My father, who was a violent drunk, died of alcoholism when I was 18 years old. For many years I thought of him as bad, evil, and weak. I judged him and felt confident I was correct in my harsh assessment of his behavior. I said in meetings that I understood alcoholism as a disease, yet I continued to condemn my father for willfully mistreating his family. Recently I gained a new understanding. I found out his father, who died before I was born, had also been a violent alcoholic. I am now flooded with new feelings for my father -- compassion, understanding, and kinship. Before this awareness I always perceived my father as one of "Them," the Perpetrator, the Problem. It was hard to think of him as one of us. I can never know what shaped him into the person he became, yet I am grateful to Al-Anon, where I learned to replace condemnation with compassion. Thought for the Day I feel compassion when I realize that my parents may have endured an upbringing similar to mine. "I take into account how affected I am by my past when I meet people who seem difficult and I try to give them a break." *From Survival to Recovery*, p. 171 ----------
XXXXXXXX i felt this way over my mother.......she enabled me to be sexually assaulted **multiple** times by her husband, my bio. father....i hated her for that.....i thought she was evil and had NO character......i judged her and i too, felt like i was correct to judge her and ask God to cast her to hell like i am SURE he did the perp.....i figured they deserve to "fry" together.......she was an alcoholic.....he forced her to drink so he could (i later discovered) get her to perform devient sex acts with him, and she after a while, got hooked on the stuff....my take is, she HAD to drink to be able to satisfy his devient desires...by the time he began acting them out of me, she was too far gone
XXXXXXXX i too, knew alcoholism was a disease yet, i continued to condemn her for doing what she did to me......since i got into recovery, i STILL think her sin against me was reprehensible....i suffer post traumatic stress syndrome, and sometimes, especially during these past two years recovery, my symptoms have been nearly unbearable..becuz i am NOT numbing out...not abusing alcohol/drugs to numb my pain, i am FACING it.......its hard not to "damn their souls" as i suffer from these horrible symptoms......i have panic attacks....i suffer over production of adrenalin, making me hyper...and than when my poor adrenal glands are too tired, they produce the noradrenelin and i am shut down and numb....my body's way of forcing me to "rest" ...lately i have suffered terriblly as a result of trying to feel these UNresolved family of origin pain/emotions of outrage and grief.....but i plod along hopeing that i will eventually find relief, or my body will quit and i'll not wake up one day......either way, i DECIDED to quit hating them...i decided its a waste of my time AND it takes away from my loving and caring for me and my relationship with my higher power....
XXXXXX i do beleive in God's justice....so i leave it in the hands of the almighty "justice is mine--i SHALL repay"....so i decided to leave it....i decided to love and accept me UNconditionally and that takes up my time, NOT the old hate/ resentment for those two........
XXXXXXX oddly enough i can even feel SOME compassion for her.....what she did will NEVER be ok, however i think the poor creature was victimized like i was and proof of that was she coudln't even save herself, much less me...so i am making my peace with her by turning it over into God's hands, as i take care of me......i am busy, too busy taking care of me...trying to learn how to cope better with life.....trying to learn techniques of relaxation to ease my symptoms.... learning coping skills as i am impaired in that area....my intense need for feeling safe...the enormous need i have to protect me/ feel safe leaves me unable to cope well with life's unwanted changes.....so i am practicing new skills in self talk.....breathing.....muscle tightening/releasing and working my program so i can cope better.......
XXXXXXX bottm line??? i am too busy taking care of me and doing what i can to put my life back together to think about those two......she drank herself to death...i am sure she did it becuz she couldn't live with what she did to me......for the sake of her soul, i hope she had remourse....something kinda tells me she did.........its not my business....my business is me and my relationship with me/ God...thats all.....what time i have left, i want to find some peace and joy......i know i have to go through this darkness to get to the light......i am working DAY to day on just that.....so i don't care about what her past was, what his past was...i remember all four of my grandparents as being just average family people.....MAYBE his parents were a bit neglectful , but i asked about both of them and their pasts and i heard of NO abuse to either of them, but whatever-- there is no excusing what they did to me......all i can do, the BEST i can do is quit hating them and resenting them , spending energy on them , so i can take that energy and spend it helping me.....thats it....some crimes are just not forgiveable....but i am not going to wallow in hate/resentment anymore............
XXXXXX i had a bad weekend this weekend, my symptoms were bad this weekend as i go THROUGH the unresolved inner child/ famiy of origin PAIN.....its hard not to feel anger/rage when i am having to nurture me through my pstd symptoms......its hard, but i will FEEL the feelings until i can get THROUGH this shit and have a life.......i am glad i didn't know how painful recovery work really was...i may have said #$#$ it and just kept abusing alcohol to keep the pain away......now that i am in so deep, i gotta keep going....MAYBE one day, i will notice that i feel better and can cope with life better........this inner child pain work is hell but it makes NO sense at all unless i get to the ROOTS of my pain, prune the tree right down to its BARE trunk, and THAN start all over...thats what i feel like i am doing......
Maybe this is not going to sound consoling, but it is the truth, in my opinion, NO PAIN.......... NO GAIN.
Many years ago, I heard a woman in a meeting, that was speaking about something extremely painful to her, she said her experience was that "At the very center of her Pain, was Exactly the place where she found God". I have always remembered that when I am hurting about something, and what she said, has become very much a truth in my life.
Hope you have a good week ahead with some peace to it.
hugs, Toni
Here's to the Light ahead of you, God's Light, as a Lighthouse holds a Light in all of Life's Storms.
I can really relate , rosie.. to both the article, and to what you're saying. I have an adrenalin problem too,,, and actually,, some experts are saying that that is a major factor in PTSD - that we don't metabolize adrenalin well,,, it surges to easily and dissipates too slowly.
I also found out that my father was horribly abused and neglected as a child,,, and am coming to understand how he became an abuser better. And my mother,,, mixed blood,, half-breed,, afraid to stand up for herself to a White man,, wanting to go home but unable to get out of the marriage with 2 kids. My father had his own PTSD. Well, so,, the hatred I had is gone,,, the wounds and scars remain,, the lack of social skills, etc.
For some years I thought I could 'get to the bottom of it',,, but I found out I can't. I now work through what is relevant to my situation at the time,,, what memories and issues come up at the time,,, but I am no longer really digging. And I found out that obsessing on the stuff to try to get to the bottom and get things over with is not really healthy either. In order to get past it we just have to get past it,,, take a break from it ,,, have some time to try and just go on retreat or take a break and take it easy. And don't always just think about my self and my stuff and taking care of me,,,, that is an obsession too... I have to do the Step 12 and start relating to other people somehow,,, balancing my life,,, go fishing ffs!
love in recovery,
amanda
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do your best and God does the rest, a step at a time
