Para, Para, Paradise

PAST

It shouldn't surprise anyone who's read the blogs so far that I read a lot of astrology. And one thing I've noticed in my horoscope, and in Chi's, and in Rory's, is that there's an awful lot about how we expect perfect happiness, finally, someday in life. One day, we expect everything in life to somehow smooth out, and to be what we always wanted and needed.


And it always tells us we're going to be disappointed.


Rory's, especially, is interesting. She has these transits that talk about how she seeks her own insular, ordered little world, that's comforting and familiar and provides everything she needs to feel loved, comfortable, happy, safe. They talk about how she seems to live in a sort of floaty, happy, imaginal world. There's a lot about dreams and fantasies. And, um, how she seems to be trying to force Chi to create that for her, as if he owes it to her. 


And it sort of makes sense, if you think about it. This hobby she's involved in I'm quite sure can be all-consuming, if you let it. There's special clothing and special hobbies, crafts, and skills. There's a whole hierarchy of leadership. Everyone has a special name, an alter ego, and plays a character. If you look around at the Facebook profiles of people in the hobby, a lot of them post their hobby name as well as their real name. Their friends are all from the hobby. They even have little symbols they all post on their profiles. I used to be a Star Trek nerd when I was younger--I had my Deanna Troi dresses and I could even do all but two of her hairstyles on my own head. (I went to a couple of cons where I had a couple of guys following me like lovesick fools.) This hobby looks even more absorbing and insular than that.



It would seem that we all expect the world to finally meet our needs and make us happy one day...and we expect each other to do it for us!



(Well, okay. Rory would probably be much happier if the earth opened up and swallowed me whole, but other than that, I mean.)



Look at this. Look at everything she expects Chi to provide for her. Look at everything I expected he would do for me! And, apparently, if astrology is at all accurate, he has quite a set of expectations for me as well. (I just don't know it yet!)



And it's all part of this thing, this phenomenon I finally do observe in myself, which took a long time to observe. Because when you believe the world is a certain way, and you believe this in error, you don't have the perspective to notice it as such. It's just the way the world is, to you. Why would, how would, you ever consider it to be a "perspective" or a "set of expectations"?



And yet I know it's true.   



I remember when I was a little kid. I was so unhappy. I had a mother who was my best friend, and then ugly, screaming, and rageful by turns. I went to school and I was the kid EVERYBODY hated. I was the kid who got laughed at every day because of what I was wearing, the hairstyle I had (not Farrah Fawcett "wings" when that was the ONLY hairstyle that was "in"), hit, kicked, gum thrown in my hair, beaten up at the bus stop. I was the kid who watched as other children I had never even met walked by me in the halls at school and pointed and laughed at me. Word spread far and wide...I was the girl to pick on.

 
I used to dream that one day I'd be a famous writer. That someday, when I wrote something everyone loved, or I wrote Star Trek or Star Wars or some such popular franchise, I'd finally be accepted and have friends then. My parents would be proud of what I actually wanted to do instead of what they wanted me to do. I'd have enough money so I wouldn't have to worry. Life would come up roses and I'd finally be happy. And you know, when I was married to Simon, he was like this, too. Of course, he was a lot closer to a career as a household name than I was, but even when it wasn't working out, in his mind it still would always work out. One thing you can say about Simon, he was a very happy, very sunny, very optimistic guy. (I got some very unrealistic ideas about the publishing business that way.) 


Come to think of it, he didn't have that great a childhood, either.
 

And then you sit there and wait for it to work out. We all seem to think that life is about It Finally Working Well On The Earthly Plane. Don't we all think that if we could just work hard and be good enough, we'd all be Donald Trump, or something? (And that's why some of us are very judgemental toward poor people?) And we keep working and struggling and waiting and waiting for it all to get easier...dreaming of the day.


In my case, it never got easier. I ended up in a career that's been very difficult for me, that I've only now managed to master and earn what I should be earning in. I started to have friends, but then elder care landed in my lap, everyone moved out of state, and I was too busy to notice. Now I can't find anyone. I met the love of my life, and then he died.



And I worked so hard during that time, I really did expect that after I suffered that last, horrible loss, things would finally turn around for me and be easy and good from then on out. As if the world would finally say, "Okay, you did a good job there. You're tired and you've been through enough. Bad times are over and you'll be taken care of and have only good, easy times from here on in."



And it didn't happen, and it didn't happen, and it didn't happen. I was grieving, and things just got harder. The elder care got more demanding, not less. The whole world just looked black.



And there I was sitting there saying, Hey, it isn't supposed to be like this. Didn't I do a good job taking care of Simon, and of all the other things I was supposed to take care of? Aren't I supposed to be rewarded for all of this?? Wasn't life supposed to get good one day??




I got so depressed with the world. It had just been too hard for too long. I started to feel like I couldn't impact anything, and nothing would ever go well for me no matter what I did. I started to feel as if I had been cursed. I started waiting to find out I had cancer, too. I just started waiting for the worst thing that could ever happen to me to start and morph itself into something even worse.


