is...a one shot deal and never to be done again when I'm done.

I was just on secret double probation....and there was an invisible time clock...that I was not aware of as far as my wife is concerned. The time on the clock....was less time than was physically possible and I cannot blame here or anyone in having to put up with this because this was not in the cards....when I first met my wife? No way to predict my neighbor dying and the property being the same way for 100 years...and then over night.....the rules and the events that happened suddenly changed over night yet my wife expectations...have never changed to accommodate but no one requires that of her including me but...it certainly showed me ...what is most important. Doesn't it?

So to say this is what I want on any level...the answer is no? What I wanted ....was for that not to happen...but everyone is different when it comes to crises and adversity...and when it comes to adversity...I think I manage it better than most? I don't expect that...from anyone else and everyone has their breaking point? I reached mine...and my best was not good enough.

And she reached hers.....long before mine was even causing me to sweat? I took that to the limits....and the clock just simply ran out. As far as that goes....I did more at age 58....than I had done when I was 30...so I'm not feeling any guilt or shame....for doing what I have never done in my entire life at my age? When you know it's your best and people are still not satisfied....then you have to say....I wish you a good life..and keep them in your prayers for the future. God speed on your journey...and I hope you find what you are looking for.

( ( ( J ) ) )

Submitted by NowOrNever (not verified) on Mon, 01/02/2017 - 17:41

I know you'll be talking with that great T of yours. Let us know how you are. I care about you. Prayers for you and your wife.

Same from me, J. Breaking up

Submitted by Delphine on Mon, 01/02/2017 - 21:53

Same from me, J. Breaking up is hard to do, I've been there. Wishing you all the best.

Delphine

The UnWise Monkeys

Submitted by kellyj on Tue, 01/03/2017 - 04:38

NON and Delphine,

Thank you both for your support. And yes....the last part of the statement I made "....it gets easier with practice"....applies to everything across the board. That includes breaking up. Just some insight to throw your's or anyones way....who may be in the process or even possibly....should be in the process, and the prospect itself is just to difficult or scary to come to terms with?

The thing that my T basically challenged me to do so long ago about "always be ready to walk away from anything at anytime....was directed at me since my proclivity is to stay too long or longer than I should. Basically....beating that dead horse analogy and getting too attached in respect to this co-dependent...insecure attachment relationship that develops from the sins of the father ( but mainly the mother ) in respect to attachment theory? There is an odd bend to this that does have to do with the father in this case which in respect to myself....there is just an idea or feeling I have always had that said.....things were actually very healthy.....and not very healthy...in terms of what might be called "The Perfect Storm"....or the "Perfect Dysfunction" as far as families go...and actually reaching the Perfect Dysfunctional Balance ...as I am calling it?

Forget about the deep psychological analysis here for a moment....and I can give you my own personal non-professional thoughts on this topic from someone just viewing it right from what it looked like and seemed like to me ( growing up ) as this weird objective 3rd wheel...of my family? I was like the 3rd wheel in my own family that kind of fell into "no mans land"...where I had been given this gift of immunity or this weird immunization ( shot) from being in that perfect place where the planets aligned....where I was given these 3d glasses in the ability to see things as they were clearly..or more clearly...than anyone else in my family? In other words.....I learned to understand each one of my own family...individually and uniquely their own with me being the odd man out?

Out man out....has both it's advantages and disadvantages but the advantages were really these adaptive strategies that mostly....had some really positive features to it? In fact...the positives pretty much equaled the negatives so without the negatives there...the plosives remained as these weird insights that I came up with on my own....long before I was even out of my own house and I am still holding to those and what I saw since in many ways...are still valid and quite accurate in their own right?

This is where...these theories even though accurate as an average means to understand attachment...there are variables in play that you cannot predict from one person to the next...that move you further and further away from the norm.....into this weird "outlier" areas that these categories and these classifications get weaker and weaker in their accuracy and more individual in nature? In other words.....unpredictable not in behavior...but what a person is most likely to do in a situation...despite their inherent tendencies, diagnosis or nice neat category they might put you into?

So in terms of unpredictability? In the way I am using that term.....a person who is likely to surprise you...going in the opposite way but this time...going in the healthy positive way...against the predicted or usual course for someone having the same experience or same proclivities and even tendencies otherwise stated? And in the case....that would be me?

This is difficult to explain....but in terms of someone like my father who had this uncanny ability to read people and size them up in order to take advantage or their weakness'? I was like the opposite of that and was very naive and susceptible due to the effect this had on me? Pretty predictable under the circumstances of this kind of abuse?

But in respect to the mother...my mother in this case...she was already the compliment to my father before she met him and was...his perfect dysfunctional piece or his Yin to her Yang so to a certain degree....the needs of the one...matched perfectly with the needs of the other in that perfect match in dysfunction? And when that happens....you have no power struggles or role conflicts and everything balances out evenly? The problem is however....that what is missing....isn't really missed? And what should be wanting or needing...isn't needed? It becomes the perfect co-dependent unhealthy relationship made somewhere other than Heaven and that's for sure!!! LOL

This is really what reminded me of the Wise Monkeys.....See no Evil....Hear No Evil....Speak No Evil. In the Asian proverb or adaptation of it...this is a means to teach a healthy or good lesson in how to live and use as a means to guide in a healthy way? Well take that...and put an unhealthy twist on it....and it still balances out and works as the reasoning works....but just off center a bit ( or more ) so in essence.....no one is the wiser? Or...No one is wise and everyone is a wise guy.....except for me in this case? The trouble is.....I was...in my own right...the wisest guy of all but didn't know any better at the time? And part of this was what my own mother was calling as "Odd"...which I also shared with my oldest sister but the way I really beleive made the difference between the two of us...had to do with gender...and birth order....which cannot be over looked or discounted here?

