Grasping, clinging and suffering: Still making my way through those kinds of days

Some days I’m overwhelmed with self-pity. This is what that looks like (indented so it’s skip-able):

I have swum with the swans. I am surrounded by people who are at the tops of all kinds of ladders in life. What is it about me that I can start at the same place as all these people, and end up in Loserville?

I’m basically a glorified assistant right now. And it feels like time is running out for me to achieve any level of success in any area.

What am I lacking that others possess? What is it about me that I can’t see that has me making almost nothing out of the education, opportunities and abilities I have? What am I missing about myself that has me end up as a failure? Married to an addict who is 100 pounds overweight and has had sex with numerous prostitutes during our marriage? Wasn’t my life supposed to be better than this?

I expected great things out of my self, assumed, almost, that my life would be amazing and that I’d accomplish great things. And others have always seemed to assume that about me as well.

I feel painfully bloated and aching with loss. Loss of what might have been.

I’m terrified that instead of being some kind of clay that I can shape into a magnificent work of art, I’m just mud.

These feelings of being less-than exist as a painful knot in my stomach and in my heart. And looking at how pathetic all this is, I feel worse.

Have I wasted my life?

That’s an ugly, embarrassing side of me. The way I sometimes deal with the pain that still lingers. Not something I’m happy to admit. I want to justify it. I’m sure I could. But what good would that do me?

I told a friend I’m feeling like I’m going through a mid-life crisis.

“Compare equals despair! You’re too young for this navel-gazing,” he said. “Don’t think so much, don’t analyze so much. Just DO!”

“Ask yourself every day: Is what I’m doing serving me?” he continued. “If not, do something different.”

And he’s right.

But how do I balance experiencing my pain, grief, anger, etc. with living and acting in the present moment? Where’s the line between having and acknowledging feelings, and getting caught in clinging and grasping? Because I think sometimes I go right to the processing part and skip the feeling part. And maybe that’s why I’m still having a lot of resentment and sadness 3 ½ years later, even after all the therapy, groups and books.

The ongoing lesson seems to be not to run from life’s difficulties, but to stay in the muck if that’s where I am, and be present to life. To feel, observe myself feeling, learn from what I see, and take action accordingly. To understand that my experience of life does not have to define me.

Buddhist monk Matthieu Ricard said in a recent article, “Happiness is a way of being, not a sensation.” Ahhh, yes. Deep breath. A ray of light to guide me out of the darkness and confusion in which I’ve been wrapping myself.

The other day, somewhere amidst my extended play version of sadness and anxiety, these words came into my head: “Don't forget who you are.”

At first I thought it meant, “Who do you think you are?”

I’ve heard that before.

But then I realized it could have other meanings.

If I think about my life in the scale of time and the Universe, I become nothing and nobody, just like everyone else.

And the freedom and peace that can come with that perspective.

The feeling that comes from understanding myself, even for a fleeting moment, as That which is everything and everybody.

Don’t forget who you are.

What to do with the things I can't change

When I met Husband in 1988, Mom and I were renting an apartment together. After Husband and I became a couple, he moved in with us and we three have lived together ever since, through 22 years, 2 more apartments and a house.

If Husband is my greatest teacher in the spiritual sense, my mother is his. This translates into a very difficult relationship between them. Not very pleasant for me, but, especially over the last 3 years, I've tried to stay out of it.

Husband had told me that he felt trapped, because he knows I'd never be able to ask my mom to move out. I empathize with him, but he's right. It's a cost to me to have her here, but the cost to me of asking her to leave would be greater. And Husband has been compassionate in not asking me to make that choice. But it's important to him that I know how stressful it is for him, that I know his feelings.

The other day as I listened to Husband complain about mom, I could see clearly how he could relieve a lot of the pressure himself.

