Wow. I am ready to rant. Rant and rant and rant about the wonders of why completely intelligent, beautiful women fall desperately in love with substance abusers and/or addicts. I don't think it's as simple as a lack of self esteem. I have learned through experience that the raw neediness and passionate (sometimes aggressive) lovemaking and the thrill of the game and the manipulation and the silent competition played out because of the many women who are swirling around in the same sort of spell by the same man....all CANNOT be quantified and labeled with a vulnerable woman's "lack of self-esteem." The dynamic here is sooooo much richer. And after a year of mutual abuse (don't anyone tell me that abusive relationships are simply the fault of one side because it would be ignorant to ignore the psychological dynamic/roles/patterns that happen with both people), some domestic violence classes where a bunch of women get together and swap stories, and a few defensive counseling appointments, I attest that it is not so easy as JUST LEAVE THE GUY. Why I ask? Why is it not so easy? I wish I had the answer for that. All I can say is that the negativity and the patterns also become an addiction. And while the love of your life is swirling around in a menagerie of chaos is his own head, living selfishly and manipulating and lying every chance he gets, you are also getting drug farther and farther in, like a black hole, with no hope of getting out because every time you try, you find yourself craving the intensity and extreme stimulation and adrenaline that you only find with him. He makes you high. He becomes your drug. So, while you juggle a fine balance of judging him and attacking him for being addicted to Oxycodone and Xanax and Sex and Adderall and Women and Booze and Sex, you realize you are a hypocrite because you....yes you...are addicted to him. He is your drug. You jump in with so much love and so much hope and you know how to swim. But you don't know how to swim and stay above water while the someone you love is wrapping their arms around you and kissing you and loving you and controlling you with the magic of his fingers, giving you the most amazing orgasms you've ever experienced. The only orgasms you ever experienced. So, as you sink with this person....you do it slowly. You don't even know you are sinking each time until you're too far down. Then, to avoid the self-destruction that happens when you wake up and realize you are in the same place you have been over and over and over again, you succumb to his witty ways of getting you to do his numbing self-medicating with him. See, he prefers you messed up with him so he can throw it in your face later. So he doesn't have to feel alone at the bottom of his sea of destruction. You need to do this because otherwise you'd beat yourself up so much for drowning. The only way you can justify drowning is to make a self-destructive choice to numb your head. Numb the fact that you know he has pulled you down again. Is it his fault? No. It's your own. You have let him pull you down again. Again. Again. You have no sympathy. No one cares anymore because this is your own choice you are making. You are addicted to the push and pulls and the need to nurture and the need to be punished and the need for enabling him and making excuses for him and convincing yourself each new time that it'll be different because you want so bad for it to be different and because you see so much potential and possibility for success in him. You are addicted to the fact that when you are in his arms, you are complete. You have been with many, many men but only he can hold you like you share a soul. Only he can love you like you crave to be loved. You crave such adventure and such attention that you no longer know what healthy looks like. But you are not stupid. And you refuse to stay down for long. Reality ALWAYS sinks in and you ALWAYS come back. You get back up. You are smart. You are a warrior. You peel back his fingers from your vagina where he holds so much control, you peel away your head from the place on his shoulder. The only place in the world where you feel safe, you push him away again by picking a fight so you can disconnect and make him go, knowing that a life with him is not realistic. And slowly. Ever so slowly you start floating back up to the surface of the water. Slowly you come out of your numbed world and start gasping for breath. You start to disconnect and move forward with healthy things. You start doing the things you enjoy. You know you are not a drug addict. You know you are a good, smart woman. A woman of God. You know you fight with every fiber for your family. You know you are creative. You know you are something amazing. No matter what he tells you, you still know that you are NOT like him. You find yourself again.....but something's missing. In the day-to-day life of living wholesome and doing the "right" thing and building yourself up, you are lost. You go through the motions. Every day. You listen to those who tell you you are doing good. You are doing great. You announce your accomplishments and achievements and educational and career advances. You wear them like trophies.....but something's missing.
The love of your life. The man you know if it was just you and him in this world, you'd consciously make the choice to spend it swirling fast in the downward spiral. You wouldn't care that you were drowning. You would live under a bridge with nothing more than his lap to crawl into. To hold you and love you. You would choose to do that.
But it's not just you and him in this world. No matter how much he loves them and treats them well, you can save them by keeping him away. You can save their future by teaching them it's not ok to allow drugs and alcohol to take over your life. You cannot do that by enabling him.
You can't fix him. You can't help him. You refuse to let him be a role model to the younger generation. You're intelligence knows that. You must stay away and allow him to help himself even though you know that he doesn't want to help himself. You must stay away and you must ignore the hole in your heart.
You must give up the love of your life. You must give up feeling complete so you can succeed in them growing up to feel complete. You must model positive behavior, ignoring the fact that you have become conditioned to crave negative, stimulating attention. You don't want that for them.
You must do this because you're a mom.
I must do this because I'm a mom.