There is one thing...to be the Engineer or ride up front on the train ( that is your own family ) and get the best view of what's up ahead and get to know the Engineer and co pilot intimately. It's another thing...to be riding in the Caboose pulling up the rear..... and the railroad bridge is out and the train starts going off the deep end into the canyon...and the person in the Caboose can see what's happening and has enough time to bail out before you go over with the rest of the train!! LOL Meaning...I may stay too long by default...but part of this insight hits a point where it's very clear...what you need to do and you get a lot of practice using this vantage point in learning how to read a situation? My father could read people....I can read situations in their entirety pretty well and easily and this is kind of that strange or odd ability to see things that others don't see? Clearly!!! I seemingly can step...outside of the circle...and right back in ( back and forth ) with ease and it becomes obvious when it's time to go...and when it's time stay and when it's time to stand still and not move? That is a survival strategies that incorporate a mixture of thing or borrowing from one category and another and using them as needed appropriately to fit any situations you run across and still walk away unscathed? You might say...I was given more than just a hammer in my tool box and borrowed a couple more tools to go with it...on my own you might say? Borrowing tools like this means....you acquired them along the way...even though they don;'t necessarily belong to you. LOL That;s what accounts for ....what is ODD you might say or....unexpected and unpredictable in an unexpected way? That means...instead of being Top from the Bottom...or Bottom from the Top as the only two choices...I can be both...and I can be Independent ( or just step outside of the cirlce ) and quickly change hats and change positions.,...which makes me kind of that Chameleon I was mentioning> Chameleon based on a person without an identity and just goes with whom ever they are with...would imply a weakness in character and with no means to guide themselves and so they adapt to whom ever they w=are with and take on the characteristics of the other person? That is not healthy and that;s not the kind of Chameleon I'm talking about?

In the true concept of a real Cameleon or the lizard of the same name....that is an adaptive survival strategy that works not only for protection...but as a means to hunt prey or just blend in with the scenery and go unnoticed for what ever reason? Basically....if you were to see a crowd of (what ever creatures you choose )....that creature is the last one who would catch your eye..and the last one to get caught by a predictor if the entire herd was being threatened? Being able to flight, fight, freeze or camouflage all equally well based on the situation...makes you kind of universally adaptable without breaking a sweat? When you have that ability.....fear is not as big an issue since you've got defensive and offensive skills covered...or just becoming invisible and not going anywhere ( freezing ) and not only having one inherent response.....now you have 3 or 3 tools in the tool box to most other peoples 1 by default? I don't think this is normal...but it is not a bad thing either?

Which means.....I may not have the greatest skills in reading people and understanding them individually well...but I can read a situation in a heart beat and know exactly what to do instinctually for myself...which is the point I wanted to make here? Which means when it comes to attachments....

So within the Perfect Storm or Perfect dysfunction that has reached it;s own equilibrium by the time you come along...all the bugs have kind of been worked out by the time you get there and everything is balanced accordingly but just off center you might say? LOL I think with me...more than anything....that mixture of tools and adaptive strategies works equally well by just sliding the whole thing over a few notches without having to reinvent the wheel?

So when you've got a female dominated environment...with a male tyrant as the head controller...these inequities and either side appear so transparent....that being a boy or male at the end riding in the Caboose...makes you more of a spectator...and the ability to go....."My God....will you people just get a hold of yourselves!!! " And you're the kid for crying out loud!! And the youngest member of the family which I have no idea if that is normal...but it is for me? LOL A true co-dependent...would get sucked into taking one side or the other and get enmeshed in that weird triangulation ( mud pit ) and forced to take a side? That would be more like a ping pong ball getting bounced back and forth and never knowing where you should be? Ambivalent would be the operant word there I do believe or torn down the middle in trying to please one side or the other..and never being able to know which way to go?

But when you refuse to pick a side...and your refuse to be a ping pong ball....no one is happy with you....except for you in that case? You are the odd man out...and everyone is unhappy with you!! LOL But at no cost to your shelf and self identity most importantly of all? But that does make you appear wishy washy....even when your not and that is where the problems come...because people misread you that way? If you really are...not the norm...or different than what people expect.....they expect one thing..and get another and this case that only works badly for me. Again!!! The identified patient....has it's plus's and minus's too? Most people seem to have more hard or more fixed boundaries and fall on one side or the other just by default? I don't seem to fall on either side...but I don't fall in the middle or on the fence meaning...I am not undecided by any means...it's just that I can adapt to people well....even if they are not very adaptable themselves and this gets ou into trouble with adapting almost too well and that was the main point I wanted to make.

If you start putting people into categories determine by gender stereotypes, social stereotypes or any other stereotypical means to do so....stereotypes are based on facts...whether they serve to support bias or prejudice...or to recognize people who seem to fit your own way of seeing things? Cutler adaptations and cultural stereotypes in terms of social groups or any kind as means to find people who are just like you? Opposite attraction is not a good thing for the most part...and it's best to find people who are not your opposites in order to get along?

But what if by default....you tend not to have an opposite ...meaning...by nature...you seem to get along with everyone....know what? Turkey's butt? LOL And seemingly from where I stand...;.most people and especially in any relationship I have had.....people tend to be on side in same way.....which means...there is a corresponding opposite side to each and everyone of us...that is not easily changed or moved and would take you way out of your comfort zone...in order to do this?

But what if....you didn't have this problem or as much of an issue with this yourself? That means...if you have qualities on both sides that are plosive ones that serve you well and you can walk across boundary lines invisibly to the other side and back.....if the person you are with...cannot do that and follow you.....now you have to pick a side and stay there..because to switch side and do what you have always done....now....what ever side is the wrong side for the other person....now makes you the enemy or traitor to your cause or side? Meaning from my point of view...not having a side and that is one thing I am not willing to compromise myself on and this seemingly...has been my biggest down fall with anyone and especially with my female relationships?