My mother isn't malicious. At her worst she's passive aggressive, but many times she's just doing her codependent best to be helpful. Mom doesn't have a good set of tools for self-expression, and she's not aware of what an absolutist she is. She rejects anything that starts to feel like an authority figure (even her own decisions) and frequently undermines us as parents by siding with my son on subjects such as bedtime, consumption of sweets and treats, second helpings, etc... She generally focuses on the worst that could possibly happen. And she is very self-righteous, while at the same time vehemently declaring her disdain for self-righteous people. In short, mom lacks self-awareness on many levels. But she tries to be helpful, and she does the best she can. (I'm really trying to cultivate compassion in my relationship with her, to let go of what I think she should be and appreciate the best of who she is. I have varying degrees of success.)

If one gets frustrated with a cat for meowing instead of mooing, who is causing the problem?

I understand many of Husband's problems with my mother. I share some of them, and I also have my own. But something I know that both Husband and I recognize is that there is little if any chance that the things that bother us about mom will change. For all intents and purposes, my mother is an immobile object.

As I listen to his complaints, I see all the things he could do from his own side to alleviate his suffering - for example, not taking her behavior personally, not expecting her to put our son to bed on time when she babysits, not getting upset when she draws our attention to the latest child kidnapping or tragic death, etc. (I don't tell him any of this, of course, because thanks to therapy I'm trying to practice listening without offering solutions.)

"It's like there's this thing in my life that I really, really wish wasn't there, but there's nothing I can do about it," he said. "You know what I mean?"

I felt like a light switch flipped on in my brain.

"Yes! Yes I do!" I said to both of us. "I know exactly what you're talking about."

I realized in that moment that this was how Husband could begin to understand how I feel about his lies and infidelity.

And in the next moment I began to wonder if all the clarity I had about how he could alleviate his own suffering could be applied to me when something triggers me into thinking about the past, or when I have uninvited thoughts and images come into my head.

Husband patted my leg. "I know you do," he said. "I know what you're talking about."

So I've been thinking it through. When there is something in my path that is beyond my control, the thing I can do is decide how I respond. I can get angry with the cat or feel hurt because it doesn't moo, I can feel disrespected when I ask the cat to moo and it meows, or I can say "That is a cat, and it meows." In other words, here is something that I don't have the power to change, and there is nothing for me to gain by wishing it to be anything other that what it is.

Or very specifically, the events of my past are what they are. Triggers and invasive thoughts are an opportunity for me to practice bringing myself back into the present moment, where I do have the power to have an impact.

What is going on in the present moment? Is Husband treating me the way I want and need to be treated? Is something bothering me that I need to address or express?

If things are good in the present moment, I can take a deep breath, surrender to the past that I have that will never be any other way, and enjoy the happiness of the present moment.

I think if one wants to try to change something that can't be changed (like the past) or that doesn't think it needs to be changed (like my mom) one must consider whether the cost of trying to change that thing (or wishing one could) is worth it, or if there is a more productive action that could be taken. I think there is a lot of truth to the saying "What you resist persists."

The trick is to figure out how to grow so that I'm not stopped by immobile objects in my path. Maybe it's finding compassion, maybe it's having a difficult conversation, maybe it's surrendering to my lack of control over something, or maybe it's something else.

I believe it's possible to progress without resisting that which I have no power to change.

It was a nice opening for me. I could feel the space created by seeing this parallel between Husband's situation and my own, and I could feel the peace that came with my willingness to surrender.

I am my own white knight

At my S-Anon meeting this week we talked about some of the surprising things we'd learned about ourselves in the recovery process.

One of the big things I've learned is how much power I'd given over to Husband. I'm not a person who becomes intimate with many people, and at the time Husband and I met, I didn't trust people easily either. But in Husband I found someone I thought I could trust 100% and I entered into a relationship completely without boundaries. I trusted Husband, I think, more than I trusted myself. And, though I never depended on Husband financially, I put the responsibility for my emotional and psychological well-being and my happiness with him.

Out of this experience I've learned that as a grown woman I am responsible for taking care of myself. Not even the most well-meaning husband, and I think mine was, can offer me the kind of safety I thought I had in my marriage. That kind of safety only comes from shuffling off delusions such as if you love someone you won't hurt them. That kind of safety can only come from surrendering to human imperfection, to suffering, to pain, knowing that all things shall pass.

