As For Me...

Credit

First of all- thank you so much for the outpouring of love and support you sent my way via comments, emails and texts.  There is power in solidarity and I FEEL it.  I love you for it.  Sometimes when I comment on blogs I feel small and insignificant.  But each comment here, EACH one, and every email MEANS something to me.  It makes me feel like I matter, I am loved, and people care.  That never gets old for me.

Finding out about lies, and dealing with a relapse after Pete's longest stretch of sobriety in years was hard.

But peeps- I've been doing this recovery business for a few years now and I think it's actually working! It's hard to put my finger on what exactly feels differently about my life.  Especially since I'm STILL dealing with these issues, as much as I've wished them away.

I took a parenting class a few years ago where the gentle, grandmotherly teacher suggested that perfection wasn't the goal of the class.  It was just decreasing percentages.  Instead of yelling at my kids 90% of the time when I was frustrated, the goal was to only yell 70% of the time.  This is how recovery has helped me.  I still have codependent behaviors, I still trigger back to trauma, I still hold a grudge sometimes and I still get angry.   But my percentages are down.

I am less panicked and desperate when Pete acts out.

I am less irritable and anxious when I see my lack of control.

I spend less time in bed and on the bathroom floor.

I personalize Pete's behavior and resentments less.

I feel more acceptance and patience.

Forgiveness comes more easily.

There are so many analogies about perspective.  But I love the words to "Let it Go" from Frozen.

It's funny how some distance, makes everything seem small. 
And the fears that once controlled me, can't get to me at all. 

A couple years ago, even months ago, Pete's pornography addiction seemed like a mountain ahead of me. So HUGE, so overwhelming, so consuming, so terrifying, so traumatizing.  But gradually it looks smaller, takes less of my energy and I find myself being more easily distracted from it.

I wouldn't say that my fears can't get to me at all.  But they get to me less.  And I can spend more time in gratitude and less time in despair.

So I'm doing okay.  Better yet, I think I'm doing well, all things considered.  Thank you again- so much!