Take the Art world for example? I can move easily and freely in the world of Art and Artist and enjoy the personalities that I find most commonly when in that world? But that world has kind of it's own group mentality....that I pretty much find not attractive in the sense....that Artist tend to be not very physically motivated or gravitate to sports or things of that nature? More liberally minded, environmentally minded and the whole nine yards? You do have a wide range of diversity of people in respects to this world...but there is an enemy or opposite however which is kind of made really very clear by the pervasive attitudes and the criticisms lodged or stance or position that this attitude seems to hold an attraction for? It kind get really Pompous and vain...and gull of themselves and self righteous and very dismissive as a whole group mentality and I Hate that more than anything...and that group mentality...does like me for it?

On the other side...in respect to say the world of sports and Jocks you might say.....I am a Jock...and I Love this world...but I love the other world too? And the same thing applies to this world as well? In the same way....the opposites of them and this identity....is the side or world or world that I Love as well...but is Hated by this group or group mentality so ...there is no win for losing and I'm the one who always loses in the end no matter what? It's almost worse...when you refuse to take sides but saying...not because of being indecisive and being unsure....I'm extremely sure where I belong.....BOTH but that is not acceptable and that is the only heart ache that I am feeling right now knowing this...and never having found a way to just right in the middle like dead on in the middle to the point where...everyone is your friend..and no one is your friend....and everywhere is your home...and no where is your home?

So with that....I bond easily and attach and commit with everything I've got and have no problems doing that at all? And I can let go and release and walk away easily so I can move about freely...but that seems like treason or treasury and being wishy washy and I can not scream loud enough to say that I am not...and still not have people believe me since...this appears to be a more rare quality...that people just can't get a handle on? People...want and need you to stay on your own side ( as they feel ) and I refuse to do that which is what people don't like?

And that makes you kind of a man with no home as it would appear...and being sets your apart and puts you in a category...all by yourself? When no one will can believe that you can do what they cannot.....people in general...do not want to understand that in which does not serve them? And what does not serve them is viewed with suspicion...and misinterpreted tremendously wrong....which the only person who gets hurt in all of this....is seemingly me?

This is the like the opposite of being ambiguous and ambivalent going in the opposite or extreme other position away from that but that gets interpreted as....I don't know what the Fuck to call you or know what I am seeing because it;s not expected and very unexpected and people want certainty....and they don't get that with me?

What I am ...as I have decided...is a threat...to everyone in one way or another...by just being myself and actually knowing exactly where I stand..and I stand firmly in the middle..and that is my comfort zone that suits me best...in all ways and serves me quite well....and there is no need to change that?

I did find in my lifetime of searching for groups or some place where I fit...and I did find that quite by accident through a friend of mine who ride motorcycles. You will get it in context to the name of this particular group?

As it was...there was is a large contingency of BMW riders out there ( which is the bike I ride )..and there is of course a forum for these people just like every hobby or interest there are in all areas on the internet? Well ...as it turns out...my friend was an active member of this huge organization ( I am too but not active ) and there appeared to be ( out of thousands ) a certian number of foks who wer always getting tagged by the administrators for not following the posted guidelines and rules of the forum since they were always igniting flame wars on the forum because they appeared to be a little too outspoken and not the average poster? So as time wore on....this "group"...bu no intention of any one individual....were the once who kept getting "sent out in to the hall for a time out" by the administrators...until finally the administrators started banning them systematically one by one or by two or threes as I heard. LOL

So....these guys and gals ( mostly guys )....formed their own internet group...and they call themselves "Onan's Children"...which if you get the Biblical reference....you will get the joke and the basic idea which is so fitting...I couldn't begin to tell you how well that really is in reality? It is the most eclectic mix of personalities and people...you will ever witness or see in your entire life with one common goal in mind and that is riding motorcycles. Every year they have a gathering...and you have never in your life seen a more odd ball group of people from all walks of life and all professions and sexual orientations, that seemingly.....don't really mind or care about the differences...which is the only place I have ever seen this in my life because there is NO group mentality or mind what so ever?

If I were to say "Anything Goes"....that might be even putting it mildly on one hand...but on the other hand...that is not true. What does not go is convention or status quo...and that seems to be the only rule which is where I seem to feel the most comfortable and at home? There are no two people alike in the group..and no one shares anything in common...except for being different and not have a category that you could actually put them into as a group...but the individual attitude of each and every person there...seems to hold a common bond or glue that is very much common...but with no way to explain it or define since there are no real boundaries except....mutual respect and nothing esle. And it's that feeling or energy is the only thing that binds which there is no name for along those lines..is what made the group in the first place

I was just thinking in terms of the future which is not in my sights at all right now....but I was smiling and thinking about an personal ad for a dating site and listing myself as this just as a joke.

"Child of Onan" eclectic mix. No preferences, No judgments. No one in particular. With an attitude. Have Gun...will travel"

What you think? LOL ( thinking NOT....if I ever wanted a response!!! LOL )

PS No sexual Bi orientation implied. Happily and firmly heterosexual to be sure!! LOL

Emotion-Backed Demands = Unhappiness

Submitted by Delphine on Mon, 01/02/2017 - 17:20

"It's never that we like it....but it does get easier with practice." That's right J.

Here's an excerpt from the book on acceptance:

Try to remember that it’s always your emotion-backed demands that are really the practical cause of your own unhappiness.

The art of happiness means learning to be with and to work and play with the cast of characters you’ve brought into your life, [by choice or by providence].

Retreating won’t do it.

Coming on like a ten-ton truck won’t do it, either.

Emotionally accepting and patiently working with life situations will get you the most that’s gettable!

Remember that a lot of human suffering is caused by the mind that takes offense at what’s happening.

You don’t have to respond to ANYTHING by taking offense.

You can learn to forgive yourself--and others.

"Accepting whatever happens—for now."

It doesn’t mean you have to like what’s happening.

It doesn’t mean you have to stop trying to change what’s happening.

It doesn’t mean you have to think that whatever happens is right.

"Accept whatever happens--for now" may mean:

You’re going to stop making yourself

so afraid,

so angry,

so resentful, so worried—

and so unhappy.