The balancing act now is learning to have boundaries and make sure I'm taking care of myself without going through life on the defensive. Now that I'm aware of this dynamic in my life, this absolutist tendency of mine to trust without boundaries or not at all, I'm getting better at thinking about my own needs and wants as an important part of every equation. I'm learning to trust appropriately, and to trust in the face of human frailty and the knowledge that nothing can be known for sure. I'm learning to find peace in the face of my inability to completely shield myself from pain.

And now for a Stuart Smalley moment

The questions in church today were "How can I grow?" "What can I give?" "What can I celebrate?

During the service what came to me is that the origin of all forms of self-loathing rises out of my perception of self as separate from the divine. And that what I can do in the face of that is to surrender to being an instrument of divine expression. To view myself as a unique expression of universal consciousness, group mind, love-intelligence - I still don't know exactly what to call it (and perhaps it doesn't matter.) To live as if this is true - whether or not it is - because I'm freed by that perspective to live a better life.

What does this mean?

For me, it means that everything is as it is and that to resist is a waste of life and a waste of energy. So rather than trying to fix what is wrong I can embrace what is so and generate, or create my life from what I want for the future rather than from what has transpired in the past.

More briefly, to be pro rather than anti.

Pro good health rather than anti-fat.
Pro bring-out-my-best rather than anti-flaws.
Pro peace rather than anti-war.
Pro love and tolerance rather than anti-Republican.
Pro expression, compassion and personal responsibility rather than anti-conflict.
Pro creating a healthy, happy relationship rather than anti-betrayal.
Pro connection, growth and vulnerability rather than anti-perfectionism.

I can grow by surrendering over and over again to my true divine nature; surrendering to my path with the grace and strength of water to the river bed; and remaining but a loving witness to others on their paths.

I can give by joyfully and unabashedly sharing myself as a unique expression of the divine; practicing love and compassion for all; and understanding fear as a manifestation of ego and letting it be.

I can celebrate that I am alive in this moment.

All I Got for Christmas

I realized this morning that I’ve come to dread Christmas.

Years ago I bought Husband a Thai cookbook for his birthday. He’d always enjoyed cooking, and had discovered Thai food as several inexpensive Thai restaurants blossomed around Seattle. I was so excited for him to open his present, and was crushed when he seemed almost insulted by my gift. The details of what was said have faded with time, but I was left with low-level dread about giving Husband gifts that has increased with the passing years.

My experience was that Husband always felt dissatisfied with gifts, particularly at Christmas. He never seemed to feel he’d gotten exactly what he wanted, and always seemed to feel slighted when given gifts that weren't "him," declaring them impersonal. He could never look past the thing to appreciate the thought and effort that had gone into getting the gift, and the care that it expressed. So I’ve learned to ask for a List and just shop from that rather than to try to put any thought into something special that I think up myself.

At the top of Husband’s list this year was an iPhone. He was also lobbying hard for Guitar Hero. But he’s being laid off in January and I’ve had a slow 4th quarter, so I was hoping we could go a little easy on the gifts this year. However gifts are a very big deal with Husband (he loves to give as much as he loves to receive,) and I began to get the feeling that I was getting some big surprise gift and that if I didn’t match up, I’d be disappointing him again.

I’d finished all my shopping the week before Christmas but realized over the weekend that I didn’t have anything “mind-blowing” for Husband. I’d gotten many things from his list, but not the high-end items. I thought back on the video iPod I’d gotten him a few years back and the beautiful watch I’d gotten him for our 10th anniversary (both of which were from his List,) both of which he lost soon after receiving. Even expensive things just seemed to sink into the insatiable abyss of wanting, instead of being valued as much as they were sought.

But as my anticipation of failure grew, I toyed with getting Guitar Hero. For the money I didn’t really think he’d play it a lot after the novelty wore off. So I considered the iPhone. It was expensive, but I’d heard that it was going to be available after Christmas for $99. So I thought I’d give him a $100 bill with my old cell phone.

