Acceptance

MPJ and Indistinct have been blogging about acceptance. I do that "accept, damn you accept" thing that MPJ talks about too. I guess that's what Indistinct would refer to as compliance. But here's what I've learned in my magical meetings about acceptance. Acceptance doesn't mean that I like something or even that I agree with it. It just means that I recognize it for what it is and that I recognize that I can't change it, whatever the it that I happen to be struggling with at the time. Once I acknowledge that something is not to my liking but it is what it is and I can't change it,then I free up a lot of energy that I've been wasting in obsessing and/or manipulating. I have energy left now to figure out what I can change- my reaction, a boundary I need to set or a way to refocus my energy.

Too much space in my head

So, this job situation is taking up waaaay too much space in my head. I'm trying to use my tools, but as many of us seem to be saying lately, the tools themselves can be contradictory and confusing. Feel your feelings. Detach. Accept. Just for today. Well, for today, I'm not going anywhere, except to the Renaissance Festival. I know that other than what I've said already, I have no say in whether I stay where I am or am transferred again. There are good things about staying, and good things about ending up in the new place. I can trust that in the end, whatever happens will be good. The suckiest part is not knowing, and if I try to process, accept, and let go of the feelings associated with that, I'll be ok. (And if I choose to obsess my way through it, eventually I'll end up in the same place. I'll just make the journey more difficult.) If I do have to go, I can know that I just got through a similar transition, and that actually, I'd be moving to a place more in my comfort zone. (My comfort zone, crazy codependent that I am, is inner-city high needs, crisis-full rather than my current upper-middle suburbia position.) So, me, relax and go to the Renaissance Festival. What will happen, will happen. The process may suck, but I'll be ok either way. Let's try to enjoy the day and see what happens. Yep, it's yet Another Fucking Growth Opportunity!!

Oh yeah, today

My partner doesn't know my internet password, b/c she admittedly has a hard time with boundaries. She decided long ago that she shouldn't know it b/c she'd be tempted to go in and read my shit. Tonight, she wanted to watch a TV episode online. Stupid me, I thought about logging out of my screenname onto hers, so that she wouldn't go invading my boundaries, but decided that, hell, we're watching together, why bother switching. I'll be right there.

So, as soon as the show's over, she says, "gee, you have 400+ messages, let's look at them." I say, "let's not." So, what does she do? Open my email inbox. First, she says that she just opened the box, she didn't actually read any mail. Then, when I tell her I don't appreciate her doing that when I specifically asked her not to, she says that she had already clicked on it before I said that. When I called her on both lying and invading my boundaries, she admitted to both, and gave me a petulant "sorry."

So now, she's acting like I did something wrong and I'm being punished. I even tried giving her an out by reminding her of a tool we learned in couples therapy- the restitution gift. But instead, she's hiding under the blanket and I won't see her again tonight. Shit!!

Happy New Year

Tonight begins the Jewish New Year. Tomorrow and Friday, I'll be going to services alone. My partner and I had a silly fight last night. Silly, because she was supporting me in a way, but not in the way that I wanted to be supported. I've been putting off sending in my dues, as I do every year. I feel guilty and torn. My religion and the Jewish Community are really important to me. But I chose to become a member of a family where I am the only Jew. We talked about sharing traditions with each other, and we have, to some extent. We do family celebrations at home. We've had Passover Seders at our house, we light Chanukah candles, and we've even gotten pretty good about lighting candles and doing Shabbat prayers on Friday nights. But my partner does not like my Jewish Community. She says they're not welcoming of her. And her kids really don't consider themselves part of my family. When we have foster kids, they usually will attend services with me. But this year, we have no kids. And the High Holidays are a hard time to be alone. I wish things were different. They're not. I guess it's an opportunity to practice acceptance. My sponsor tells me that acceptance doesn't mean I like things the way they are, but that I acknowlege. And I have to acknowledge that as my partner has isolated herself, I have isolated with her. I've stopped asking her to go to functions with me, and I haven't gone on my own. I wish that I were sharing this really important part of me with this really important part of me. But it's one of those things that I cannot change.

Meanwhile I avoided the issue of dues until last night. When I brought it up, she said that "logically" it didn't make sense to pay that much, because we don't particpate enough to be worth that amount of money. While that's true, it's not the way I want things to be. I can't make her choose to participate, but I can choose to participate with or without her. So, tomorrow, I'll go to services alone. And this year, my intention is to participate in my community, with or without my partner.

It Seems

Well,

After a tumultuous couple of days, we've processed through this last incident as much as we're going to. It seems that she wasn't lying, or at least not consciously, and like all of you addicts and codies have been telling me, it wasn't about me.

She slept through all of the time that we were home together on Friday. Of course, my addict-addicted brain said that she was avoiding me, or we're going into another deeper crisis, or all kinds of other crazy shit. She woke up at 7:30pm and told me that she'd be home late that night. So of course, I'm spinning, spinning, spinning even more.

I talked to my sponsor, who was surprised that I was so upset about an addict lying. She told me that if I choose to be upset every time my addict lies, then I'm choosing to be upset a lot!! She said that I can't expect my addict to be trustworthy until she's had at least a year of clean time. She told me to stop beating a dead horse, and to read about acceptance. She reminded me that acceptance does not mean that I approve, but that I acknowledge the way things are.

When my partner got home at about 11, she told me that she'd been to two meetings, and that she only has one more to catch up in order to make her 90 in 90. She told me that she imagined that I thought she'd gone out after her meeting instead of coming home. She said that she knows that she could/ should have told me what her plans were, instead of just saying that she'd be home late, but that she's not in the habit of giving complete information. She said that she knows that her not giving complete information makes things harder for me, and she's willing to work on it.

She then talked more about opening the lockbox. She acknowledged that she didn't give me complete information, but said that it wasn't deliberate. She said that she did turn the dial until it opened, but that she really did see the numbers she told me when the combination opened. She acknowledged that maybe those were the numbers her brain wanted her to see. She said that she wished she had been lying, because the alternative is that she's crazy, and she'd prefer lying to crazy. She also told me that taking the prescription has awakened her tiger, and that she's really struggling now to stay clean.

In the words of Married to an Addict, it SEEMS that she was telling the truth, her truth,abeit not the whole truth, all along. I guess I'll never really know whether all of these convolutions (is that a word??) are her way of dealing with MY obsession with truth and trust, or if it's just the way her brain is working right now. And I guess it doesn't really matter.

"Seems" is my new detachment tool. I don't have to know. And I don't have to invest quite so much into whether things really are the way they "seem."