You’re going to prefer

that something be different—

but not addictively demand it any longer!

You’re going to change your internal emotional experience.

Emotion Backed Demands

Submitted by kellyj on Tue, 01/03/2017 - 13:13

Delphine,

I have some things to add to this from a very open and enlightening conversation with my wife this morning after staying up all night reflecting on our relationship. While it's fresh in my mind....I thought this might be really useful to hear what was said on my wife's end....along with a really production time spent thinking about everything and putting things into perspective? I did go back over the entire ground of our relationship chronologically and remembered the things that were said early on....that now make perfect sense to me at this point now seemingly...my wife has made up here mind? That is kind of misleading to say...but I will explain this better in what I learned?

My wife and I did meet on the internet..which actually proved to be a really good way to connect with like minded people which is not so hit and miss in doing this the old fashioned way and just meeting them by circumstance or being introduced? That experience has a lot of down sides too and a lot of wasted time especially when you read what people say...and compare it to you see when you actually meet them and a lot of it....just simply does not line up and readily easy to see within the first 5 minutes! LOL Much of what people actually say sometimes...is pretty emotionally based and not based on reality but not necessarily completely off base which really became apparent after the conversation I had with my wife. It did show me hom ever...just how far away my wife's thinking and feelings about these things are in comparison to what she says or did say....but she was really not being emotionally honest but without any awareness of this what so ever?

To put the BIG one...as it really turns out is the concept of Time. As I said....the hidden clock ran out? I now know a little more about that...to put this into perspective

When this came up ...I asked her for her honest feelings about what it is that she simply cannot get past just for my own knowledge and understanding? I had my own thoughts prepared to what I thought..and to a certain degree, it only validated what I was thinking?

As she replied " I told you what was most important to me. Someone who has time for me. I even wrote that plain as day right on my dating profile in big bold letters And I told you that...but you were just like all the other guys I left in my past over the same thing? ( light bulb of understanding moment ) Now in context...this is no surprise...but I actually now know what she really meant and it wasn't time she wanted?

As she continued " It's the same thing I've heard repeatedly and no one listens" ( or she feels we all lied to her or tried to deceive her and just told her what she wanted to hear? ) "Every time it's same thing "( with her past experience and me saying the same thing to her as well ) "It's like when I tell them ( and you now )...they're all shocked like I never told them before?"

My chance to say a few things. "D....I don't think you are understanding something here? I heard you say that...and now that you're saying the same thing about these other guys? What's the common denominator here? You....or all these guys and me? It's you of course...but I have to tell your straight up....you are making an assumption that everyone understand specifically what you mean by time and that was really quite a general statement that could have meant a lot of different things to a lot of different people? It really didn't narrow it down very well and I am still left with wondering exactly what you mean right now this very minute but I have an idea that I may know the answer to if you will entertain this idea for a moment?"

I said ( true story ) "One of my best friends M...has an amazing gift in his ability to be attentive and pay attention to you when you are with him? It's quite overwhelming to have someone who can give so much undivided attention to you and stay connected in this way in that he is very generous with his attentiveness to women and that has always gained him a easy following? One of the most successful men I know...at meeting and having girlfriends who are just enamored with him because of this undivided attention he gives to them almost non stop which is just who he is...and he is quite benevolent and attentive to the women he has been with needs."

Not only is my friend like this with women...he is also like this with everyone and men as well? He literally was and still is one of my best friends....and he is likeable, charming and in almost every way...just a great guy and fun to be with and a very smart and interesting man? The only problem is.....he has a bit of a Narcissism problem and I knew his ex wife well enough that she confided this with me before they broke up and told me what her therapist had said which was basically the same thing? What I remembered last night was something that he use to say or said a couple of times that stuck...in my mind? As he said "If I had my way....I would have ( blank ) attached to my hip" ( the wheels are turning here as you can tell?

So I said to my wife after a little more recounting some things about my friend and what I saw as kind of trade off without getting into what his ex wife had told me but just continuing to use this example? I said " The remember being frustrated that he could seem to catch women quite easily and they would be immediately drawn to him...while in the mean time...I lacked the same ability he had to be so charming and re-affirming quite naturally and seemingly without any effort at all."

The problem was and still is with my friend? He love to be the center of attention...which is why he is so charming since...the better he is at being charming...the more enamored women get which is exactly what he's after and he seemingly cannot get enough? Red flag right there...but moving onward and upward. LOL

I said " You know....I'm around all the time..and I have lots of time to give you and I can pretty much give you as much time as you have asked for that doesn't appear to be doing the trick? What seems painfully obvious to me...is that it is the undivided attention that you want....WITH THAT TIME....that you are getting...which seems like you are asking for the wrong thing which is why all these guys and me are still kind of scratching our heads with you? It's neither here nor there at this point in time...but with my Attention challenges and being so aware of them....I can tell you that what I haven't been able to do...is give you the quantity of undecided attention....that you really want and need and I have gone over this countless times...so it is surprising to hear you go back to where you started saying....."no one has enough time for you?"

"A child with a disorganized attachment expresses odd or ambivalent behavior toward the parent, (i.e. first running up to them, then immediately pulling away, perhaps even running away from the parent, curling up in a ball or hitting the parent.) The child’s first impulse may be to seek comfort from the parent, but as they get near the parent, they feel fear to be in their proximity, demonstrating their disorganized adaption."

