"Change Back!"

I'm reading a book on anger by Harriet Lerner. In it, she describes the "change back!" phenomenon. This is the reaction of most people when we try to change our behavior, improve our communication, set a new boundary.

This is certainly what happened in my case. When I decided to set some boundaries with Husband after D-Day, I certainly heard "change back!" in the way he responded. In the beginning, he did some recovery work, and by that I mean that he went to a meeting once a week only if it was convenient for him to go. I now know that nothing really changed, and he was just attending the meetings so that I would leave him alone. After a few months, he quit going. He claimed that he was too busy, and he didn't want to discuss it further.

I did a lot of thinking about this. His lack of recovery behavior made me feel unsafe. But was I being too demanding? Was I being controlling in wanting him to participate in recovery? How would he react if I set a boundary? I decided that I would no longer have sex with him if he was not going to be in recovery. I talked it through with my therapist, and she thought this was a good solution. It was not a boundary to punish him, to try to control him, or manipulate him. This was truly a boundary to keep me safe. I had no idea if I was putting myself at physical risk by being intimate with him, so it had to stop.

His response was probably the most painful string of words I've ever heard from him. He told me that I was cutting him down at a time where he was just getting his life together. He said, "What is this supposed to accomplish?" "Why even try recovery if it's not going to do any d*** good?" "Eleanor, you can be my best motivator to change or my addict's best motivator to act out." He thought my therapist put me up to this and was brainwashing me. He told me I was clueless and selfish. That I don't realize how much I've hurt him. 

Looking back on that time, I can clearly see the addict response. He was losing easy access to his drug, and he was willing to do anything to get it back. He didn't care who he hurt along the way. But in the moment, I felt ashamed. I felt like a horrible wife. I eventually, after a month, gave in. He did not change his behavior, but I started having sex with him again. I couldn't take the hurt, the mean words, the coldness.

It took me almost a year to set another, more permanent boundary...our separation.

I'm reflecting on that time because I now realize, in reading Lerner's book, that this was "change back!" behavior. And it worked. I did change back. But now I remember how awful it felt. And I have resisted the "change back!" message during our separation. I will NOT back down. I will fight for my safety, and I will fight so that my child can live in a home free of addiction.

Reality Check

I, along with most members of my family, am afflicted with an illness. It's called "viewing the world through rose-colored glasses". On the surface, this seems like a positive character trait, and in many ways it can be. We tend to see the best in people, we jump to help when people are in need, and we look for the silver linings in situations. But this character trait has also at times prevented me from seeing Husband for what he is, an addict. It is what kept me living in a situation that was harmful to my spiritual, emotional, and physical well-being. And I have worked so, so hard to accept the reality of my situation, as that is what gives me the strength to set healthy boundaries for myself.

But, today I want to travel back in time to the days before I knew he was an addict. I want to stay up late with him talking and laughing, making jokes and getting too competitive playing board games. I want to watch off-beat movies and lie together on the couch, and I want to end the day feeling loved and cherished. I just want one day where I have that man back, even though I know he did not really exist. I created an idealized version of Husband that was at odds with his hidden life. It's just so hard to accept reality.

What I'll actually do tonight is exercise my anger out, spend quality time playing with my child, cook dinner, prep for tomorrow, kiss my child goodnight, and go to bed alone. But I'll go to bed knowing that I am taking care of myself and my child in a home that is free of addiction. And maybe that new reality will start to grow on me.

"It's What I Do, Not Who I Am"

I recently made a decision to make a change in my career that will allow me more time at home and a lower-stress environment at work. I have wanted to make this change for a very long time, but just now worked up the courage to go for it. When I made that decision, I felt very good about it. This was the first time that I made a work-related decision because it was best for me and my family, even if it wasn't necessarily the best thing for climbing the career ladder. I called that a victory in self-care because one of my biggest struggles has been that I judge my worth based on external accomplishments. "I am a good person if I get this award at work. I am worthy if I get offered the very best job."

Last night I was at the playground and started chatting with another mom who works in a similar field. We got to talking about work, and I told her about this career move. Before I knew it, I found myself qualifying the move left and right. "Well, I did it because A and B. And, yes, I know there were more promising career moves. And I could have gone for those positions." Code speak for "I am really worthy, you'll see. I have A, B, and C in my career portfolio, you should believe me that I'm a worthwhile person. And my self-worth clearly is based on what I achieved externally rather than who I am."

The playground conversation let me know that although I made a step in the right direction by choosing a career path that is best for me and my family, I still seek validation through external accomplishments. I want to remember that my job is what I do, it's NOT who I am. But now that I am no longer basing my self-worth on what I do, I need to figure out exactly who I am.

God Are You There? It's Me Eleanor...