But then on Sunday I had the opportunity to get him a gift certificate toward some spiritual classes he’d wanted to take. That wasn’t on the official List, but he’d mentioned that he was interested in taking some classes just weeks ago. I knew he’d end up with an iPhone anyway (especially if they were really going to be available for $99.) I decided to get the $200 gift certificate because, while the iPhone was more practical and could be written off as a business expense, the classes were a luxury so he’d be less likely to do that for himself.

But this morning as Son opened his considerable bounty yet still seemed to feel disappointed when it came to an end, and when Husband made joking mention of “not getting what I really wanted anyway, an iPhone” (he hadn’t opened my gift certificate yet) that feeling of dread surged and I felt the hollowness of what Christmas has become.

As I pondered, it dawned on me that because of Husband’s narcissism and affliction with addiction, almost anything would fall short of his expectations. Just like with all the prostitutes, he was always looking for that one mind-blowing ultimate experience, conversation, gift, whatever, that always seemed just out of his reach. Nothing was ever as good as he imagined once he got it, and he was always left unsatiated. Of course, nothing was ever enough to fill the undistinguished empty space he carried with him.

So all these years it had nothing to do with me falling short. It was a manifestation of where he was on his path.

Though I understood that logically and the realization helped me get some space and clarity, a heaviness continued to linger until I began to look more closely at my own feelings of sadness and disappointment. (The benefit of all the therapy and reading over the past 19 months is that I can often stay with the muck long enough to recognize the opportunity for me to grow rather than spinning into resentment, blame, distraction or skipping down the happy path of denial.)

I realized that I was feeling bad because I didn’t get what I wanted either.

What I wanted was for Husband to be thrilled with the gift certificate I’d gotten him (he wasn’t.) And for Son to revel in what he’d received rather than to be looking for more presents under the now barren tree. I was attached to each of them having specific experiences and because I didn’t get what I wanted I was hurt, sad, angry, disappointed.

Then, my Higher Power reminded me that I have no control over the experiences of another.

Authentic gratitude is a steep learning curve for narcissists, and only through this crisis we've faced has Husband found a foothold with which to being his ascent. (As I heard in church recently, it is darkness that makes it possible for us to see the light.)

All I can do is give what I give with love and joy, and Husband and Son must make their own experiences from there. And that will depend on where each of them are on their own paths, not on anything that I do or don’t do.

I still want to do Christmas differently next year, with less focus on lists and what we want (in other words, less focus on lack and desire for the months leading up to Christmas day.)

But now I have an opening to give with love and joy, and to revel in what I’ve received – life’s important basics: food, clothing, shelter; the love and support of family and friends; my health; my son; a career; material luxuries; spiritual growth; good therapists; the breath I'm taking now; all my needs met; and my growing presence to myself and each of us as unique and vital expressions of the Divine.

"... if the wave bends down and touches her true nature she will realize that she is water." - Thich Nhat Han, No Death, No Fear.

Once again, my life leaves me present to gratitude. That's what I got for Christmas.

More opportunity to practice (AFGO)

On the CD that comes with the book Spiritual Liberation by Michael Bernard Beckwith, he says "In the mind of God there aren't any problems, there are just impetuses for us to evolve." He goes on to say that the real question to ask as we face challenges is "where must I grow, where must I evolve?" What is it within me that I must set free to empower myself in the face of this issue?

I've also been thinking about the difference between self-delusion and serenity. If I just choose to be happy, as I'm often invited to do, isn't it possible that I'm just looking on the sunny side and not dealing with the muck and darkness like I've always done?

After more thinking I've concluded that delusion is when I choose to be happy by ignoring or otherwise distracting myself from problems; and that serenity and empowerment come when I can choose to be happy in the presence of challenges and obstacles. This involves acceptance regarding what I can't control, and faith that I have everything I need within myself to meet all challenges that come my way. I can grow, I can evolve. It may not be easy, it may not be pleasant, but it's definitely something I can do. I can find the opportunity in any situation if I really want to.

So I have another opportunity, and my grand conclusion is easier contemplated than practiced.

Husband found out last night that he's being laid off in January. With my consulting work a trickle the past month, my mind immediately flings off in the direction of foreclosure.

This is part of my sickness. I fall into a downward spiral and hem and haw about disasters that haven't happened and things I can't control.