Lack of specifics or inability in being specific ....is related to current research which posits two types of memory: implicit and explicit. There was a fascinating case study of a man whose brain was injured in an accident so that he could only retain memories for five minutes at a time; his only long term memories were those that he had at the time of the accident. He could neither form or store long term memories going forward from the accident. If all memory was explicit, stored in such a way that we had to “fetch” our memory to do a skill, then you would believe this man incapable of learning a new skill. But he was taught to braid every day (a skill he did not have before the accident). Through persistent repetition he learned the skill so that when asked if he could braid, he would answer no because he had formed no long term memory of learning to braid, but if three stands were placed in his hands, he could braid because he had the implicit memory created by the training. Such are many of the skills we learn as infants, they are learned by being in the presence of a wiser, stronger, other who repetitively models the behaviors and skills we need to learn until they become part of who we are. Explicit memories cannot be formed until our frontal lobes come “online” which usually happens somewhere around the age of two. Implicit memories, however, are theorized to be held in more primitive areas of the brain that are already operating at birth, so we start to form implicit memories from the get-go. Which is why much of this knowledge is out of our consciousness.

My T threw that at me last time we were together which was adding his original thoughts about avoidance/ dismissive to as he said....."disorganized" as well? I haven't talk directly to him yet more in depth...but he pretty much knows me by now...and all he has to do is says 'the word" ( lol ) and I usually look it up on my own ( and of course he was right!! LOL )

Anyway...the article excerpt I included had to do with this disorganized insecure attachment style that did go on to say there is was a mixture of avoidant / anxious / ambivilent behaviors and incoherent inability to express and get there needs met? That rang a few bells and brought me to an immediate understanding of my wife and what she has really been trying desperately to say? Actually she is not trying desperately...she is seeking desperately for something and not knowing how to ask for it because she has no idea? I have finally learned to interpret her...which is part of why she wants to leave since I have been directing to thought and communications directly to what I see as the main problem?

Unlike my good friend with what I would call a slight Narcissistic bend because he really is very generous and benevolent and has never showed any signs of rage or losing his temper? More just kind of a my way or the highway kind of guy....who can be rather thoughtless if he wants something that you don't? Otherwise...he is just really likes to be on stage or the center of attention and love the admiration feedback he gets but he is so good at charming you in a genuine way....that you really want to give it to him so and he is very good at giving back and not the stereotypical Narcissist in his own right...but just more of a bend in being that way?

This is where I am so very compassionate to my wife but at the same time...am being realistic as well? She is...or a part of her is....desperate for attention. When she says time....she is being vague and non specific. What she wants is nearly non stop attention....but not intimacy or connection and this is why she will not let you get close enough in order for you to actually connect and why when I try...she lashes out compulsively as I am now understanding this better? It's not even abondonement issues or fear of being alone as much as being extremely needy but needy in her own way which is very specific..;.which why she doesn't understand why ( me and all these guys ) keep telling her the same thing or react with supervise when she says she is going to leave but can't explain why?

I know she has memory holes as I have noticed and that goes right into this explicit and implicit memory issue? She literally knows she needs or wants something...but has no way to remember what it is that she wants and cannot tell you?

When it comes to time and attention...she needs more than anyone could give her to make up this deficit she has ( attention starvation as I see it ) and to say she is a black hole is really not true. It's just that the amount and quantity of time and undecided attention she needs and to be in close proximately but not wanting to be too close or actually connects...becomes smothering. and to the point...no one can keep it up long enough to satisfy this somewhat insatiable need or drive she has in this way? If she gets it...she is fine but to get her to just fine for her...is not fine for anyone else?

And every time I have broken away long enough to do things on my own without her....it takes only a couple of days and she has another melt down and panicky attach which ultimately ends with lashing out and attacking you....for not meeting these ( undisclosed needs she has? ) And she cannot connect her needs or wants to anything that she can remember? She is literally going on what it feels like to her by feel only with no ability say...what those are and even be accurate? All the times I was feeling "used"...or "for her"....I was right...she needed me as her anchor...and I did give her plenty of attention but this had a short lived effect? I was not off doing my own thing....I was right there in the room or doing other things together...without focusing on her and paying direct attention to her which is what she wants but doesn't realize how unreasonable or unrealistic she is being in her demands for this very reason? It isn't Narcissism or being selfish...it's desperately trying to fix this and get rid of that feeling...in the only way she knows that works but cannot express this, explain this, or even knows how to say what she needs.

This is probably the first time that tears are coming and I can stop them in all the times I have been writing here about anything but not because of me or any loss or sadness on my account as much as finally seeing what it is that I have spent so much time in learning how to understand...and wanting to reach her and knowing that I can't? I am not wanting to save her or rescue her...I am wanting to touch that part of her inside and have her feel what it feels like...to have someone really Love her...not just meet these dysfunctional needs she has in this compulsive never ending search that will only lead her to the same place?

Yes....even when I think about her posting " I want someone who has time for me".....is causing the tears to fall because I finally understand what that really means and the thing is....I can really sau why I Love my wife so much now for the first time ever I think? I do feel sadness and sympathy for her...but that is not why I Love her...to feel sorry for her and that is not what this is about? It is that I finally understand her....and understand what she needs...but I can't give that to her because she will not allow it...and the qualities that she does possess to make up for this deficit...that exceeds any genuine and real quality in any of my past relationships in a way that is hard to describe but with no doubting her intentions and her genuineness that I have not seen before. It is the thing that I trust...implicitly...that despite what it appears like on the outside and the things that it looks like and is not IMHO... I see her wanting desperately what I have to offer her in a real authentic way...but there are these built in reactions and impulses that are preventing her and me from ever getting there. She really is still that vulnerable wounded child....but is doing everything in her power to make sure she will never gets it...and now as it sounds...she going to go right back out there...and do it again and no one is going to be able to do this in the way she believes can really happen? That's the problem...she believes she can get it from someone....or that someone is out there still waiting for her...but she does not understand the reciprocal nature of connecting and Love...and really all she wants is for me to be there all the time and give here my undivided attention which for me of course...is a very hard thing to do anyway consistently and none stop all of the time? It will be more of the same...most of what I put in will never come back to me in a healthy way for me but it still makes me cry.

