Author, thinker, speaker Danielle LaPorte asked her readers to answer:
what's one dumb thing that you used to believe in?
I was certain that my answer would be in sharing how I used to think MY LOVE could CHANGE someone who I was attracted to because they were diamonds in the rough. I believed in POTENTIAL. "All he needs is the love of the right woman. Me!" Ah foolish youth. Dysfunctional family of origin sets of beliefs were running my romantic rough boy taste in men until I married one. On the surface, that's pretty dumb! Loving a person for their potential may have been a good enough example in answer to Danielle's challenge. I have determined that "loving a person for their potential to be my hero and believing 100% my love can change them" is the thin skin covering my dumbest core belief in days of yore ...
EXPECTATIONS were the core of my dumbest belief system
I picked him, I ignored all those around me while I lived with him for 4 years, then still married him in 1986 based on my belief that I could repair HIM! That - despite knowing he'd been to 13 rehab programs before I met him in 1982. I started attending Alanon around 1984, while checking out this cool new TV lady, Oprah. In the earliest days of attendence, I went to meetings with the notion that this group would help me change HIM! I was quickly disabused of this goal. I was told I was attending to change myself because THAT IS ALL I CAN EXPECT about my life. I rejected this premise, plus, it bothered him that I was going, so I didn't really go very often. It did not penetrate that I'd become what I'd learned as a kid. I was born a Care-taker and a People Pleaser. Besides, I did not have the drinking problem HE DID. I EXPECTED that if I hung in there with him, all my hard work, years of tears, damage control, paying off tabs, enabling his worst traits with my own worst traits would end up in my being THANKED, being a hero. I EXPECTED that all my friends and our families would see what a wonderful girl I was to have been that Chalice Of Permanent Sobriety he would crusade for.I was sporadically attending Alanon meetings, giving lip service to my brain ... some of the group think and lessons made osmosis changes in my behavior. I was not cognizant that I'd started to behave differently in the home. He went to rehab as a condition of my marrying him in May of '86. I bought him a 1981 Harley Davidson Sportster for "us" as a marriage gift. In our 5th year together, trying to change for each other, he began to reject me and my expectations of 'saving him' with escalating verbal abuse. I grew up with emotional abuse, so didn't think it was abnormal. Then came the first shove. I didn't EXPECT that! Then came a punch in the arm. A slap here and there. Each of these ignored warning episodes came with an apology and honeymoon period of compliance from him. I still Expected that having gone so far, he would really bottom out and do as I and all his family EXPECTED of him. He did not have his bottom out, but I sure did!
One night, a full blown tackle on our ice covered, rural driveway ensued and all my expectations were about escaping alive. He'd been drinking, I'd been working, normal to us. I came home and smelled the fumes ... I EXPECTED I WOULD. I'd learned to avoid noticing out loud. He Expected that I would notice and say something. I Expected that if I said nothing, I could keep to myself. Expect the unexpected. That much is true. Domestic violence does not have expectations above the fact that there will be more of it. He did not like the "looks" I was giving him by not looking at him! That was enough for whatever red mist of mental blackout exists within the abuser. I had changed out of work clothes to put on a Tee shirt and robe. Nothing more. That was/is my choice of comfy wear. He kept trying to engage me. I kept deflecting any hint of whatever it was that he was waiting for. No such luck. Picture a 230 pound man, 5 foot 9 inches. Picture a 115 pound 5 foot 2 inch woman. A collar grab and shoulder shake. Thankfully, my mind has blurred most of it. In 1987, so there was no cordless phone. He'd ripped out so many phones over the years. At some point, I found wiggle room to put my bare feet inside his big Sorrel clunker boots, and out of the door, up our endlessly long driveway in hopes of making it across the street to another year round neighbor and get help. I heard his elephant bellow as he came out of the house to catch me. I was near the half-way point and it did not seem to matter that my tiny feet were driving the clown sized winter boots under me. I tried to go faster, but nightmares slow the best runners. He bashed into the back of my body with full on NHL strength. Front down, I hit the iced drive and the force of his body upon mine created a human sled out of me for a few more feet. I did not have to play possum. I had no air. I was awake, but that was about all I was. He stopped himself. He always did. Many abusers don't until they have created a lifeless body.