And then...along came Chi.


The world really IS going to reward me!! I really am going to be given some of the things I need!! IT ISN'T HOPELESS!! 


Throw the confetti. 



I think that, growing up in an unhealthy family, there's no sense of balance in what the world will offer. If you grow up in an extremely unhappy family, the world looks skewed bad in your eyes. And you make up for it by telling yourself that one day, if you're just good enough, ONE day it will all be as good as it once was bad. I did it. And, it seems, Chi and Rory do, too. Do all children from unhappy homes do this??



And it's never true.  Even with Simon, which was the most happy, fun, and effortless relationship I ever had...there were still problems. Horribly unfair, terrible things happened in the world outside that affected our happiness, and took him away from me far too soon.



And I sat around wondering what was wrong with me that life should be so cruel. Or, what was wrong with LIFE that life should be so cruel.



It never occurred to me that my worldview was just, wrong.



If you don't understand that the basic plan of life is that there will always be SOMEthing wrong, SOMEthing missing, and that life will never be "just GREAT!" you're going to spend most of it expecting that WONDERFUL thing to happen and fix it all.



And it might be the next person you fall in love with.



And that might be a terrible disaster. Even if the relationship might have been okay otherwise. Look at all the expectations you're heaping on the other person and the relationship.



Rory certainly heaped her share onto Chi, and he was slowly dying inside trying to meet her expectations instead of living as he needed to live.



Now I'm going to come along and do the same thing?



It really is time to wake up. Life's not a child's daydream.



The interesting thing about that child's daydream is, we're so happy while we're dreaming it. For years and years, as long as we think we're suffering now for a beautiful future next month, next year, next decade, it helps us keep our moods happy and sunny.



WHILE IT'S WRECKING OUR RELATIONSHIPS.


One thing I see now, you can't pile all that onto another person. Otherwise you can't let them be themselves. Chi and I were in love four months, and it was already starting to happen.



What do you think? Did you have a tough childhood? Did you enter adulthood with a dream of rosy, Hollywoodland happiness someday? 

So, how much of your future is set in stone, and how much can you really change?

FUTURE

Or: Be very careful what you wish for. You just might get it.

 

When you lose the guy who looked perfect, and you’re desperate to get him back again, you’ll do almost anything.

I spent the equivalent of an old used car online looking up my yearly horoscopes, far into the future.

I have to say that what I found is absolutely terrifying.

As I said, I’m pretty sure I’ve got his wife’s birth time down to an hour and a half window. It turns out that an awful lot of interesting things run all through our horoscopes. I once hired an astrologer to do my and Chi’s composite chart, and she said this is a fated relationship. After buying all our transits on my own, I’m beginning to believe it.

I lined my transits, Chi’s and Rory’s all up side by side, read, and took notes. What happened when I did that was fascinating. Put Chi in between us, and you can watch him change relationships. A computer-generated transit won’t, of course, tell you who the other parties involved are, but every time Chi changes relationships, either Rory or I gain or lose a partner. When I’m bereft and unhappy, Rory’s happy; when she’s bereft and unhappy, I’m with somebody and happy. I’ve never met her, but the three of us look linked.

The story that's told goes on far too long and is horrible for all three parties in the end. And why the problems happen is very sad indeed.


I've moved the specifics to a private posting on Live Journal, but what Mark Smith of Family Tree Counseling says about situations like this is most relevant and should be viewed by anyone angry over anyone else's affair.

And a prescient one at that...

PAST

Old psychological burdens

Valid during many months: Don't become too worried by any profound changes which may turn your life upside-down, because they will give you the necessary strength and energy to finally get rid of some of your old psychological burdens. A friend, work colleague or close family member could have the necessary therapeutic capability to help, being able to put their finger on something which you find particularly painful to discuss. Rather than intending to hurt you, their behavior will simply reopen old wounds which you suffered in your childhood or adolescence. 

The recognition that many of your problems with others are simply the result of your own tendency to cover up your weaknesses and avoid painful issues will help you to gradually change your behavior. Try to overcome the compulsion to keep up appearances all the time, and admit that you also have your failings, weaknesses and inferiority complexes. You will then discover an inner strength which you thought would be lost by admitting this. Feeling powerless or having a vague sense of being controlled or manipulated will only take hold of you if you are unable to find the courage to confront your own inner demons. 

Be quietly thankful to all those people and events which are now throwing your life into turmoil. They are only helping to stir up regions of your unconscious which you have been so adept at repressing, a repression which has been blocking any chances of healing. If you can accept your whole self, including those influences which are painful, you can help to pave the way for a more confident and calmer future. 

Transit selected for today (by user):
Chiron opposition Pluto,  ,
activity period end of April 2015 until end of January 2017

So what happened...?

How can you tell when a recovering codependent has recovered enough to be safe to date?

FUTURE

Some people say astrology is crap, and maybe it is.

Then again…every single thing my horoscopes have predicted for the past four years or so has happened. I even pinpointed the date of my husband’s death within a week by looking at his horoscope transits. They read exactly the way my grandmother’s did the week she died.

