Hi Jenny
Making the calls is awful – it is something you would never imagine having to do but having done it I hope you feel relief – people do listen and they do understand. It was new to you, along with all the other experiences that you are coping with so well, but the people you were speaking to would have heard it all before. Maybe a tick box would be in order – collect the ticks and move up the mountain 10 paces.
If your ex has a new car I am sure the sheriff’s office will be very pleased to see it although it will of course depend on the name it is registered in! Keep following your instincts, I think you are fine-tuning them now and doing brilliantly.
The only negative I could see in your post was thinking that you were not doing what is best for your ex because I believe you are. I don’t believe in ‘what ifs’ for the past but how about a ‘what if’ just for today. ‘What if’ you didn’t give his address to those people he owes money to – your children would almost certainly be subjected to more unpleasant people looking in the window and possibly hear things they should not have to hear – while his addiction revels in its ‘good luck’ because he hasn’t got to part with gambling money on old and forgotten (by him) gambling debts. ‘What if’ his parents have bought the car so the Sherriff cannot claim it – his addiction will thrive but his debts will be mounting up, there will be creditors banging soon at their door. ‘Enablement’ however small opens a door for an active CG, such as you describe, to dive through and carry on without looking back. If he doesn’t look back he can’t see his daughter or hear her crying but turning his back on debts and his child is not going to bring him happiness, ‘protecting’ him from facing responsibility is not going to bring him happiness – facing up and sorting himself out will be tough but in the end he could be the man your daughter wants as her father. He has his mountain to climb but it isn’t yours.
Your non-reaction is pulling you up that mountain faster than you would have done listening and reacting to his addiction or trying to reason with it. Does ignoring him feel good? No it bloomin’ well doesn’t and I know that only too well; Does getting closer to the summit feel good? Yes it does.
I hear in your posts a person who cares for her CG but has recognised that her caring has to change from that which is considered ‘normal’ by society. The most wonderful word I have ever heard was when I eventually left my CG at a rehab and he said ‘thank you’. All the time I was trying to give him what I thought was a better life he would feign sorrow but he never thanked me like he did that day – it was only when I toughened up and behaved in a way that was foreign to me that he found his rock bottom and eventually changed his life.
There are so many songs that make me happy now that I couldn’t choose just one but I love the one you have chosen as your anthem.
Well done Jenny and well done to your children for doing so well at school
V
