Hey Rich, the girl you're referring to appears not to be an angel, but rather just another person into head games.  You say you have read the literature, but maybe you should go back over all the passages about co-dependants. 

Most of us who have gotten sober and stayed that way, did it by putting our sobriety above ALL else, and not by worrying about our scorecard.  Worrying about having to be cool, funny, witty, charming, attractive to all the of opposite sex, and being able to "pick-up" as many of them as we can, while still being the most looked-up to by our buddies, is the exact place to stay if we want to be sure we aren't far from our next drinking trainwreck.  My ego had to go before I finally stopped drowning in a sea of booze.

Just another alkie,
Dan
PS. I also found that I didn't even have to keep trying to write like I was the next Mailer or Hemmingway. 
PS.PS. I also discovered that it takes extra effort to type the "f" word so many times, and I didn't really need it to get people to listen to what I had to say; in fact, they mostly listened better when I cut back on it. 

-- Edited by Sick of being sick at 06:01, 2007-11-28

Hey Rich,

You're in the right place buddy. It wasn't long after I got sober that I got in touch with my womanizing. Funny thing was I didn't even know the definition of the word. I walked in late to a meeting, one night, that I thought was AA, and sat down over on the other side of the room. While I was sipping my coffee I raised my head and realized that there were about 50 woman and only 3 men in the room. I thought to myself "how strange to have a women's meeting of AA at prime time in the main meeting room of this club". Then the leader of the meeting (I had missed the preambles) said "tonight's topic is characteristic #27 "I accepted sex when all I wanted was love".

I immediately choked on my coffee and went whoaaa!. The door was all the way on the other side of the room and I was too embarrassed to get up and leave. Besides, there were a lot of hot looking women in the room ;). Well the meeting went on and I listened to one woman's story after another of about how they had been slept with and dumped and the pain/heart ached that it had caused them. I kept slouching lower and lower into my chair. It seemed to last for hours and I couldn't wait to get out of there. Then, to my shock and horror near the end, the leader of the meeting pointed at me and said "would you like to share"? I was bright red and sweating profusely but my pride wouldn't let me say no. I was experiencing every negative emotion simultaneously- guilt, shame, fear, did I mention shame? All I could say was thanks for sharing and letting me see the other side of what lust and dishonesty can do.


After the meeting I walked up to one of the other men and asked him how long he had been attending Codependents anonymous and he told me about 2 years. Then I asked him if he could give me a definition of a womanizer and he laughed soooo hard and said "you don't know"? and I admitted that I I'd only heard the word a couple times (it wasn't a regular topic of conversation with the people I hung with lol) and I thought it meant a guy that was skilled at dating and perhaps did it a bit more frequently than most :o) Well he busted out laughing again and I thought he was going to roll on the floor. Of course I was embarrassed and then he told me that a womanizer was a man who leads woman to believe that they are having a romantic relationship for the express purpose of having sex with them when in reality he has no such feelings. He added that the relationships tend to end about as quickly as they started. Wow! and all that time (I was 30 years old then) I thought I was just "playing the game" and playing it well (sound familiar Rich?). Thankfully I accepted that I was a womanizer (yes I said it to myself right then) and realized that it was all about honesty, responsibility, and commitment subjects that I knew absolutely nothing about.

At that time I came to realize what was meant by the phrase "they don't know what they don't know". And I added on to that 'denial is a state of ignorance that prevents the person from knowing the dysfunctional behavior that they are regularly engaged in', hence I didn't even know the definition of the word, let alone that I was one. I didn't know what I didn't know. Once I grasped that concept my mind was truly open to learning and growing.

Keep coming back Rich, we'll leave the light on for you

Dean

Yeah seriously, thanks alot for all your responses. You guys were right of course. Danielle, you helped me a whole lot actually. I brokeup with the girlfriend today... She used to be enamored of me on every lievel, and after numerous benders, disasters, and general alcoholic BS, she stopped. Cant blame her. But i heard the words come out of her mouth, the fake i love yous with nothing behind them, which really mean 'meh, whatever ill keep you around and F around on you i guess.' I wanted to cry, not because she didn't care for me anymore, but because the reason i wasn't fooled is because its the same crap ive been doing and saying to others for all my adult life.

By the way, Sick of being Sick- you oughta be a poker player, cause you got some good reads my friend. Angel girl turned out to be a hooker, who lives in a hotel thats so ghetto that its about 1/2 a step above being homeless. I wont explain how i figured this out, but lets just say that gamblers see the telltale signs. My angel stayed with me for so long because she didnt want to go home, and/or had nowhere else to go. One thing ill give her though, she could have robbed me blind, and she didnt take anything at all. After i called her out onnit, she asked if id just be her attorney, and i just said OK.

Back to danielles comment, yeah i had to get rid of the girl because its way too mentally destructive to have to wonder what she's doing all the time, and wonder if she cares, and basically know deep down she doesnt. BReakup ill get over, the constant mindwrack of worrying, i never would.

But lemme tellya, it was a goddam eye opener, because it really showed me for the first time what a real monster i have been/am. She meted out about 1/20th of the punishment i did to her and others, and I totally crumbled, and went on a 9 day drinking spree. THis is sort of along the lines of what dean saw in codepndants anonymous, except i really got the tables turned on me for real this time. It didn't feel that great...It is so wierd to think that i am so sick that I have to be alone.

Anyways, im 5 days out and still having night sweats, but goddam im glad to be sober. I cant even explain the exhilerating feeling of driving by a cop knowing that im sober, and that he cant do anything to me. LOL. That and i can actually think again.

Thanks so so so so so much to you all. I know im a pretty immature prick, but i hope you can all bear with me...

PS, my writing styles not changing anytime soon, but the Fbombs, i can limit... :)

-- Edited by Zarathustra at 16:54, 2007-11-29

Hang in there Zarat,

In about 5 more days you're going to feel like a new man. Just don't go out and celebrate. get in the gym 3 or 4 days a week and do some cardio. It'll really lift your spirits.