I grew up in a very conservative religious family. Somewhere along the line, although I'm sure this was not my parents' intention nor the intention of my religious community in teaching me about faith, I internalized what people have called "Catholic guilt". That nagging feeling that I am doing something wrong, I am not doing enough for others, and that I am just plain wrong. I had a sneaking suspicion that I just wasn't who God intended for me to be, I wasn't the daughter my parents wanted, I just wasn't.

After D-Day I found myself not only questioning many "truths" I had learned growing up, but I found myself questioning the very existence of God. And here's why. My brain and its warped logic decided that men are not to be trusted. Men are dangerous. Men abuse their power. I now realize that my brain is making a huge, unjustified leap from my experiences with Husband to half of our world's population (thank you for the reality check, therapist!). But because I have traditionally thought of God as a father-like figure, somehow my warped logic has also included God in those not to be trusted.

So I guess I'm starting from scratch here. People in my recovery circles speak of a gentle, caring Higher Power who loves unconditionally. They speak of unearned grace, the necessity of taking care of ourselves as a way to thank God for giving us life. They talk about letting go and letting God, trusting in the process, feeling the healing presence of God in their lives. I'm trying to be open to conversion. If a God like the one I just described exists, I would love to get to know Him (Her?).

Some Good Decisions and Some Bad Decisions

I felt like I was having an out-of-body experience. I was watching the story line for a psychological thriller in which a wife finds out about an entire double life her husband is leading, and she tries to put together the pieces and understand how she got herself in this situation. It didn't feel like my real life. I felt so alone. Surely other people were not experiencing this kind of pain. I was wrong about this, unfortunately, but knowing there were other people in my situation opened my eyes to a whole community of support.

Having a recovery group, finding a therapist, and confiding in a few trusted friends were all decisions that helped me to remain sane in an insane time. Seeing a doctor to get tested for STDs, although humiliating, was so important. These decisions to reach out for help were what kept me from completely losing it in the first few months after D-Day. I also reached out to the priest at my Church and found that the encounter only made the wound deeper. For a while, I harbored anger and resentment towards not only him but the entire Church. It took me a long time to realize that, like me, he had no idea how to respond to my story.

I also made some decisions that, knowing what I know now, I would not ever have made. The first is that I allowed Husband to move back in after only being gone a few weeks after D-Day. I don't think I truly realized what it meant to have an addiction, and I know I didn't realize how much I enabled his behavior. I told him he had to sleep on the couch, but before I knew it, we were back to our same old routine.

I was so easily swayed in the months following D-Day, and my confusion about the situation made my judgment blurry. My brain would just simply 'forget' that he was an addict. Although he'd known he was an addict for years, I had just discovered it. I found myself going back to my old way of interacting with him and stopping mid-conversation with a feeling that was like a punch to my gut...oh right, he's an addict, a liar, a manipulator. My Husband, the man with whom I have a child, the man I committed myself to in front of God and family, my best friend, is not who I thought he was.

My Very Best Decision

At my request, Husband moved out of our home a while back. This was not the first time that I requested he move out, but it was the first time I was serious. I told him that I could no longer function in a home with him. My progress in healing from this trauma as well as dealing with my own issues was at a standstill with active addiction still present in the home.

In the past, I would ask him to move out, and he would use his best tactics to convince me that this was not a good idea. I wasn't yet strong enough to stand up to him. But I finally hit the end of the road. I was at my limit. I tried every known method possible to function in a home with an addict, who sometimes proclaimed to be in recovery, but most of the time still lived in secrecy. I realized that the only thing left to do was to let go. Let go of his recovery, let go of our marriage, let go of my dreams for our life together. I told Husband that if he did not agree to move out, I would file for divorce. And because I knew from past behavior that I was a wimp when it came to standing up for myself, I actually went to far as to hire a lawyer and draw up papers just to make sure that I would follow through this time. With no other options left, Husband agreed to move out.

My Two Worlds

It's been almost two years since D-Day, or the day I discovered that much of my marriage had been a lie. It was a sunny Saturday afternoon, and I had just come home from a run. I opened my computer to pay a bill before going to the grocery and found that my husband forgot to log out of his email.

Thinking that it was my email account, I was surprised. What's with all the spam? I thought. Until I saw my husband's name, and I saw that these were his emails. They weren't spam. They went back years. To before we even met. They were filled with evidence of infidelity. My hands started to shake, and I couldn't speak. Stunned by what I was seeing but still unable to grasp the severity of the situation, I could only get out the words, What is this?

Still hoping that somehow there was an explanation for this that was anything other than my husband was a compulsive cheater and liar, I waited for his response.

I don't know. He said.

There is no training for the type of situation in which I found myself. So I did the only thing that seemed rational and called my sister to tell her that my son and I needed to stay with her for a while. My husband suggested that he leave instead, and I suddenly remembered that these were the types of actions for which wives kick husbands out of the house.

So he left, and I stood in the living room, motionless. Unable to cry.