What I said to PI the other day about seeing 80-90% good and wonderful things is true. For me and for me alone with my own set of issues and what I do have to offer her...is more than she ever has receives in some way...but in other ways has failed her worse than others in my own inability to sustain that kind of undecided attention to her in the way she really needs? I am torn between feeling regret about my ADHD symptoms ( not so much guilt in I understand this )...but the regret comes from the Love that I have...and all that I will miss which are things in some ways...I have never had with anyone else before? I will be losing a great deal with D......and I am already feeling the pangs of my loss? It really is an ambivalent feeling yet I am clear as to why?

This is the feeling...of understanding and knowing exactly why I chose to be her partner...and these qualities I have never had before and I will be missing them tremendously...along with D and her wonderful many qualties that are just over shadowed by something,...that is keeping us from connecting? What she really doesn't see or understand is just how much I do care for her and it is these rare qualties that she does have...that I Love and will miss so much? Unfortunately....and realistically speaking.....the negatives outwieght the positives for me too unless she could find a way to accept what I have to offer her...and be happy and not angry with me for failing to give her more? If I could I would...but the cost to me would only be worth it....if I felt that my needs would be met and without her ability to actually say so......I think she knows so....and is why she is leaving this time? These were not idle threats so much in the past...as much as her simply trying to tell me.....what she needs as an absolute requisite ( specifically speaking ) and then telling me how to do it which is exactly what I have been trying to figure out? It's little consolation...to understand what I can't give her...and even if I could.....I don;t think it would be enough? And the trade off for me...would just be more of the same? It is an insatiable un quenchable burning need....that is only wanting to feel she is Loved....but this thing or hole that needs to be repaired is the hole in her heart that nothing stays in long enough for her to feel it...even though I've given it to her....it's not registering or being recognized as what it really is? I truly believe that it is so foreign to her...that she doesn't know what Love really is and what she wants as a replacement...is just to have some one be there and care for her which is not the role of a husband in the way she needs it?

It really does break my heart...and there will be a loss in terms of something very genuine and real....that is buried and locked up and only comes out at times when she feels safe enough to show it? It comes and it goes...but it is as real and genuine and just simply honest.....but the effect of living with the responsibility to her emotions and disappointments and the over reactions and anger when I fail to meet her unspoken and somewhat unrealistic or unreasonable needs.....both breaks my heart...and saddens me tremendously because I finally found my way to Love her....but now have no way to do it...because she has been trying to tell me in her own way and as honestly as she can...that I not meeting this need for her...and this need is non negotiable. That is how I now interpret her and all the things she has been trying to say.

What she doesn't understand and I wish there was a way to tell her ( which I have tried but it doesn't really register because of her deep insecurity and self loathing....that I am the one who will be losing the most here...since she doesn't have the faith or belief when I tell her....all that I will be missing. I will be missing ....more than she possibly ever could know on my account despite the problems and the struggles.....that seemingly have no end? If I believed there would be end to this which is not even of my choosing....I might try and stop her...if I believed I could give her what she really needs and wants which are the very things that are my weakest areas due to my own ADHD symptoms all by themselves. The stark and sad reality...but it is what it is. I did try one more time to tell her that I gave her more than anyone else I have ever been with in the areas I have concentrated on with her and gave her my best..;..which was little consolation to her....in that it is not what she thinks she needs and this is a tragedy for her....and I wish I could find another way? More than anything else....I want her to Happy...as much as I want this for myself. If I knew she could find it in the same way she's been doing it....I would feel better about this right at this moment...but there is nothing I can do for her there.and that is what is causing me to feel so much sadness...more than anything else right at the moment.

Maybe share Prescriptions

Submitted by Delphine on Tue, 01/03/2017 - 13:44

Maybe share Prescriptions with her, J? No relationship she gets into will ever live up to her emotion-backed demands.

Yes, of course you want her to be happy, but that's her job, not yours.

Can you give yourself

the insight

that it’s your struggle

and your demanding

that’s making you unhappy?

It’s not whatever

you’re struggling over.

It’s your emotion-backed demand,

not the life situation itself,

that causes your experience

of unhappiness!

Make a list of

all the things

you couldn’t stand

last year—

and the year before.

Some of them

you’ve now learned

to emotionally accept.

This is called growth.

You’re too wonderful

to keep yourself

from growing more.

Most of your life problems

can no longer

be effectively handled

by primitive

"fight or flight"

responses.

You usually deprive yourself

of getting the most

from the people and situations

around you

when you come on with power

or let your fears

make you run away.

To develop the most

satisfying outcomes,

most of your problems

require

more insight and a

practical back-and-forth

working with the situation

over a period of time.

Try to remember

that it’s always your

emotion-backed demands

that are really

the practical cause

of your own unhappiness.

The art of happiness

means learning to be with

and to work and play with

the cast of characters

you’ve brought into

your life,

[by choice or by

providence].

Retreating won’t do it.

Coming on

like a ten-ton truck

won’t do it,

either.

Emotionally accepting

and patiently working

with life situations

will get you

the most that’s gettable!

The "We" Thing Again

Submitted by kellyj on Tue, 01/03/2017 - 14:57

It was good that I didn't let her lead me down the rabbit hole with her when she was jumping to the conclusion that I had decided anything or drawn any conclusions as she assumed. As she sat down the other day and said something like "how are we going to do this?" I've come to learn we me's I which is her inability to take responsibility again. That's when I stopped her and made her back up and not include me in HER decision? It was important for me to do this not just an arguing point. Resolution on my account required her to tell me what she did when I asked her what it was and it came back to the beginning again when she mentioned this time thing again "no one has enough time for me"...as I explained.

That is the entire premise of what she wants but cannot say ...or better....l.the emotion backed demand...that she feels she has made so clear to everyone?

In this time that I think she means it.....she knows she is not getting this "thing" she feels she needs.....but as I was having a moment to grieve.....I need the resolution more than her. At least it allow me the chance to get that which I wouldn't have if I hadn't stopped her and put the ball back in her court?

