The Waiting Game

So I sent him the email. My alcoholic friend. I sent him a boundary-setting email. I had CoolGirl read it to make sure I was actually setting good boundaries and being healthy. She didn't like the first letter, which I kind of knew she wouldn't but it was kind of me puking my feelings out onto paper. She liked the second one. I feel good about the fact that I didn't rush into sending it. I felt as though this was a needed next step, and having him call helped me realize that I need to communicate now, because I can't step back into our relationship the way it's been in the past. I really have changed. I can't be the codependent friend anymore. I want and need to be healthy. I am mostly convinced now that I am being a good friend in addition to finally taking care of myself. I'm nervous about how he'll react. He might get really angry and cuss me out, or he might try to laugh it off and tell me I'm over-reacting. He might do a combo of the two. Or, there's a possibility that I will never hear from him again. I think the chance of the fourth scenario is fairly slim. I hate the waiting. But I'm surprisingly able to function and not freaking out too much. A sign of health or denial?

Freaking Out Freaking Out Freaking Out

Just got a call from my alcoholic friend who has been incommunicado since he's been up in Alaska all summer. It was brief, but he sounded good and sober and normal. I couldn't seem to make conversation with him, and we only talked for a few minutes. I'm not sure if he had limited phone time or if he gave up because I couldn't think of anything to say. I was asking him questions that I had been wondering. And now I feel guilty for not responding the way he wanted me to. Ah, the wonderful cycle.

Must write that letter tomorrow. He can't come back not knowing. I don't know if I can do this.

Why I Think My Insides Are Ugly

I've been pondering my insides a lot lately. Not so much things like my intestines and kidneys and such, but my soul. I don't believe I'm a bad person. In that sense it's not like I believe I have some kind of black soul. But I do seem to feel pretty deeply that I have a malformed, disfigured, hideous kind of soul. On many levels I don't believe this, but there seems to be a few deep down parts of me where this rings true.

This belief seems to rear its ugly head when I panic about my friendships. How can they keep wanting to be friends with me when I show them the ugly parts? Coolgirl has pointed out to me that she has shown me some of her flaws and that doesn't make me want to not be her friend, or view her as less. And it's true. With my very dear friends, I know about their flaws, and I know at least some of their deep dark secrets, and I've seen them when they are not at their best, and it only makes me love them more. But those things don't make them ugly. I try to take that experience (loving friends more deeply because of that deeper knowledge of them) and use it to gain perspective on how I can be lovable. But my brain pauses. Because that is different. They are beautiful inside. And I have no idea what good they see when they look at me, or what they might find to love. That's not to say I don't find things to love about myself. It's more that there seems to be a shadow over it all when I think about what they might see. I know my friends think I'm loyal, and Coolgirl has told me in the past that I'm one of the kindest people she knows. But then she also has pointed out that I am a caretaker and that isn't healthy... so that isn't good?

If all of my "good" traits are tied into unhealthy behaviors connected to my issues, then do I have any good traits? I wish I could work up the courage to ask Coolgirl what she loves about me, because I'm not really sure at this point what there is to love, since I've shown her so much of my ugly insides. How does that look to her? And why can't I put myself in her shoes? I'm usually good about seeing other perspectives. Apparently when that perspective is regarding me, I am blind.

The one place I have made some progress is figuring out what the point of friendship is when I can't keep them bound to me by their need. If they don't need me, they can still be committed to the friendship because of the love. Because that's the point of friendship, and what keeps those bonds strong. It takes work to keep love strong, but that's a healthy thing to focus on, instead of trying desperately to find a need to fill. That has been my epiphany this week.

Now my new question is this: what do they see in me to love? And why is that so hard for me to answer right now?

A Happy Moment

Just when I was beginning to question if I actually seek out ways to feel bad and just haven't admitted it to myself, I find myself feeling good for no reason, and feeling good about the fact that I feel good. I am fairly confident that I'm not seeking out ways to feel crappy, although I do have the habit of making choices that lead to me feeling like crap. Primarily, I don't communicate to my friends when things are bugging me. Or I don't communicate well, and so there is no resolution. But there's also the element where no matter what I do I still feel like poo. That does not help.

This week I have resolved conflict in healthy ways, and I'm not worried about anyone abandoning me. I would like to say that I have cleared a hump, but I know that I have more just cleared a wave. I'm sure there will be another panicky wave of feelings of abandonment at some point in the not-to-distant future. My hope is that I will continue to deal with them all adult-like. And hopefully at some point the waves will be fewer, far between, and ripple-like. I hope that's not an unreasonable expectation.