I have A LOT OF FEAR about financial insecurity, and about Husband being able to handle the stress of job loss, job hunting, stress in his current job, his continuing health issues, his upcoming operation, staying on his new medically supervised liquid diet, and sometimes not being able to get enough good sleep. I worry that the addict is going to pay us a visit.

So...I'm going to meditate more, exercise more, ask myself how I can evolve (I've already got a hunch this involves restructuring my relationship to abundance and surrendering to what I can and can't control,) talk to my higher power and turn things over...and we'll see. I'm getting better at seeing what is mine to deal with and what is Husband's to deal with, so that's useful progress.

Maybe over the past 18 months I've gained some facility in dealing with groundlessness and the impermanence of life.

I've started going to church

It's a surprising development, considering my skepticism. But more than anything else, this has been a spiritual journey for me. Who woulda thought? Certainly not me.

One of the things I've realized through all the reading I've been doing (mostly Buddhism) and through participating in the S-Anon 12 step program is that spirituality has been missing from my life. I've always had to have every answer, to be completely self sufficient. My ability to figure out things, to anticipate and solve problems has been one of my most successful tools for survival. Even now, there is a part of me that has fingers on the buttons that will hermetically seal me off in a Bat-Mobile of self sufficiency.

But now I also see another possibility.

A few days ago I was exploring my resistance to forgiving Husband. I realized that the obstacle was my fear of being hurt again, and that I was resisting my powerlessness in this area.

Refusing to forgive, holding on to just a tiny bit of the past, feels like power...like a safeguard against being vulnerable. Holding onto the distrust is my way of reminding myself not to let betrayal happen again. (There's that resistance to powerlessness!)

I realized that what there is to surrender, what I'm being given the opportunity to wake up to, is that whether or not I'm hurt or betrayed again is beyond my control, and in fact quite likely to happen again. Not something I really want to surrender to, but there it is.

I thought about what would happen if I were betrayed so deeply again, if I ever again felt such deep and raw pain. What would happen if the world as I know it proves profoundly false, lets me down, doesn't meet my expectations / fantasies once again?

The answer that came was that I'd have to face that unbearable pain and surreal disorientation. And that I'd have only myself and the community I've created to support me to help me get through it.

That answer surprised me.

I've never felt community before, let alone thought about getting support from any kind of community. Mostly I've seen myself as very isolated and alone, with the few bright exceptions of 3 or 4 very close friends. I'm the one who helps others, not the recipient of help.

What I've come to realize is that community is there if I open up to it. I've learned that I don't have to have the answers. I don't have to always be the one holding it all together, handling everything when others can't. I can be human, I can be lost, I can be wrong and fallible without becoming unforgivable, I can have messy, even irrational feelings. And when those things happen, there can be a community of people there to hold me, nurture me, hear me, comfort me, and lift me up.

I don't have to do it alone.

As an only child of very young parents, I think I learned a lot about self-sufficiency. And growing up in a family where "bad" feelings were immediately squelched out with love or the withholding of love, where anger was frosty and tight lipped and a lot of communication was indirect, I learned how to deal with things internally instead of reaching out. But now that I'm an adult can I see other options. And acknowledging a power other than myself, a god of my understanding, even if I don't have a clear definition for what that is, seems to turn out better for me than trying to hold it all together alone.

Surrendering to the unknown, embracing the impermanence of life, facing that moment by moment without taking refuge in my intellect, cynicism and skepticism...that is a spiritual experience.

Eleven years today

Husband and I got married on November 1, 1997.

We don't have any special celebration planned this year. Last year we celebrated with a honeymoon on Maui, about 4 months after the truth had come out. It was an intense, emotional time.

This year I feel different. Less emotional, more guarded, yet willing to leave the past in the past, live in the present moment and give what I have today a chance.