After all I have been through to get here.....at least I can get the resolution within the answer for myself...without trying to get that from my wife? If there is anything I have learned from the past....resolution of the past...allows you to move forward and be happy? It's one thing to have your cup so full you want to give what you have....but it's another to keep thinking that this will change in her...which I actually don't believe it will. And in what I was saying...I think she knows this...but again like always...cannot say it or express it or even knows how? This is the only way she knows how.....and from how we are talking about this more openly....I can tell she had made up her mind...and she is ready to try another way?

I have said this in the past that I could not understand why she could not understand? As if she really thought I could not have ADHD....as it felt like she was asking of me? That was not what she was doing....what she was doing....was trying to tell me in her own way....that inattentiveness she was experiencing....was the thing that was causing her to have this negative reaction and it really was a threat...but could not explain why? Being able to understand her now.....is for me this time. It is for my own resolution...because resolution has never been what she needed but she just couldn't say so? It is in the primitive sub conscious where this is all happening....but like you said it's not my job....my job is to be happy and find the resolution needed in order to move on and find that for myself?

I think I said this a long time ago.....in doing what I was doing here and focusing on my wife? As my T had said a very long time ago....you need to be in a relationship at the time...to make these discoveries and he was so right. I learned more about myself than anything else and none of this was a waste of time for me....no matter which way it ended up and I can confirm that to anyone right now.....the benefits of doing this....have gone to me and I am better off for it, which would not have happened any other way. Taking a chance and learning all you can learn....is the opposite of what happens...when you do nothing or your unwilling to take the chance and take that leap of faith. No regrets, no blame, no fault .....not lingering anger or misunderstanding and clarity of mind as well.

That is worth the price of admission...and then some after all? You will never learn anything or grow...if you are not willing to take some risks to get there;)

The only way that could happen...is for her to go get the help she needs...and if she is ( as it appears for her own reasons ) just not willing to do this....then my answer is already been given to me? There really is only one person who will ever make my wife happy...and it;s not up to me to pick the method or the way in which to do it?

Good ones

Submitted by DependentOrigination on Sun, 01/01/2017 - 20:16

“If you are patient in one moment of anger, you will avoid one hundred days of sorrow.” - Chinese Proverb

Amen. Happy 2017

Happiness...and the 3 Magic Words

Submitted by kellyj on Tue, 01/31/2017 - 12:06

I just ran across this video on happiness and the 3 Magic Words which was really interesting for me to read because in part...I realized I have already been employing them?

In this Ted-X "talks" video...the speaker defines these words in two groups or 3 ?

The main 3 words that he describes are ......"Tell Me More"..as a means to inquire and want more information?

And the second group or bonus words as said are ....."what happened next?" as a means to validate the speaker and show interest in what they are saying?

I have to say...that my favorite two words that I use a lot in everyday language is...."Now what? ( Turkey's butt? )"...as a means to say approximately the same things? I could replace that with "what happened next...without the humor within the rhyme attached...basically saying that I have no idea but to guess .."turkey's "butt"" is surely wrong? Obviously!! LOL Which is a means of saying about same thing or there about but not doing it as meaningfully as saying "what happened next"...even though if I am hearing a person's story...I usually want to know the ending so I am generally speaking...waiting and wanting to hear as a general rule of interest alone?

I think what is more important here...is not which words you use....but that they show your intention to the other person...regardless of which way you say it?

The fact is....people actually get tired of too many questions I have found...even when I want them to :"Tell me more"...as this guy said? This goes all the way back to getting "kicked out of Sunday school".....when I was basically asking the same thing by saying....."Tell me more on how this happened? Tell me more in why it happened? Tell me more than what you just said...so I can understand it better and I want to know?" This...I do without even thinking about it....but to say it always works....depends on who you are saying it to I guess?

I suppose....if you say it to the "wrong person".....no matter what you say will make a difference...no matter how you say it especially when they don't want to tell you more...or they have no idea what they are talking about and don't have the answers for you there which when I stop and think about "my audience" back at the time ( in Sunday School )....the speaker..didn't have the answer...but was afraid of saying "I don't know"...and was more offended that I even asked in the first place?

And or course at the time....I was not very gracious about the answer I got...and just kept on asking because I wanted to know? That I am sure....was more than just a little annoying? You think? LOL

I also wanted to come back here and say that my wife is still grouchy in the morning...but she stopped "taking it out on me" as much....because I've learned better how to avoid any conflict myself in this and the reason for that is mainly due to my wife's impatience. This is where I am both....not very compassionate...and very understanding myself with that problem having ADHD?

What I am not very compassionate about...is a person who can't "hold on to it" basically...because they are having an "impulse problem" and can't maintain composure? You'd be "preaching to the choir" on that one with me...which is why as I see this at times, I immediately go..."yeah, tell me about it? It I can do it ( which I have learned how to )...then what's you excuse??"...especially when I see my wife having "impatience problems" and can't keep it together?

On the flip side to this...I can be understanding...and with that....I don't need to be compassionate in that case....just the understanding why that is? And because I understand....why that is....I also understand how to avoid it and stay clear of it...even when it shows itself with me coming at me from my wife....who I feel and see sometimes as just not having any control of herself? I certainly don't feel sorry for her since I know exactly how hard that is to do sometimes? But the fact remains...."I do it"...and I have to "learn how to do it"....and ..."it can be done"...is a person wants to or not?

I think what changed is two fold here with my wife?

part A )....is she is realizing that she has some issues and problems that are more than she thought or more than what she believed at the time? What she is willing to accept is...she has PTSD..and she feels that is related to everything that she is having issue with..since those symptoms are pretty obvious even to her? When she read up on it...after me putting that on her enough times...she finally agrees that she fits that much for sure...and is willing to accept this as the source for now...and listen more and realize why she reacts so hostilely sometimes?