Next week may be different. I've decided to write a letter to my alcoholic friend, to warn him about my new boundaries before he rolls back into town expecting things to be the same as always. I really need to stop procrastinating on that.

Won't Somebody Love Me?

I'm feeling very isolated today. Everyone is either out of state, so wrapped up in their own problems I have long since come to terms with the fact that they can't/don't want to be a meaningful part of my support system (after lots of tears and trying), or... too busy, even though they have assured me they love me. But the evil devil on my shoulder, who seems to be a lot bigger and louder than the angel, keeps telling me that they've tired of me and/or don't want to/can't be my friend in a meaningful way, because I'm all toxic. I'm trying not to be all toxic. And the reality is people have lives. This is what some of them would say.

Also I haven't heard back from my alcoholic friend, to whom I wrote a letter. Not a deep profound letter or anything. Just a letter to him where he currently has a job, since internet access is not always an option right now. And so I'm wondering if he's gotten my letter, and it's bugging me, and this is the part where normally I would check with him, or send another letter, or something. But I'm not. And for the most part I'm okay with that. But on another level, I want some love right now, because I am feeling isolated. So I reeeeally want to recreate that intimacy that I feel from time to time with him, so he will come back all lovey, and I will feel, if only for a short time, like I'm not a loser with no friends, like I've been feeling. I've been really, really considering it. Which would horrify Coolgirl and my other pro-healthy behaviors friend who lent me the codependency book. But they're not giving me love. So what's the point. Yes, I have more rational moments, where I know that there is a point and it would be silly to go back now. But right now I just want a good hug. And he gives good hugs, in between insulting me and disrespecting me in every way imaginable. And I can't find anyone who has time for me, let alone who is in close enough proximity to give me a hug. Also, I don't like to ask. Why do I have to ask. I feel so lame. I really want a hug. Lots of hugs.

How I Found My Nose

I am currently reading "How to Hug a Porcupine: Dealing with Toxic and Difficult to Love Personalities." The funny thing is, I bought the book with my roommate in mind. She's seriously passive aggressive and has some really unhealthy relationship issues, and I have struggled with giving one of my oldest friends love without going insane from her manipulation. This book seemed to shout her name when I saw it on the bookshelf. I started to read it probably about a year ago. I got through most of the first chapter and then, as it often seems to go with any kind of book that might help me improve myself, I set it down and didn't pick it back up. I picked it up tonight, another year wiser, and focused more on myself than others. I've realized that it's more about ME dealing with things than it is about the porcupine. Go me. That sounds all healthy.

While I'm trying to really evaluate myself and how I can have toxic moments as well as healthy moments, I've realized that in the description of a toxic personality, my friend/ex-boyfriend fits 90% or so of the description to a T! I think I've blogged about him here. I would need to go back to see what his blog name is and I'm too lazy to do that right now. But the points is this: I realized some things about him that were right there in front of me. They are things as plain as the nose on my face! I've discussed them with friends, and identified them myself, but I've never quite defined them the way I just was able to.

He never, ever apologizes. Nothing is his fault. Everything becomes either my fault, his boss's fault, his family's fault, etc. I knew that on some level. But I literally can't think of ONE sincere apology from him. About anything. And having known him for the past 16 years, as a friend, then a boyfriend, then a friend again, you can imagine we've had some disagreements. The words "I'm sorry" may come out of his mouth from time to time, but the tone says, "I bequeath upon you my acknowledgement that you want my forgiveness." After the words I'm sorry, there is no discussion of him changing, or any real acceptance of responsibility. Somehow, with the apology, he also plants the idea that deep down, I must know that it's really my fault. And deep down, I told myself that I must try to be better.

He also has never fully given me his love. Even when we were dating, he used his love to maintain power. He would with hold it when he knew I was asking for it, and give it when he felt that would keep him where he wanted to be in my priorities and affections. He would give it when he wanted something, or to reward me for giving him something. I am a little sickened by that realization. But as much as these two things have become crystal clear to me in a way that I have never fully acknowledged before, I know I still have work to do. The way I know this is that there is still a part of me that is convinced that despite all the manipulation, deep down he really does love me. That I'm special. That he would not write me out of his life like all his other friends and family if I demanded more-demanded to be treated better. The rational part of me tells me that I will hear a lot of verbal abuse and receive a lot of punishment from him, in the form of all the things he knows will hurt me most if I try to draw healthy boundaries. But in my heart, I have a huge hope that my drawing boundaries will cause the huge awakening.

So basically I've got one foot out of dream land and I know in my heart that what I really want to do is pull it back in. But I know in my mind that I have to keep moving.

In case you are wondering, yes, he's an alcoholic. And one of the most unhealthy relationships of my life. I never realized how unhealthy until just now.