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Post by Loving My Life on Apr 15, 2014 15:03:45 GMT -8
I was reading on the forum today, and it breaks my heart to read when others are feeling so hopeless and hurt and in so much pain from this addiction. I want you too know it does not and will not stay this way, you can face your pain, and heal your pain through this process. I have been there, and I know this pain, and I know how bad it hurts when you can have the person that you think it right for you. If our poa's we supposed to be with us, then we would not be feeling so much pain over all of this. We are not in a healthy place, and most of our poa's are not healthy themselves. When you have to people feeding off of each others addictions, it will not sustain if one addict starts to recovery, and the other one has no interest in recovering, it just does not work, and this is the painful part of recovery. Some recovery and some don't, this is why is it so important that we do this for ourselves, and no one else, because if we are recovering for someone else, or in order to get our poa's back, and it does not work out, this will only cause us to relapse, and this is not the goal of recovery. I want to share from my meditation today and it is about grief.. "Grief may be JOY misunderstood; Only the Good discerns the good." It may seem strange to grieve for the loss of our addiction but there is indeed mourning the needs to take place as we recover. There is so much to let go of as we discover and admit the toll our addiction has taken on our life. Letting go includes feeling the loss. The challenge is to grieve without judging ourselves, don't self-blame and automatically think your defective, and don't judge how you are feeling, you have ever right to feel the way you are feeling, and if you cant identify what your feeling, you can not heal. Maybe our addiction helped us cope with life when we didn't have healthy coping skills. Maybe it helped cover up feelings or events that were too painful to face. Maybe living as a practicing addict was truly the best we could do with our life at the time. The tragedy was that as we sank deeper into addiction, it began to control us. It became our Higher Power, our lover, our job, our friend. That's why its important to grieve not only for the loss of the addiction/poa, no matter how unhealthy it was, but for the loss of ourselves and the things we missed out on in life because of our addiction. Grief, honestly felt and expressed, is a healing experience. If I am grieving today, I give myself permission to do so. I need not be accountable to anyone else for how I feel, but i'll simply take care of myself with gentleness and compassion. We really need to try to stop the insanity of our love addiction, if it not worth it, too keep trying new relationships over and over again, thinking the results will be different, if we have not allowed ourselves to grieve the loss of our poa's, and really did the necessary work on ourselves, to see why we feel the way we feel, and why we keep choosing the same kind of poa's, thinking it will be different, it we have not change from the inside out, nothing is going to change. Grieve the old person of addiction, and get to know the recovering healthy person you will finally meet, you will be amazed.. Hugs
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Post by pursuitofhappy on Apr 15, 2014 15:20:53 GMT -8
Great post Loving My Life,
Really hit home with me. I really just wish I can skip the whole grieving thing (thats the addict in me). What you said makes alot of sense. Ive had numerous friends, family members, and even members of this forum tell me that I'm being too hard on myself. Its just that I hate this feeling of pain, it is all encompassing.
Hearing from the veterans here such as yourself, that the pain will go away someday is inspiring and gives me so much hope.
This has been such a scary ordeal for me, I've been on antidepressants for the first time in my life and couldnt get out of bed during the initial withdrawal period. Coming across this forum definitely has helped me tremendously as well as utilizing new tools in my tool box. Thanks for all of your work and messages, they really help
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Post by Loving My Life on Apr 15, 2014 16:49:35 GMT -8
Pursuitofhappy, I was there, right were you are and I did not know what I was going to do either at that time, but I just kept putting one foot in front of the other and kept working recovery and as the days past I kept getting stronger and stronger until I could finally say, enough and know without a doubt, I was going to be ok without my poa...it took me along time...4 years but I finally made it...in december 2013, I could not do it anymore.
The obsessions will lessen, you will start moving again, and you will even catch yourself sharing a laugh or two with people, and with laugh comes healing also...when my laughter returned I did not even realize that I had stopped laughing, but I had.
I even got too where I would laugh at myself some, what a relief...I was human..lol
You will get there too...keep doing the deal..
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Post by Loving My Life on Apr 16, 2014 5:58:21 GMT -8
I wanted to share that there are 7 stages of grief:
1) Shock and Denial
2) Pain and Guilt
3) Anger and Bargaining
4) Depression, Reflection Loneliness
5) THE UPWARD TURN
6) Reconstruction and Working Through
7) Acceptance and Hope
I am going to share on each of these stages, and when you can identify what stage you are at, please try to get past the loop of stage 1-4, stages 5-7 is where you will finally find your peace.
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Post by Loving My Life on Apr 16, 2014 6:02:21 GMT -8
Stage 1: SHOCK AND DENIAL
You will probably react to learning of the loss with numbed disbelief. You may deny the reality of the loss at some level, in order to avoid the pain.
Shock provided emotional protection from being overwhelmed all at once.
This may last for weeks.
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Post by Loving My Life on Apr 16, 2014 6:05:19 GMT -8
Stage 2: PAIN AND GUILT
As the shock wears off, it is replaced with the suffering of unbelievable pain. Although excruciating and almost unbearable, it is important that you experience the pain fully, and not hide it, avoid it or escape from it with alcohol or drugs, or another poa.
You may have guilty feelings or remorse over things you did or didn't do with your poa. Life feels chaotic and scary during this phase.
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Post by Loving My Life on Apr 16, 2014 6:10:15 GMT -8
Stage 3: ANGER AND BARGAINING
Frustration gives way to anger, and you may lash out and lay unwarranted blame for the breakdown of the relationship on someone else. Please try to control this, as permanent damage to your friendships may result.
This is the time to release bottle up emotions, we are trying to learn how to feel our feelings when we are in recovery. We are safe in recovery. Earth people don't get us, people in recovery do.
