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Dear M
The ***s are difficult to deal with, even when you know you are being told a ***, they continue and just to top it off you are then supposed to feel bad for even suggesting that your loved one is telling ***s – how dare you even think that !!! I suspect that whatever you find out for yourself will still not be the whole picture and if you continue to do this you will surely burn yourself out eventually, it is more likely that no matter how good your private detective skills become, they will not be good enough to keep up and sadly can only serve to increase the level of deception and secrecy.
If you have protected yourself financially and he cannot access your family funds, then it could be better for you to try not to find out what he is up to, after all you do already know. You will end up being confronted with yet more ***s to wind you up and so it goes on, you have or will become a part of his cycle and it will alter nothing. It is his addiction that is playing you like a fiddle, it knows you well and thinks it knows exactly how you will react and its currently safe and secure in its be***fs about itself as a result. It may be time to give his addiction a bit of a rattling if you feel up to it, by reacting differently. When you change what you do you will get a different reaction in return. It thrives on what it perceives as a false threat, every time you don’t follow through with an ultimatum it gains strength, if possible only threaten what you are fully prepared to carry out or say nothing.
When you feel the urge to check up or do a bit of digging – do something nice instead and give the addiction the disinterest it so rightly deserves, but to do so seriously means protecting your finances if at all possible as a priority. Whatever amount of money he can get is not likely to be enough, hence the ******** of your daughters things to gain more funds if you don’t put some protection in place you can unfortunately expect to be cleaned out again and again.
It is difficult M ( not sure whether difficult sums it up!!) but there are some things you can do to begin to take control of your life back and away from the addiction, he is choosing to live this way at the moment and may well continue to do so until such a time comes that he is sick of the consequences to his own actions this can only really happen if he does have to suffer at the hands of his own actions, anything like paying off gambling debts or funding the habit only prolongs the process. Enablement takes many forms and ensures the addiction can thrive.
Try and take a step back and give your head time to clear,
Jenny
We see things not as they are, but through how we are today xDear Muckalow
Welcome to the forums. I am doing Ok and although this is a forum for gambling issues and yes there is often sadness, anger and despair flying around there are also some brilliant examples of people who have gone on to live in control of their addictions, rebuild relaitionships and be happy – so have a read and see that all is not lost as yet.
If your husband has this addiction it is he that ***** to really want to seek help, we can point in the right direction but frustratingly we cannot do it for them as i’m sure we would have all done it by now. Anger is understandable especially when faced with the barrage of lies that go hand in hand with the addiction and fuelled or driven by the terrible fear of what will happen next, can we cope financially etc etc. Anger will burn you out and can get in the way of your rational thought, I suspect that at the moment you are the only one there capable of rational thought.
There are things you can do, which can help you in the short term if you are able like taking control of the family finances, removing his name from accounts, changing numbers and taking control of paying bills etc protection for you and barriers for him if he wants to stop. Looking after you is a phrase you will often hear around here and although it initially seems not to do this problem justice in a way, it really is a good way forward for you and also your child, it is about not allowing this addiction to control your day, your thoughts, in the way that it controls your husbands
I don’t have much time to add anything else at the moment as i am skiving work !! i’m sure you will soon get loads of replies from other people but in the mean time the more you can learn the more it will help you, read as much as you can, I hope you will gain as much as I did from finding this site
Jenny
We see things not as they are, but through how we are today xGood one Jayson !! far cry from those old posts of yours, long may it continue
JennyWe see things not as they are, but through how we are today xHi Ell
Sometimes there is just nothing left to say, sometimes there are things that should be said and are not being said for whatever reason, sometimes when it is said, we are so busy talking that we miss it, we do not hear the volume of what is said by silence and in silence.
Our trust is destroyed through incident after incident, lies and deceipt to the point whether we can wonder if it can ever return. The ability for a CG to trust in themselves is also destroyed and in turn this must affect their ability to trust in others, to trust enough to communicate, to say the truth when possibly they have lost touch with what that is. I think I learned that I expected too much. To say nothing, is one way of keeping you, compared with the truth which provides such a risk or is blocked in denial.
Like you Ell I made every effort to understand this addiction, I read until I could read no more and posted until i dried up completely, there was an idea in my head of what a recovery would mean to him and to me and to us. There was also an idea of why it should occur and when. I was wrong on nearly all of it.