I'm tired of my bouts of fear and anxiety, yet I still can't seem to shake them entirely. Husband is struggling with his food addiction a little right now, and I get really nervous about the possibility of things getting out of control. I know he can't be perfect, but I've been through the food struggles before with him and now I have an idea of what he's really struggling with, and where that can lead. I don't think he'll go so far as to go back to porn, massage parlors and prostitutes, but I still fear it. This indicates to me that I have more spiritual work in front of me, more surrender to impermanence and unknowability. And more work around control issues and my ability to feel safe in an uncontrollable world.

I'm standing on the edge of a cliff, afraid to jump back into living 100 percent. It feels easier just to be afraid. But I know that if I jump I might find out I can fly. The fear is still there, though. But it's not insurmountable.

And maybe I'll find that I need to choose again whether or not to jump every single day from here on out.

And I can only begin to imagine where that kind of life will take me, jumping and jumping and jumping again.

I can't do this alone

I've come a long way in 15 months.

As I face the current situation there are many ways in which I can see I'm doing things differently.

I'm not giving him the benefit of the doubt on anything that doesn't feel quite right to me.

I'm allowing myself to be in my feelings of anger, confusion, and pain rather than immediately looking for a way to be understanding and reasonable or make him feel better.

I'm reaching out to others (and there has been lots of support with many different persepectives, every one helpful) and not trying to figure it out myself or handle it alone the way I've always done before. I actually made some outreach calls to people other than my two best girlfriends, fighting all the way the tempation to manage other peoples' experiences (I always worry that people won't be able to say no when they want to, so I often don't do things like make outreach calls.)

Looking at this in the context of screenplay analysis, this is one of those points where the protagonist has undergone change and the new self is being tested by old, familiar challenges. One of the benefits of this current challenge is to allow me to see how far I've come, and how much further I can go if I choose.

I don't know yet exactly what I'll do. We have a couples therapy session scheduled for tomorrow night to deal with this (I feel so thankful that I have therapy as an option) and I'll finally be able to express myself in an environment that feels safe to me. Until now I've worried that if I started really getting into it with Husband, I'd say something I didn't really mean and/or his narcissist and my co-dependent would join forces and ambush me (which is usually what happens when we go head-to-head.)

In this moment I am full of gratitude for all that I've gained, and for the love and compassion of others.

Images in my head obstruct intimacy

Last night Husband and I were making love, and I couldn't get certain thoughts and images out of my head. I opened my eyes, and kept my gaze fixed on him, my eyes on his eyes, and still I could not feel a connection. The images and the fear they brought up were pulling me out of the moment and I couldn't stop it.

Thinking about it this morning, I felt a deep sadness at not being able to connect with him. Sometimes my lack of ability to connect is worse than others, but it's always sad because Husband used to be the person I felt most deeply connected to.

I got up earlier than I expected to this morning, and so had time to jump on the treadmill for half an hour and do some reading.

Finishing an article I'd printed out from Buddhadarma, The Wondrous Path of Difficulties, I came across exactly what would be helpful to me right now.

Jack Kornfield talked about making a human connection. "There has to be a willingness to go to the place of vulnerability...we have difficulty making a human connection because we don't trust our heart. We don't trust that our heart has the capacity to open to the sorrows as well as to the beauty of the world...We have within us buddhanature, the capacity to hold all the sorrows and joys of the world."

He described not being reactive to others as "being present with a lot of courage," and quoted Martin Luther King. "King said to his adversaries, "We will wear you down by our capacity to suffer, to face suffering and still not stop, still march, still tell the truth, still do what's necessary to make the change.""

Fear is my adversary. Perhaps I can wear it down by expanding my capacity to face suffering and pain.

I can practice expanding my capacity to be open to suffering and sorrow, as well as to joy and happiness; not to resist those things, not to react to the fear I feel in the face of those things; but to take a deep breath and turn toward those things with open arms as I would welcome a beloved friend or a beautiful day. And on that path I'll find intimacy with Husband. That practice of being open to pain and fear will allow me closer to that which has been the source of pain and fear, but also the source of happiness and joy.

My instinct is to run from pain and fear, but maybe to run from that is to run from life. To cut off pain and fear, maybe I also have to cut off joy and intimacy, and that's not the path I choose. To have the quarter, I must take the heads with the tails. There is no tails without heads. So maybe life is joy and sorrow, happiness and pain, and there is not one without the other.