You may rail against fate, questioning "Why Me?" You may also try to bargain in vain with the powers that be a way out of this despair..("I will never drink again, if you will just come back to me and lets make this relationship work" ) Don't do this, this is only continuing to hurt yourself.
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Post by Loving My Life on Apr 16, 2014 6:14:43 GMT -8
Stage 4 DEPRESSION, REFLECTION, LONELINESS..
Just when your friends may think you should be getting on with your life, a long period of sad reflection will likely overtake you. This is a normal stage of grief, so do not be "talked out of it" by well-meaning outsiders.
Encouragement from others is not helpful to you during this stage of grieving.
During this time, you finally realize the true magnitude of your loss, and it depresses you. You may isolate yourself on purpose, reflect on things you did with loss with your poa and focus on memories of the past. You may sense feelings of emptiness or despair.
Also during this stage try to be around healthy people, and try to get involved in some kind of 12 step group, or some kind of support group.
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Post by Loving My Life on Apr 16, 2014 6:18:37 GMT -8
Stage 5: THE UPWARD TURN.....THIS IS WHERE THE TURNAROUND BEGINS...DONT GO BACK TO STAGE 1-4, IF YOU DO DONT STAY THERE LONG.
As you start to adjust to life without your poa, your life becomes a little calmer and more organized. Your physical symptoms lessen and your "depression" begins to life slightly.
At this stage also start adding in some healthy activities for yourself...Exercise, Meditation, plan some kind of healthy activity for yourself weekly, going out to eat, or the movies, or getting your hair and nails done, go back to school and take some classes to improve your self esteem, and make more money in the process. just plan something so you will have something too look forward too each week.
We have to set small goals for ourselves, we have to have something to look forward too.
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Post by Loving My Life on Apr 16, 2014 6:22:01 GMT -8
Stage 6: RECONSTRUCTION AND WORKING THROUGH..
As you become more functional, your mind starts working again, and you will find yourself seeking realistic solutions to problems posed by life without your poa. You will start to work on practical and financial problems and reconstructing yourself and your life without your poa.
Get to know who the real person you are, all by yourself now, you might realize that you enjoy your own company, and you are awesome all by yourself.
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Post by Loving My Life on Apr 16, 2014 6:28:05 GMT -8
Stage 7: ACCEPTANCE AND HOPE
During this, the last of the seven stages in this grief model, you learn to accept and deal with the reality of your situation.
Acceptance does not necessarily mean instant happiness. Given the pain and turmoil you have experienced, you can never return to the carefree, untroubled YOU that existed before this experience. During the process our innocent is gone, the blinders are off, and we will move forward with our life now, and we will be able to protect ourselves.
You will start to look forward and actually plan things for the future.
Eventually, you will be able to think about the loss of you poa without pain, sadness, yes, but the wrenching pain will be gone. You have suffer enough.
You will once again anticipate some good times to come, and yes, even find joy again in the experience of living.
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Post by Deleted on Apr 16, 2014 15:31:40 GMT -8
Its been three months since ive contacted my POA and i was told by my counselor that i am in the denial stage. I wasnt really aware of that until she told me. It seems to be very accurate. But I am also in the anger and pain and the depression stage too. Denial is first on the list, which tells me im no where close to recovery. How do I move pass denial?
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Post by Loving My Life on Apr 16, 2014 16:42:34 GMT -8
Everchanging,
I was in denial for awhile myself, I could not believe how gullible I was, I could not believe another human being could walk around with no feelings for other humans. I felt like I had been sexually seduced over the phone, and I was...my poa knew exactly what he was doing because he does this every day...so it took me along time to get out of denial as well.
I always thought I was a good judge of character but I totally missed this one, it was a process, my poa groomed me for this, the first year we talked he was here for me, once the hook was set, he changed like the wind, and nothing was matching up at that point, and it hurt so bad, because I still wanted to believe all the lies he told me at first, the person that I fell in love with never existed...and this is just so sick..
So I just had to keep doing this deal with recovery, because I knew he was not the person I wanted to be with...he was a loser.
I felt like I was losing my mind alot of days, but I kept praying and praying and doing my recovery...this is not easy but we have to face our truth.
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Post by Jacarandagirl on Apr 17, 2014 17:13:10 GMT -8
The way to move past denial is to be open to seeing things differently. Be willing to see yourself. I've also heard that it's typical to be in various elements of multiple stages at once.
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Post by fitbrit on May 12, 2014 7:21:32 GMT -8
This is really helpful...
I feel like I am mostly in stage 4, with random visits to stages 1, 2 and 3.
It's tough to get out of the loop. I hope that I can get to stage 5 soon.
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Post by leahb on Jan 11, 2016 17:54:19 GMT -8
My therapist says I haven't actually grieved for my childhood or the pain I've been through. I guess I haven't. At least not yet. I feel so hopeless at times. And sad. My life has no purpose and because I feel like it has no purpose I feel like it's not worth living. I miss having a man in my life and I miss limerance. I was just watching a couple scene from a tv show and I got so teary about it. I don't even know why. I guess I'm a romance addict. Nothing quite like the high of falling in love and I do miss it. Boy do I miss it. That's okay though. The pain is real. This grief is real. The love I wish I had and don't makes me so miserable. Argh.
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Post by Susan Peabody on Jan 12, 2016 11:08:12 GMT -8
My therapist says I haven't actually grieved for my childhood or the pain I've been through. I guess I haven't. At least not yet. I feel so hopeless at times. From Susan . . . I have a section in my book The Art of Changing about how therapy should work. It is not just talking and venting. You have to get down to your unconscious through flashbacks, slips of the tongue, and dream analysis.
You can do it. Don't give up.
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