My life has been going so good that it hurts. A newfound intimacy and committment to honesty with my husband, uncovering painful but useful parts of myself, building new and close relationships with women for the first time in my life, even having the willingness to get honest in ways I've never been honest before.
Today I want to act out, to fall deep into a relationship that I can get lost in. Find an extramarital partner who I can make my Higher Power, so that I don't have to build and intimate relationship with a true power greater than myself, or get close to the REAL people in my life. I want to do this because yesterday I acted out.
After months of physical sobriety, but still playing too close to the fire for too long ... testing myself and God ... I let it sneak up on me. Today I feel disgusted and ashamed with myself. And I have to realize that something about this horrible feeling works for me. Perhaps it is that it propels me further into my disease ... that giving a quick hand job in a parking lot leads me to be obsessed with the need for more, more, more.
I'm so sick of writing about relapses. But apparently not sick enough. I'm so angry that I was so stupid to let this happen, to skip meetings and isolate ... to cut myself off from what I needed to stay sober just long enough to be drawn back in.
I can't change yesterday, and I'm having a hard time changing today, even though I did ignore two messages from people I could have engaged with. Those two messages tell me that I'm putting the energy out there. I'm ready to scream. The quick hits don't get it anymore, but they can set off a shit storm of hurt.
I knew there was a chance for this. I came so close to acting out just a couple of weeks ago. I just didn't take it seriously enough. I got too cocky (pardon the pun). I literally despise myself right now and that makes it all the more enticing to go out and find someone to "love" me.
Thankfully my niece is coming tomorrow and will be here through Monday. I hate it that my withdrawal will interfere with my chance to be close and open with her.
Am I really even willing to accept the real love that is around me? Am I willing to be happy? I thought that's what I was working for? Why do I keep fucking it up so royally?
I'm just writing because it's the only thing I know to do. And I'm crying ... because I don't know if I'll ever be better. If it will just be a few months of getting better only to have another painful slip. How can I forget all the things I've learned? How can I forget how many people hurt?
Thankfully my friend EC was there to listen and not yell and to remind me that I have made progress ... just refraining all these months. But now I may act out for a few months. Who knows?
Someone shared recently that they couldn't take another relapse because they weren't sure they could come back. Coming back to recovery is the only thing I keep doing right. Everything else I keep really, really screwing up.
Maybe I’m Regaining a Religion
6 years ago
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8 comments:
Sweet, Sweet Rae,
My heart broke for you, feeling your pain. I know. I know. I wish I could be there, if only to cry with you.
I feel it important to tell you that you do not need to convince yourself that you are a victim. You are not. I have proof.
I was telling my therapist a month ago the very same words you just typed into your keyboard. Crying, I was pleading with him. I wanted to know I was going to be okay. I wanted to proof.
I am going to tell you what he told me. "You want proof?"
"yes"
"you're here."
I must've given him a completely retarded expression, because he said it again. And then I understood.
Sweetie, the very fact that you come here, and blog, and are so brutally honest, it hurts, is proof that you will survive.
You only have today. That is all you have. Today you have not acted out. So dwell on your moment of strength. It is yours, own it. And in this moment, be still, and let the love we all have for you encourage you for. this. moment.
In this moment. You are perfect.
What bizylizy said. You are here and you are working -- and it's not perfect -- but it's progress and it's beautiful. Hugs, Rae.
Sometimes I wonder if addiction is in essence self-sabotage.
And if self-sabotage is escape, from the possibility of real failure.
If we sabotage ourselves before we can honestly try for success, then our failure is less real than if we honestly tried, and, God-forbid, find utter real failure then.
It's a courage hurdle, to get past self-sabotage, and face, REALLY face, the possibility of failure in life.
But if we never really face it, we will never really experience success, either.
Time for a paradigm shift. Something needs to change, because the pattern persists.
Examine self-sabotage. Like you said, something in it is "working" for you - that is, working to bring you back to your pattern, where you are familiar, where your coping mechanisms have been. The leap is to that of new coping mechanisms. And that is indeed a paradigm shift, a major one.
-TT
I'm so sorry you're suffering. When I relapse it hurts so bad. How can I forget that much pain?
And yet tonight I entered my former therapist's name into a search engine, which is just insane! After playing around with that flame, I came here and read your blog, which was a big help to me.
I think you do have the willingness to be happy. Maybe it's just taking time to have the habit of being happy.
I hate relapses. I hate feeling like a pile of poop afterwards. I hate feeling like a took all the hard work, all the trust I had built with my spouse and took a huge dump all over it.
I just take joy in the fact that you're brutally honest, open, and somehow God still loves you.
Grace and Peace
Michael
www.the-confessions-of-a-porn-addict.blogspot.com
P.S. -
Thank you for being so honest. It helps others. And we cry with you, because for me, I've been there. I know the pain, the shame and the hurt.
You're an inspiration.
Rae, please don't make whatever happened yesterday ruin your todays and tomorrows. It is over. Keep using the good you have learned and let go of the bad. Don't carry the weight of your mistake with you. Learn what you can from it and move on.
Much love to you. You are a good person.
I have found that I am partly addicted to the shame that I feel after acting out. When I act out, it's not just about the "erotic moment", it's about the pain and shame afterwards. To a certain extent, I like the self-pity and pain. Probably because I haven't understood how to be truly happy in the past. I wanted to beat myself up and self-loathe. The idea of being gentle with myself after acting out has been huge for me. When I am self-loving instead of self-loathing after I mess up, it makes recovery easier. The self-loathing leads to more acting out.
Full effort is full victory - Mahatma Gandhi.
Don't give up! Be gentle with yourself!
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