When something that eerie happens, and then it’s telling you you are almost certainly bound to your married ex-boyfriend in some significant way for the long term, it does indeed give you pause.

Even if it’s not true: We do tend to attract the same kind of person over and over again, and play out the same kind of relationship time and time again. I really do hope that if someone else came along, I would know better this time than to feel a soul-mate attraction to someone so hopelessly codependent that he can’t stop wrecking his relationships and his life. I really, really do hope that I would have learned better, and maybe if I ever met someone I could fall in love with again, he’d be more like my late husband, who knew who he was and what he wanted and wouldn’t compromise that for anything.

But. What are the odds I’m actually done in this area? Am I going to pick Chi or someone just like him, again??

If a person’s self-esteem is so critically low that they morph themselves into whatever they think you want, struggling to please you because they’re afraid of losing love…and then ten years later they discover they’ve betrayed themselves so painfully there’s nothing to do but have an affair or get a divorce: Even if they’re in treatment, how do you know when they’ve recovered enough that you can trust that what they’re telling you is true?

Can you EVER trust that what they’re telling you is true?

Do they even know that it’s not?

By Chi’s own admission, he knew he was unhappy with the dynamic he agreed to in his marriage and his life for something like TWENTY YEARS. And NEVER SAID ANYTHING. Except to come to club meetings and talk about how he was studying Zen to tolerate the unhappiness in his work, in his marriage, in his life. Of course, he was never specific enough about what was going on until those six months we spent together.

He could tell me then because I wasn’t truly a close part of his life. One phone call, and <snip!> I was gone. He didn’t live with me; all he had to do was not be online, and he didn’t have to deal with me at all. What a person to tell all your secrets to! If no one knows about the relationship, one phone call and it didn’t even happen.

Whereas, for the people in his life whom he called “nearest and dearest”…well, I knew sixteen years before any of them did how unhappy he was in his marriage. SIXTEEN YEARS.

When a person has lived this inside-out and backwards life their whole entire life, can they ever change? And how would you know whether they had?

Because a person who can chronically and habitually lie to you about how they feel and what they want, while suffering unimaginably for TWENTY YEARS, going, “Everyone’s happy but me, so what’s wrong with me? I can’t talk up and hurt these people,” is NOT safe to live with. Ten, fifteen, twenty years later—BLOOIE!!!! Everything you thought was real…IS NOT.

I can’t think of anything that would hurt me more. If I love someone enough to be in an exclusive relationship with him, to let him into my house, into my bed, into my life, to plan a future with him and only him—I’d rather watch that person have sex with someone else than know that person didn’t trust me enough to tell me, “I don’t want to do this or that. This is making me feel unhappy, can we change this?”

To THINK that the second love of my life didn’t trust me enough to believe that I loved him enough to care about his needs…well, I’d rather jump from a bridge. And that is no joke.

Are codependents hopeless? If you’ve been so seriously codependent, with such terrible, horrible, low self-esteem for almost sixty years, is there any hope? How would you know the person was functioning well in the relationship, rather than just shining it on so seamlessly that you won’t know until your whole world falls apart?

I’ve been asking myself this question a lot. Since if this one doesn’t come back, I’m likely to just pick out another one just like him.

I guess if there’s a lot of disagreement and differences, you can be sure the person is probably telling you the truth. If they are dissenting with something you want to do and saying so, why would they say it if it wasn’t who they really were and what they really wanted?

But if it’s smooth sailing, and everything is, “Yes, dear” how do you know that the person really is okay?

I guess you don’t.

And that is truly scary.

I’d be afraid to let this person move in with me. I’d be afraid that if I did that, he’d start overcompromising and overdoing, overplacating and overyessing, overpleasing and undertalking, unhappy the whole time and not saying anything for fear I’ll snap at him or leave him. Even if I’m asking and asking and checking and checking with him: “Is this okay with you? Are you sure this is okay with you? You’re not just saying this to please me? You really, really are comfortable?” I don’t know that I could trust the answer. Chi came to our club meetings for years, talking about the hobbies he was doing with Rory as if they were the most interesting things in the world. Only when he finally let me into the deepest recesses of his heart did I hear the truth.

If the price of being close to such a person is being kicked OUT of the deepest recesses of the person’s heart, it isn’t worth it to try to be close. That Chi trusted me that much meant more to me than a million bars of gold. If we established a relationship, and he didn’t trust me anymore…

I really would want to die. I really, really would.

And I realize this has nothing to do with me. This is this person’s illness, which predated my birth by ten years, which I did not cause, and which I can do nothing to cure.

How about it, out there? Is anyone reading this involved in a relationship with an adult child of an alcoholic? Does that person lie to you? Did the relationship stay intact? How did you get past it? How do you know you can trust what that person tells you about their feelings and your life together?

If you find out you’ve picked out an ACoA to have a relationship with, should you just abandon ship?

Thought: How do you know if an ACoA is better or not?

Answer: Look at the person’s self-esteem.

Anybody got any more??