Not a new discovery for me, but one I must think about and practice daily or it will disappear and survival instincts will take over.

I think survival is about protecting yourself (an instinct), and living is about making yourself vulnerable (a practice), and those two things, safety and risk, seem to go against each other. Perhaps this is why it's just a one-day-at-a-time thing, moment by moment giving up instinct for practice.

Both a wave and the water

I've been thinking a lot about a passage from Thich Nhat Hanh's book No Death, No Fear:

"...Looking deeply, we can also see that the waves are at the same time water. A wave may like to seek its own true nature. The wave might suffer from fear, from complexes. A wave may say, "I am not as big as the other waves," "I am oppressed," I am not as beautiful as the other waves," "I have been born and I have to die." ...But if the wave bends down and touches her true nature she will realize that she is water."

"Water is free from the birth and death of a wave. Water is free from high and low, more beautiful and less beautiful. You can talk in terms of more beautiful and less beautiful, high or low, only in terms of waves. As far as water is concerned, all these concepts are invalid."

I feel powerful and free in my life when I remember that my husband and I are both waves and the water. We are each individual expressions of the same thing - whether that is God, my higher power, the universal consciousness or something other. Non-duality. We are all aspects of one thing, so there is nothing to be afraid of in the not-knowing of it all.

Tonight (on the treadmill where a lot of my good thinking seems to happen) I realized that I've been holding my husband responsible for the unknowability of life. "I am afraid, I've realized I can't be certain about anything in life, and it's your fault."

But the unknowability of life is not Husband's fault. Husband is only the vehicle for this lesson. I don't believe it's possible for me to know the future, no matter how sure of it I feel. But in some areas I had forgotten that. In some areas I felt sure that I knew what I could trust, sure that I knew how life would go. But despite the surety I felt there was never really any knowing. How can I know what hasn't yet happened? It only felt that way.

That is not to say don't trust, don't have faith, don't be optimistic.

Instead, I see there is a possibility of learning to trust, to have faith and to be optimistic in the face of not knowing. Of being present, experiencing the moment with whatever it brings, feeling the pain and the joy of being alive instead of trying to escape into the future or the past, into desire or distraction.

Sometimes I can actually wrap my head around these things, and in those fleeting moments there is such serenity and peace.

Feeling peace

In couples therapy this weekend we talked a lot about my feelings of doubt. About my wish that there was some way to be sure I could count on somebody not to betray me. About my concern that I was returning to my old feelings about the untrustworthiness of men that I was left with after I found out that Dad was lying to us.

I was trying to get to the learning that is there for me. The lesson seems to be that no matter what, ultimately you can't trust anyone. But I don't see the growth in that lesson. And I do have girlfriends I can trust - who I feel like I "know" in the same deep way I was sure I knew Husband.

In our session I realized that I so reflexively take on responsibility for the way Husband feels that I don't have an instant to see what actually happened. And I'm such an absolutist that I judge myself a bad person when somebody important to me is upset because in my word view good people don't do things that make those they love angry or hurt. If somebody around me is mad in reaction to something I've done, I look at myself to see what went wrong, instead of letting them be responsible for their feelings and simply looking to see where I can take responsibility for my actions.

We learned the tool of checking with each other about our "paranoid fantasies," the often catastrophic things we make up that may be true, or may be completely off base.

We talked about whether or not I could accept people as flawed, as doing the best they could. And the fact that in Husband's addict mind what he was doing, although it impacted me, wasn't directed at me and wasn't really connected with me. Those are things I can get my mind around most of the time. But the self doubt is still there. The struggle with trusting myself, which didn't work out so well before.

I think the fact that I was able to share and have validated so much of what I have been feeling has given me a sense of peace this week. Husband heard me. He expressed the fear he feels when he hears me talk about considering what it would be like to leave, or to be with someone else. But, as I tell him, I don't really want those things...I just turn them over in my mind like stones to see if they feel like more appropriate paths...but they don't.