I think the main reason I was a way off the mark was because I wasn’t actually listening, I thought I was but I wasn’t, I heard the bits I wanted to hear and filled in the gaps. I listened but didn’t hear. I read and I made things fit into my idealistic view of what should be.
I said what I thought was the right things to say, things that would in some way make a recovery more likely, believing that in some way I could influence that – wrong again, all that achieved was to help me forget who I was as well !!
What I am getting around to saying before i ramble on is, don’t allow this addiction to close you down, do not let it stop you from communicating what you feel and recieving the communication he is sending to you either within speech or silence, never mind what is being said or not said we all know that the addiction likes to dictate this – what do you see before you and what does it feel like ?
My biggest regret if I have one was in not listening enough, the wrong type of communication, no wonder i couldn’t understand that it couldn’t be understood. Not saying what I should have said and saying what i shouldn’t say because it was what i thought I should say or i feared the response or the outcome if I said it. My biggest regret is the breakdown of communication it was very nearly the end for us.
Your CG couldn’t find a way to speak but he let you know how he was feeling, it brought a lump to my throat reading the end of your last post. Keep listening Ell and he will tell you so much more
Jenny x
We see things not as they are, but through how we are today xHi Sosad
As you know I recently fell foul of my posts being read and no it didn’t go down very well at all and caused a fair amount of problems, having said that it was about how I saw things and how I felt at the time. If I was writing that post today after several weeks of reflection I may have worded it differently, who knows ? as I am writing to you now I am maintaining an awareness of who may be reading and their motives for doing so and my advice to you is to do the same. Things may be said that are uncomfortable for someone to read, their perspective on a situation may be very different, there is often no rights or wrongs, just differing oppinions. As we have a choice to write then so there is a choice to read I guess.
I would like you to know Sosad that we have been able to get past that episode, I wrote it, he read it, but we are still together it is just one small part of the bigger picture. I think the thing for me about this sort of thing is that it is by no means a form of communication and if one reads to know what the other is thinking and vice versa then the normal opportunities for discussion are missed and there is little opportunity to explain mismatches in understanding. I would love to say, carry on writing as you were but I also know that it is not easy to do so as sometimes we want to vent without causing offence or without being overly analysed !! and neither do we want to be manipulated. In an ideal world it would be nice to have an aspect to the forum that could not be read by absolutely everyone! You may not want to care but the fact remains that you do.
Things do shift somewhere within us, I feel there is a time when we are no longer controlled by the addiction even if our loved one is. We may not like the fact that they are not in recovery but in an odd way it no longer has the same effect. I don’t think it happens on its own SoSad I think it happens as a result of you taking control of your recovery and accepting that there is not much you can do about his and if his happens, then even better.
You have put the work into this by taking steps forward in your own life and although maybe it doesn’t feel so rewarding if you again find yourself under attack from him in a different way, it is good to see that it is noticeable that his addiction is now not the complete focus of your life and that you are finding things to do which make you feel happy. Why would you not choose to put other things first and not a destructive addiction ?
My feeling is that further into recovery he may not have the expectations of you that he currently seems to have, why would you suddenly change over night and have the trust necessary to confide and hold intimate conversations if these have dried up due to his gambling addiction, not really very realistic of him is it ? As you said you need proof, he may not be able to give you what you need immediately but continued actions in the right direction are useful. Putting you down or criticising you, blaming you, turning everything around is the behavior of the addiction and is not condusive to encouraging intimate conversations really, is it ? When you say you need proof, what can he say or do that you will believe at this stage and furthermore should you be believing it ? Proof of another handling finances is not proof that there is no gambling – not wishing to rain on your parade or anything. It is the changes in behavior that happen slowly and subtly that convince me.
My reflections on my own situation was that we talked to other people, on here, in meetings etc both of us ***** footed around the other, walking on eggshells – really we seemed to have the same problem in different ways, if that makes sense. As a result nothing that should have been said, was said, resulting in all sorts of missed opportunities. But as I said eventually we got past that one !! talking to others but not each other.
You are doing well SoSad, the distance can be a negative and it can be a positive, you can make it work for you or against you. Although you may think you don’t know where the line is, I think you know more than you think you know !! if you read your post again you will see that you do recognise where it is.Even without the addiction in the mix it is easy to look back and imagine all sorts of ways in which we would handle things differently, its just life. Just because you feel scrambled does not mean you are. You have learned to put you further up your own list of priorities – whats wrong with that ?