And since I've been telling her this for so long now that I have given up trying to get her to see it....I still wasn't letting her get away with "reacting" out of control...without doing something which in my case...that something was turning around and walking out the room..and not saying a solitary word to her? The second she would react like that...I would about face..and walk silently out of the room to another part of the house..and leave her there ( which is what she asked for....."LEAVE ME ALONE, I DON'T WANT TO TALK ABOUT IT!!!! ...directly out of the horses mouth ) which I obliged her every time...which she didn't even have to say it to me anymore since I beat her to the punch line..and left voluntarily faster than she had a chance to say it?

So later if she complained about this....I told her that this is what she always says...so I was just doing what she asked of me....since I understand English...and "leave me alone"...is very explicit and easy to understand?" What else can that mean or what other way can you understand that?

The last thing I was going to do....was do what I saw in my house with my sisters when they would get into a scabble about things...and run to my mother for her to referree and try and make it all better for them? As if...to play "stupid"...or that "not born yesterday game"...where one person "pouts" from not getting their way..and the other person tries to make...."nicey nice"..and say....:"what's wrong....or you Okay......what can I do to make it up to you? How can I make it better for you." from this kind of dishonest "ploy"....used by little girls during play? I saw this countless times with my older sisters when they were kids....and there is no way in Hell....I was going to play "little girl games"...when someone isn't "playing right at the tea party"...and the other one gets offended?

If you "speak the words"....then at face value....that is exactly what you get and nothing more or less than that? "Leave me alone"....means....."leave me".......all by myself..."alone". And nothing more than that? And the second I started doing that.....I was "happy"? And in the case of "Tell me more".......that really doesn't apply? I don't need to "know more"...when the words pretty much speak for themselves? All that is required...is just "follow then implicitly" and let her figure it out for herself...once she is "alone" and finds that this is not what she really wanted after all? That is a "consequence" that came from her own words and nothing more? That worked perfectly...to serve to teach her a lesson that she could understand....in "her own terms". Speaking directly..and listening directly..to what is being said?

The fact that I started doing exactly as she said...right when she said it....put the power in her own words into my action and response..and that has been working as well going in the opposite direction? I really have come to find....that it's my wife's impatience more than anything...that is directly related to our problems sometimes? If I see it that way...then doing things immediately ...serves her comfort level..and keeps her from over reacting and believing things will get done but mainly.....these "acts of service"...which is more to do with serving her "impatience" and inability to maintain...but reducing the conflict and the problems down to me...either leaving the room instantly...or staying instantly...depending on "what she says".

I think she has found that...the more she says these things...the more she finds herself "alone"...which is exactly what she doesn't want which she is left to figure it out by herself...instead of "running to mama"...for "mama to fix it for her"? I'm not her "mama"...or her "daddy"...and it's not my job...to make her "happy"..and try and "fix it for her"....like my mother did with my sisters....mainly because....that is not how "little boys do it"....and not how a "man does it either?"

If she wants to play with the "big boys"...she needs to learn how the "big boys" operate which acting like a "little girl"....is NOT how it's done? If she thought..that saying "leave me alone" was going to get anything more than that....then she learned the hard way....that "leave me alone".....means...."leaving her alone"..and "all by herself".. she could come to me and speak to me like and adult..and not play....."little girl games" with me?

And that's exactly what happened...and she had to come and "speak to me about it"...and do it like an adult which is exactly what I expect from her...all said and done? And when she did that...then I could say....."Tell me more"...and show the interest and validate her...once I knew what "game that was"..and how not to play that game?

It took me a while....to remember that particular "little girl game" from my childhood experience with my two older sisters....but mostly, even back then... I would just get up and leave the room then too....just so you know? LOL What worked then...still works today!!!!LOL

Nothing new under the sun...as they say? :)

https://youtu.be/UDXtFbSmBAg

in the muck...

Submitted by MrsADD (not verified) on Tue, 02/28/2017 - 11:57

I was thinking of this last few days. It's almost like the more I learn about ADHD and my own depression and anxiety or my kids weird anxiety issues that have surfaced as of late make things more complicated. I am an analyzer I can analyze anything to the deep dark depths of the subject. I like it. It is an annoying character trait yet a blessing at times. I was thinking, including with this site. For lent stop drinking at night, stop smoking, stop all forms of forums and social media and just go inward. Because I need to get out of the muck and stop trying to solve problems and instead roll with it and accept it.

yes, acceptance...

Submitted by Delphine on Tue, 02/28/2017 - 12:57

It's key--acceptance. Resistance = suffering.

Eckhart Tolle (whose works I also recommend) talks about acceptance a lot:

When you live in complete acceptance of what is, that is the end of all drama in your life.

Acceptance of the unacceptable is the greatest source of grace in this world.

Whatever you accept completely will take you to peace, including the acceptance that you cannot accept, that you are in resistance.

The moment that judgement stops through acceptance of what is, you are free of the mind. You have made room for love, for joy, for peace.

Watch any plant or animal and let it teach you acceptance of what is, surrender to the Now. Let it teach you Being. Let it teach you integrity — which means to be one, to be yourself, to be real. Let it teach you how to live and how to die, and how not to make living and dying into a problem.

The mental suffering you create is always some form of non-acceptance,
some form of unconscious resistance to what is.
On the level of thought, the resistance is some form of judgement.
The intensity of the suffering depends on the degree of resistance to the present moment.

But as Ken Keyes writes: ''Accepting whatever happens doesn't mean you have to like what's happening. It doesn't mean you have to stop trying to change what's happening. It doesn't mean you have to think whatever's happening is right. 'Accept whatever happens--for now' may mean: You're going to stop making yourself so afraid, so angry, so resentful, so worried--and so unhappy. You're going to prefer that something be different--but not addictively demand it any longer! You're going to change your internal emotional experience."

Oh, and I am certainly still learning to apply this stuff myself, more consistently... reading Tolle and Ken Keyes helps a lot.

Quitting drinking/smoking is a good idea, methinks...you will be better able to cope when your mind is clear and you feel stronger.

Good luck and keep posted!

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