Maybe the growth is in compassion, forgiveness, letting go of the way I think things should be, wish they were. Letting go of that desire for a different past. In coming to terms with the unknowability of our existence. In accepting that Husband is human, and acknowledging that he was truly doing the best he could at the time with the tools and coping skills he had. And in being with him in the present where he is also doing the best he can, now in the clarity afforded him by his recovery work. I will lean toward these lessons, and away from fear and mistrust.

But even tonight as I was wrapping my arms around Husband, breathing in his scent as he played the piano, that cold sliver of fear passed through my heart for an instant. I wondered how many other times I'd breathed him in that deeply, filled myself with his presence, allowed myself to be intoxicated by my love for him, while he was lying and leading that secret life.

This will be the dance for a while, I guess. The dance between fear and forgiveness, between love and mistrust, between joy and anger. Until I can get free of the mindset of duality, and accept everything as existing at once and be at peace with that.

Steadily getting better

The trip to Hawaii was amazing. Exceeded our expectations in every way.

One thing Husband and I realized was that in our 19 years together, this was the first vacation we'd taken alone together that didn't involve visiting someone. Because we've lived as room mates with my mother since the very beginning of our relationship, we've had little time comletely alone as a couple. We've always had a lot going on in our lives. And since the arrival of Son in the Fall of 2001, life has just gotten fuller.

When we returned, Husband said he realized the difference between kissing in Maui and kissing at home was that in Maui there was nothing else we should or could be doing at that moment. No son to care for, no work following us home from our jobs, nobody wanting or needing anything from us. It was just us. Alone, together, with nothing to think about and no decisions to make except whether to wake up and go to yoga on the beach, go snorkeling, meditate on the beach, or have a Mai Tai.

On the flight over to Hawaii I was having anxiety about what we were doing. I wasn't clear what we were celebrating, and I didn't want to go through the motions and feel conflicted in my heart. So I brought it up and we talked about it. Husband said he was celebrating our life together, our love for each other, and the happy times that we had, despite his secret life.

I said I could also celebrate our love for each other. But the memories of happy times are tinged with pain for me because I know that the life I thought I had in those happy memories is not the life I was really having. He said he understood, and we left it at that. I felt satisfied that we weren't ignoring any elephants in the living room, and that I had identified something I could authentically celebrate about our 10 years together. There is a lot of good...lots of love, and there were so many good times.

At the airport on our way back to Calfiornia I realized I was feeling sad because there was a part of me that wanted to know that things were going to continue to be as blissful and wonderful as they had been for the past 4 days on Maui. A much bigger part of me knows that there is no knowing anymore, but the desire to feel some assurance in spite of that is still present. I talked with Husband about it, and although there was no solution to that dilemma talking about it helped.

Since our return I've been able to focus and concentrate very well, and I've been spending a great deal of time catching up on work that I haven't been able to focus on for the past 4 months. No blogging from the office since I got back a week ago. And focusing on remaining connected with Husband has kept my attention after work and family stuff have been attended to each day.

In our couples therapy today we realized how differently we've experienced our sex life prior to June 1st. I realized more pointedly how little priority I'd placed on that, even though I knew it was important to Husband. We could go for weeks without having sex and I wouldn't realize it. I really took it for granted that he knew how much I loved him, that I found him desireable, and that I thought he was a great lover. Meanwhile, he was feeling unheard and unimportant to me, and his feelings of hurt and neglect built up over the years.

NOT that a lack of sex is either an explanation or justification for lies and infidelity. It's NOT. But I could see how I hadn't really been present to him in the way that I'd expect him to be present to me. And how his feelings about that, combined with his feelings about other things going on in his life, his inability to express himself, and his lack of conscious awareness of his feelings led to him react by distracting himself with food, sex, shopping, alcohol and other things he felt entitled to because of his pain and anger (which he didn't have the ability to recognize for what they were.)

One of the promises of Twelve Step programs is that you will come to not regret the past. While I wish there was another much less painful way for me to have learned what I'm learning from this, we are experiencing individually and as a couple so much growth from this that I could honestly say that I am beginning to not regret what has transpired. Not that I wouldn't change it if I could, but I can't. And that doesn't seem so awful anymore.