Jenny xx
We see things not as they are, but through how we are today xHi AJ
I am not sure what part of the world you live in ? so things may differ as regards for any liability for debt but maybe the helpline could advise you on this? But as I see it you are not responsible and if you do decide that paying it is the only way out then maybe you could think about how you can recoup it from him by withdrawing some of his non essentials perhaps if that is possible. Better still if they do turn up make sure he is the one to deal with them or if alone tell them politely to get lost (making your new found anger work for you!!) If they cause you to be frightened then report them immediately – please do not live in fear for anyone.
I would urge you not to put your heart into sorting out his recovery but more so your head at this stage !! For a while at least just sit back and think about your position and what you want for you and your children. Velvet made an extremely good point regarding ultimatums – they really do not work unless you are really truly prepared to carry them through, if you have thought it through then there cannot be a next time and if there is one then the addiction only draws strength from that. If you are really going to be out next time around, then lay it on the line to him very clearly and mean it – if you cannot then perhaps it is not the right time yet for you to do so.
His share of the business is a waste to you and I – but as yet not too him, his addicted mind is more than capable of not seeing it quite as we do just yet, hang on to that AJ he is not thinking with the mind of a rational person. I felt my problem was often that I could not rationalise the irrational when i accepted that I was able to stop trying and life became a little more simple. He is the one that is based placed to understand but i doubt that he can either. But if I could just understand it maybe it would be different ………. Guess what I still don’t understand and my acceptance that I never will keeps my sanity these days at *****.
Keep your heart for you and your children, you are the one that is deserving of it at the moment and it too ***** to be looked after. Use your mind and your intelligence to learn all you can so that you make the best choices for you, if your answers are not yet coming fluently then I suggest that you need to look after that heart just that little bit better than you maybe doing. I should not be trying to tell you what to do but if i was!! I think I would say read everything you can on this forum within all of its dimensions so that you can learn whatever it is that you may need to know to keep you safe within a time of indecision. Keep reading, keep posting. I would love to read a post from you where you will be telling us that you have done something nice, for just you or you and your children that does not involve the revolting G word !!
Jenny x
We see things not as they are, but through how we are today xHi AJ
Oh i’d be mad alright but so mad that I would have to think very carefully about how my anger could work for me rather than against me in dealing with what was before me. I agree that someone who is serious about seeking recovery would have found out where their appointment was to be held and certainly made sure for the second time, but that is someone who is serious about recovery, it would be interesting to see whether he does attend if you provide him with the information at least then you know he knows and there is less room for more ‘mistakes’
I would be so mad at the expectation that would have to pay off this gambling debt at all, and after being told i had dropped off the wrong amount and then being expected to take time out to deliver yet another even bigger amount of my own money, I think I would be past seething!! I would probably be more angry with myself for shouldering the responsibility and feeling an obligation to do this. I have felt in the past AJ that I should pay off debts and have indeed done so and resented every second of it. Why do you feel that you have to do this when you do not ? I do not believe it is possible or right to give a CG a clean slate it gives free lisence to carry on running up more debts safe in the knowledge that you will keep clearing them for him. That really is giving him a slide. He is a sick addict and by paying his debts for him will only serve to make him sicker. Perhaps you can get angry enough to say NO to his expectations rather than let his addiction snigger at you in the background as it gets away unscathed.
Why run around after him when you and your children are suffering as you are, his ***** are not more important than yours and your children do deserve a mom who is not unhappy and stressed. Let him face the consequences of his gambling, if he has the bookies on his back and doesn’t like it then good maybe he will eventually reconsider his actions the more inconvienenced he is by his own behavior the better it is for him.
Choose your battles AJ, reconsider what it is that you feel you have to do for him and why. The best changes are the ones that we can make to ourselves, those that give us the confidence to take back control of our own lives and begin to rebuild the person who has become a shell.
Jenny
We see things not as they are, but through how we are today xHi M
You monitoring internet usage etc would make no difference to him gambling, There are things I believe that can be installed to block these sites and create barriers but unless someone wants to stop gambling M they will always find a way to do it.
Without sitting in judgement of your FIL I believe what he is saying to you is wrong on many levels. It is wrong for your hubby for him to suggest that control of his addiction is down to you and that the results are in some ways are your fault, this only serves to help your hubby take less responsibility because this is what addiction wants to hear.
It is wrong and harmfull to you as well for someone to try and give such a responsibility to you and leave you in such a position where it is possible for you to feel guilty and feel that you should do more or should have done this that and the other, it sounds like he is in denial but is bullying you with his nonsense.
