I did a chair tonight at my home group and it struck me when listening to some of the sharing back that I had focused the entirety of my share of alcoholism on my dad's alcoholism not my own!!! I had never really appreciated that I had done that before.
I get so frustrated with HIM when he focuses on drinking patterns of his alcoholic friend, but I am doing exactly the same thing by focusing on HIS alcoholism and not MY OWN.
It's like I "got" step one on an emotional and mental level but I am still firmly entrenched in denial about my own drinking habits. Sure, they did not progress to the extent that some have known, but they were dangerous, out of control. I do not mean by this that I still have an obsession to drink because I absolutely know that I do not. That obsession left me very early on in my time in AA.
I can only clear my side of the street. I have tried to make my dad go to AA, go to Al annon, read the Big Book but he won't. His denial is too thick. I am completely powerless over this and think I may have reached the point of "throwing in the towel" on that issue.
(Reminds me of one of those AA sayings I heard fro the first time the other day "Throwing in the towel, but holding onto the corner" Hehee I liked that one)
As my sponsor said to me when he had his last bender, I am NOT that important and DO NOT make him drink (although this was a line he used to take when I was younger, bless his heart) or CAUSE him to drink. I simply do not have that much power. There is a god and I am not it. That does not mean that I do not continue to try to be the best daughter I can be, despite my frustrations with him and, anger. I am trying to cultivate compassion here and have made progress, but this is a tough one. Still, it's doable I am sure!!
I will check out Adult Children of Alcoholics soon...when I have some more time!!!
I also seem to have more acceptance around the fact that it's taking me a bit of time to catch up with my non alcoholic peers. I have a long way to go in terms of my ability to form relationships and to trust and to make friendships, but I will get there in the end.....
As one of my sponsors used to say when I asked HOW...it takes HARD LABOUR..:-) For me, this is about trying to suspend my disbelief when people say there lives keep getting better and better the more they practice these principles in all their affairs (and not throwing so many tantrums :-))
Goos luck to those of you embarking on those legal courses/new term. You know who you are.
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3 comments:
I try not to judge my parents, but looking at my drinking habits has forced me to look at theirs too - especially since in some ways they are intertwined. My mom believes that I am over-reacting and that I am being my typical melodramatic self - turning a bump into a mountain.
Thanks for your thoughts!
Kindly,
K.
Thanks!
yeah, I don't rate ACOA as I did it for 1-2yrs before going to AA.
I think this tihng with your dad is a classic control freak issue. Actor trying !! to run the show. very unsuccesfully.
the thing about focussing on him. thats a BLAME culture. always looking OUTWARD for your FIX. Instead of looking INWARD.
With you, it seems you KEEP doing this thing AGAIN and AGAIN. Like you REALLY believe that:
"if only people would do as he wished, the show would be great. Everybody, including himself, would be pleased. Life would be wonderful." p61
Yeah RIGHT!
"NONSENSE. Some of us have taken VERY hard knocks to learn this truth: Job or no job-wife or no wife-we simply do not stop drinking so long as we place DEPENDENCE upon other people ahead of dependence on God." p98
Seems like this is your mantra for this lifetime!
Hopefully !! you will get sick and tired of being sick and tired enough to accept this one day..
Thank you :)
And why not try writing out a drinking history (?again) unglamorised, ego puncturing truth, exactly how YOUR DRINKING WAS undignified, and all its consequences? YOURS not his.
Were you really a high class drunk drunk?
Pray for the willingness
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