Until he picked me up, I had no idea of the pain I was in. My mind went away here and there. He was scared enough to call an ambulance. We lived 25 miles from the dispatch starting point. He was so nice. So sweet. Coaching me not to tell on him. I agreed out loud. Inside I knew I was going to tell. Could he detect this? Could I make him believe my nods and swollen lips trying to form the allegiance? My Angels were on my side. He opened the door to the EMT's. Of course, their eyes had seen this scene in too many horrible variations before they met me. They smelled his alcoholic perma-stink. My eyes sidling here and there like a skittered horse, his tale spinning while they paid no attention to what Mr. Concerned, It Was An Accident - was saying. They had to get me checked, onto the back/neck board and onto the gurney. No one was talking but my husband. At some point, one of the EMT's radioed a squad car. As I was being loaded into the ambulance, my husband was going to climb in too. The EMT's made excuse that he had to follow in our car because they needed room to work. He nods. As soon as the bay door shut, one of the EMT's said, "He did this right?" I stared at him. "He can't follow, there's a squad car at the top of the driveway, they can take him on drunk driving for the night. If he did this to you, they can do a lot more. You could have been killed tonight, we don't know if you have internal injuries, you still could die. DID HE DO THIS TO YOU?" I nodded yes, I mumbled yes, my head was screaming, "Yes!"
I had long ago forgiven my first husband because without him crossing my bow, I would not have learned what was wrong with me due to my Expectations of Fixing Another. If not for living through an abusive and sick relationship, and then re-parenting my 'root of origin' dysfunctions, I could not have raised my own child in better capabilities a few years later. I would not have gained the coping skills to endure and survive my auto-immune illness of Crohn's Disease and the acceptance of expectations realistic to getting the best out of life that I could. I am grateful and humbled by the broken man I tried to love into his potential best self so he could role change and then be my Knight. (looking down as I write, and shaking my head at the girl I was)
I wish I could say it was the end of the marriage.
It was the beginning of the end of the marriage.
It was the beginning of me as I am today.
In an Alanon meeting, not so long after I was the hockey puck in our driveway ... a member stated a bit of 12 Step gold that lives in my core soul every single day. "The brief definition of insanity is expecting better results from the same behavior." As I wrapped up the relationship and ended that chapter, I'd devoted myself to having learned as certainty - that - I cannot EXPECT ANYTHING FROM ANYONE BUT THE BEST OF MYSELF, and that's not always going to work out, but keep challenging MY beliefs & expectations.
I outlived my first husband. He died in 2001, 11 years past our time together. He died from mostly the complications of a life time of substance abuse. His sister got his adoption papers unsealed after his death and after their folks passed away. His records showed he was born with Fetal Alcohol Syndrome. This was how it was done in 1955. He never had a chance at life. I never had a chance with him. Catholic Charities Adoption laws are changed now.
Dear Danielle, this was not dumb, I was deaf. I acted out of ignorance. But then I acted in stupidity for knowing better and still tilted at windmills. I nearly died for my dumbest belief 'thing'.
When my son was a brand new 4, I met the man I would risk marrying again. I was 8 years past the first marriage. I was an IBD patient advocate, full time mom, full time job(s), and started sharing my tales of survival for others in my radio jobs and Crohn's Colitis forums. Early in 1997, I met my man who had the baggage set one collects by age 36. I did not fall in love with potential. I fell in love with eyes wide open. We married 14 years ago today, on 2/21/1998. We separated just after Thanks Giving 2011. We accept the loss of each self and circumstances we both now understand and are healing in couples therapy. I am embracing the original beliefs that my 12 Step program ingrained so long ago. I left a lot of my tools out in the rain. We both Expected in sideways directions. He is picking up some new self ownership and is doing the good work. No ONE is perfect and I have blessed again the idea that two whole selves make one good marriage. He'll come home in April as we are still working on important things we both need to do better within. The last couple years of our marriage feel like puberty upheaval! Middle age crazy for him, menopause for me, leaving off old pains and paradigms for each. Utilizing Personal Accountability to love a person just as they are, without EXPECTATIONS that they will change is our priority to repair what time, illness, economy and exterior challenges exhausted in both of us. We are deciding what we can accept or find unacceptable. And we are open to seeing where this will take each individual. We are making amends, we understand that no one acted in malice. We owe amends to our son and others. We are behaving our way away from unrealistic EXPECTATIONS. We each really did pick the right person to love and have more Pro's than Cons to build upon. We need to be mindful to EXPECT that 'each is what they is'.
To my SariSays readers, receiving Danielle's email motivation of the day for her Burning Question challenge - was not an accident, it was an anniversary gift. My Daily Hazelden was the anniversary card with their Thought of The Day quote: "Hope is the thing with feathers that perches in the soul, And sings the tune without the words And never stops at all." By Emily Dickinson Hope is not to be confused by Expectations - it is a human cry to make into reality the best of your desires if you go about it with realistic EXPECTATIONS of SELF.
Thank you!
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