Life slowly returns to pre-ultra-active addiction phase. I am working at the level I did before I got into active addiction. And something is bugging me so I ask myself:
What would a woman who loves herself do? She would clean the room. 13:57 – 14:30 hours
I thought I could continue to write but ask myself: What would a woman who loves herself do and she would call a friend and ask for advice. Did so. Now I am back to the computer. And the sun is coming out. I need to change the mode I am in, not hang around here. Work is overwhelming. The external consultants think the deadline for the audit I am preparing for is not feasible but my boss is not happy to change it. I feel like I am being set up for failure. But pushing the audit out a few months, 3 would be reasonable, makes it so that it is after the end of my contract. So I feel I can not bring that up. Also, I feel that I am not making enough money for the responsibilities I have been given. Making double the amount would not at all be strange, I did not pay enough attention when applying, thought is would all be less difficult. I specifically do not make enough for the way I fill in the requirements for the function. But I feel I am in this tight spot where I say: “I am very good, do not earn enough, but I am not meeting the requirements and need more money and more time.” I have difficulty doing so. Don’t know how to deal.
Next thing: I think and fear the external consultant is gas lighting me to sabotage the project. The project is very extensive, includes a manual requirements for procedures to be set in place which is 200 page long. Those are only the descriptions. Each sentence can mean a day of work to get the procedure in place. They say it takes about 3 years to know the whole process. The consultant is helping but he does not give boundaries and priorities. He also contradicted himself the other day on a point where 2 weeks earlier he had said was ‘on of the most important procedures’ to show ‘we’ve got this system up and running for at least a few months’ while now he said ‘no need to do so’ and ‘go make those drawings’ (which in my eyes are of little importance) of which he says ‘well, everything needs to be done, this too’.
It brings me trouble because I do not want to work like I am checking a person and keeping a record. But he probably is. And the details are so many that I can not see through them anyhow so… Nasty.
And I need to keep sober. Not that I think drinking will solve anything but that is the person now who can, but only just, take care of me. If this continues there comes a time that I do not want to take care of me and that I want to forget and not feel.
I rewrote my ‘About‘ page today. Should have kept a copy of the old. Did not. The new page says that:
I compare being sober with a pressure cooker: I would build up pressure because of not/underdeveloped life skills, experienced pain and stress followed by ineffective coping techniques, then I would drink to let the steam off. Obviously the way to let steam off only got me into more trouble but it took me to age 44 while to find that out. In sobriety I think I need to:
1 learn to not build up steam and
2 let go of it differently.
I need to learn to not build up steam too much. I thought I did so by leaving my former job and looking for a new one. I guess I underestimated the level of overwhelm that this project brings. If I would still be a consultant myself I would be working around the clock to set things straight. But then I would be making 6-8 times my current salary AND I would be drinking to deal with the stress. I find it difficult to come to a
So yeah, I have, unknowingly been set up for failure. My boss admits that he has underestimated things. He has another project which is going haywire because the people he put on it are not doing their job. At some point last year he made 3 decisions which do not at all support the structure of the company and now it needs all his time to set these straight. I see that. Me being self-supporting makes it very easy to forget about my project. However… is it possible that he was as enthusiastic about them as he was about me in the first place? And now I am looking for a way to quench the fires and the overwhelming powers of shame about my assumed incompetence, of shame because I am being lied to by the consultant, of shame and pain about the memories of the culture of deceit I grew up in, of pain about not being in contact with my brother and SIL because of what happened due to that, of anger about my salary, of shame about my incompetence of dealing with salary, shame about me having been addicted and being in such a state at age 47, all of these fires are burning inside. First drink thought since ages came up last Friday. I was very happy that the friend I went out for dinner with drank tea instead of alcohol. I guess if she would not have done so I would have asked her to change to soft-drinks.
I now understand how I got myself into drinking in my early working time by being overtaxed and needing to rewind quickly. It is Sunday afternoon now. I have been thinking of work 24/7 for a few weeks now with breaks only when I sleep and even then I can dream about this.
I need an arm around me. The realisation that having a partner can make a change in this is big. A friend of mine is moving out-of-town, she and her boyfriend are buying a house of 500.000 Euro’s, it needs rework. I feel ‘left behind’. I suddenly feel all the work I put into getting sober and being sober has been stupid because I was stupid to become addicted in the first place.
You know, dealing with addiction is not a big thing when all goes well, it is difficult when I come to the point where I do not want to care anymore because I feel stupid. Where I think I have no value anyhow. Where I am convinced I have less right to be here because of who I am. A woman who loves herself would: love herself. But I can’t currently.
In my head I hear Anne (Ainsobriety) (hi!) saying ‘compassion, show yourself some compassion’ and I realise I do not do that. Now I step outside me experiencing this attack on me and try to be the observer. The observer sees a very frightened girl who is afraid to fail bully another with shame, denial and all types of emotional abuse. The observer thinks I identify with the one being bullied. I wonder who the fuck the bullied person is. I do not recognise me from the outside. Strange this is. Don’t worry if you can’t follow, I don’t understand it either. I’m thinking I am dissociating in 2 steps here.
The frightened girl is very effing frightened. Need to go talk with her. She is very afraid to fail. Feels like she will die if she fails. Wonder where this comes from. I only remember my father once saying “If I would have built this faulty bridge I would have committed suicide.” He meant it. I was going to write I can not understand where the fear of failure would come from but my mother was a perfectionist. My whole photo album reads like a manual to the defected daughter. A lot of criticism hidden in wittyness. I can’t even read it anymore. My brother and SIL laughed at me when I mentioned that I found this painful. Adding insult to injury. And I do the same to me: not taking me seriously, not valuing myself, killing/selfdestructing when confronted with possible failure. Patterns are difficult.
Meditation helps. Plan to wake up half an hour early to meditate again during working days too. Meditation makes that everything I attach to; thoughts, opinions, fears, feelings of all kinds sort of seem unimportant, become unimportant and it helps me to energetically set to zero. I used to not know ‘how’ to meditate but the navel staring of the last years has helped me greatly to find what I was looking for; it helped me see how I attach to things, to feelings, where they, well ‘enter’ my ‘aura’ for lack of another word.
Hmm, don’t feel like writing anymore. Suddenly all of this seems superfluous. It is not. I know that. It is a log and it is a set time for me to force myself to check upon my sobriety. To see what drives me, what puts me in (e)motion. People say ’emotions are not facts’ – which is often true. But emotions will fuck up sobriety – which is why I think it is a good idea to keep a good watch on them. 🙂
A woman who loves herself would now read the book which she has wanted to read for the whole week. Turn off the computer and wifi to ensure better quality of sleep later. And make the bed now, not at the moment she goes to bed so she then dislikes herself for putting it off. So, that is what I will do. 🙂
I am happy that I quit. I find going through this time very informative. I need to take care that it does not take me over and I need to delegate and take care of the girl who is so afraid of failure. She is afraid she will lose me because I have left her. This is such strange territory. With these descriptions I am ‘just’ phrasing how it feels/what it looks like, in order to give voice to what is happening, putting words to what I feel, how I experience things helps me to see and experience things. Or maybe it helps me to take seriously what I experience. Not sure. Guessing this is a phase I need to go through. Because it is here. Let’s see what it brings. What is in the way, is The Way. I can only get out by going in. 🙂
Sorry for an unfulfilling post with no ‘solutions’ to yet another drama. :-D. I’m off to read, make beds and meditate. Better than staring at a screen. Wishing you a good night/week.
xx, Feeling
and I can see now what difficulty got me into drinking more and more.
feelingmywaybackintolife 