Even if your finances had been better protected at the time – he would still have gambled, enablement is giving someone the means to gamble and if he took it from you without your knowledge then that is not enablement on your part it is theft on his part and abusive of the trust you showed him. Prevention of this occuring again is all you can do to protect yourself.
If FIL thinks that assisting him to get loans is helpfull then good luck to him but I have never heard of that ‘helping someone with a gambling addiction’
I understand now what you meant by control and I see your point but from the point of view that his dads view is also demoralising you as a person and creating doubt in your mind. You are not responsible, but you are strong and you are doing well. Put your efforts in to you by dismissing from your thoughts the ramblings of this man and know that you are right in your own beliefs. Looking after you means you look to you to make you happy, it doesn’t depend on the actions of others ***Hi M
My ex partner is a CG alledgedly now in recent recovery. I feel that your father in law will soon learn a sour lesson with regards to enablement and manipulation and I would have thought the least he would have done is appreciate the fact that his son was rescued from the sea and not pushed right into it !!!! However it appears that you may be dealing with 2 people with gambling issues not one, both of whom have their own agenda, perhaps achnowledging his sons issue properly may lead him to look at himself. Someone once said to me that which you dislike in other people may be what you fear in yourself.
I would not use the word control in relaition to your CG too much if I were you, you will never control him and neither will your FIL and if you feel that you are in control of him at the moment then that is not really a good sign. Being in control of finances and in control of yourself is different from controlling him. The only person that can address his gambling is him.
It is good that you plan to put your children first and unlikely that they can be totally protected from what is going on but you need to put you first to. Your children will be happier if you are happier!!
I think many of us have developed our private detective skills to the point where they are second to none and bordering on being obssesive, much of our day taken up by checking up on our partners activity or in wondering what they are doing, when does the next bombshell land etc etc. It is possible that we can put nearly as much effort into gambling as they do!! unfortunately this is a game we can never stay ahead of but burn ourselves out trying. If a CG wants to gamble he will do so and so the lies and deceit get bigger. It is a waste of time and it is time taken from our children and our own lives become empty. Next time you feel the urge to check up, try doing something nice instead.
Where money is concerned never think you know for fact what maybe the truth, it is highly likely your FIL has been giving him money but that your partner is better at concealing this fact than you are at discovering it. Other people who enable eventually find out they have made a mistake and infact have only helped him to become sicker by feeding his addiction. What is important is that your own finances are now protected.
You are not responsible for his addiction. He is the only one that is responsible for his actions and also his own recovery, you can support him but ultimately he has to do it for himself. The only person you can change is you xx
Hi Linda
Not sure to say its good to hear from you or not !!! It is, but I guess it would be better in nicer circumstances if you know what I am trying to say. Perhaps as you say now is not the right time to plan too far ahead whilst confusion is back and emotions are running amock.
Another answer to the question is – that you have not set a date yet . For the short term Linda remember the importance of looking after you. Hopefully he may realise the importance of getting some proper support in order to manage to sustain a recovery.
I am learning more and more Linda that the best chance of a good relaitionship starts with both people having a longer time in recovery before making big commitments and the importance of support through these processes, the bit I struggle with is applying that to myself!!! when affairs of the heart start to take over my knowledge seems to go a bit out of the window !!! but that knowledge is there Linda and at ***** like this take a momment to reflect on all you have learned and allow it to carry you through a difficult and disheartening time xx
Hi Vera
Thanks so much for your reply on my thread, have just updated – it has helped me no end – Forgot to tell you my Op is the first of March I could have had it done in January but i was a bit concerned of any icy weather we might have and how I would cope !!!
So we have between now and then to discover the latest fashions in Velcro foot wear and any recommendations will be greatfully recieved. Happy New Year Vera may it be a good one for you ***Hi Bettie
Over the years I have tried every nicotine substitute going – several times to no avail !! I have spent as much money on them as the fags – lol !!! This time I am doing a cold turkey which seems to be working a bit better. I was intrigued to read about these e- cigarettes please tell me do they work? or can they be used as a sharp implement on very annoying people grrrrrrrr hope your mood is better than mine with it today xxHi Bettie
Just wanted to pop in and empathise with you I am on day 9 and its terrible – foul tempers, cravings the lot, I hope it gets better than this !hi katheryn
just thought i’d say hello, and thanks for your insight. Hope things are better for you and more positive, lovely to chat with you and hope to do so again soon, you are in my thoughts a lot lately xx