Married Hard Mode - 60+ days goal

I guess it's possible that I did happen. That's really hard to admit given that I don't have any recollection of it, but you're right that it's not out of the realm of possibility. When I perceived her accusation (I treated it that way, right or wrong), that caused me to get emotionally hijacked and go into Fight mode. This is somewhat interesting in and of itself as I almost always go to Flee. Being in Fight mode lead me to outright reject something that is definitely physically possible. I've had this experience a lot recently where, when recalling the past, the details may not be exactly as I recall, but the feeling is almost always correct. If my wife felt unsafe for some reason, then it did happen for her.

Anyway, I had a rough day today. I was emotionally disconnected this morning - kind of an emotional hangover from yesterday and relapse as well. I was having a lot of trouble getting out of the shame narrative. I became defensive, I was not able to show up in empathy, I'm disheartened at the state of trust in our relationship (none), I feel like I can't do anything right.

I also feel like I may need to talk to my boss at some point because some of this stuff is really at risk of bleeding over into work. She already knows I've been in counseling for the last 18 months.

 

I feel like I've been having a self-worth crisis. Feeling like I am not enough manifests in so many different areas of my life - my relationships, my ability to be present, my ability to connect with those deeper emotions, my ability to express my values and demonstrate my talents. The reason that I turn away and hide is that facing that pain of rejection feels so scary. One of the vulnerable thoughts that I had this morning while walking was "My wife would be better off if I stayed away from her entirely because I've already caused her so much pain." It's hard to even describe how raw those thoughts feel. Even though it's a lie because that would only cause her more pain, it's tempting to think that rejection from her would still be less painful than rejecting myself.

Clearly, I am not past the shame part of this journey. In fact, it may always be something that I am more susceptible to than the average person just like addiction. At least I can recognize the issue and begin to communicate it. I know I need to develop my capability for self-compassion and ordered a workbook to that end. I do feel a bit calmer today. The crisis feeling may have been that of crashing back down to near-rock bottom (emotionally).

I don't want money or success or the big house or any of those things. I just want peace and a break from the emotional roller coaster.

 

I had a good walk this morning. I sat on a snow bank by the side of the road, watched the snowflakes drift down under the street lights, and enjoyed a quiet start to the day. I need more stillness in my life.

I was reflecting on my job and my shame spiral a couple days ago and tripped over some more lies that I tell myself:
- Succeeding is more important that trying (Truth - honest effort is more important than any measure of success)
- I have to demonstrate effort and growth every day to have value (Truth - I have value today, every day, and just as I am)
- Shame negates the good things in my life (Truth - Good things are good things, even when shame tries to hide them from you)

I had another wet dream last night. Boy, those are getting annoying! They are not enjoyable for me and I do not look forward to the potential to have one. I don't feel as upset as the last time that it happened, and it's very likely that it's related to the relapse a week ago.

My goal for today is to find some time to get really still and work on discovering what I really need at this stage of my life and my recovery. One of my daughter's books had this empathy practice in the back:
May you be healthy, May you be happy, May you be free from suffering, May you be filled with peace

 

I relapsed again last night right before bed. The difficult thing to accept is feeling the ritualization begin, feeling the desire grow in your mind, and not doing enough or being honest enough with myself to counteract it. I'm diving into this experience a little this morning to try to understand it better.

Yesterday was an indulgent day for me - I slept in (no dailies in morning), we went out for a big breakfast, I ordered a cinnamon roll to have after we got home, I had some alcohol (1 drink planned, 2 partial drinks spur of the moment), and I ate some food that does not align with my diet goals before coming home. I was engaging in mindlessness by looking for dopamine hits all day.

My relationship with my wife was going well yesterday, I think. We were able to talk some throughout the day and had a great evening at the Valentine's Day event that we attended which was a nighttime picnic and outdoor walk on lighted trails. We specifically talked about not attaching too much meaning to Valentine's Day because of all the damage in our relationship. That being said, I did feel close to her in an honest way - I could show up as myself, I did not have any significant expectations, and I was there in the moment with her.

Physically, relapse occurred in our downstairs bathroom which is the most isolated from our normal living space. There is a shower down there which is rarely used. Periodically, I tell myself that someone should take a shower down there to make sure everything is working properly. My wife does not like to shower down there for various reasons, so this ends up being me. In this particular instance, I think that showering down there was absolutely an excuse to isolate myself to enable acting out. I'm thinking that it may be helpful to have a boundary around the use of this bathroom, for example, I do not shower down there period. I'll relay this boundary to my wife today when I disclose to her.

A big factor was not doing all I could to prevent this from happening. I did not shut down the thought process as quickly or effectively as I could have (by meditation, for example). I did not avoid the situation by showering upstairs or showering the next day. I did not counteract the isolation impulse by surrounding myself with people I care about. I did not review the reasons why I am in recovery (Idea: put these in OneDrive in a highly accessible place since I almost always have my phone).

I did not put in the effort required to respect my bottom-line behaviors and maintain integrity. And now I need to disclose. Honesty and transparency is good, integrity and avoiding relapse is better.

 

The weather turned to poo around here (rain on top of lots of snow-covered ground and roads), so I'm avoiding walking for a day or two. We got a golden retriever puppy on Monday night! I hope that wasn't a mistake... caring for a puppy is a lot of work and we're already strapped for time and emotional resources as is. Anyway he's very adorable and fun-loving. I hope with love and training, he's grow into a treasured member of our family.

We did another F.A.N.O.S. check in last night (Feeling, Affirmation, Need, take Ownership, Struggles/Sobriety). My wife's struggle was that she feels her self disconnecting again to protect herself from the emotional pain of my relapses. I can understand where she's coming from. If I re-frame a lot of her responses as "Are you there for me", it's easy to see where the fear comes in. The goal is to do this check in every night so we have a dedicated time to talk and can mostly avoid "filling in the blanks" with the worst case scenario which is something we both tend to do. The emotional pain this time around was from this past weekend - we worked together to finish projects, we spent time with friends, we actually had a date at the botanical gardens for Valentine's Day and I still relapsed. This causes her to feel hopeless (and me too, at times). I'm really not sure what guard rails I need on my life to get over masturbation.

I've been using the feelings wheel quite a bit to help explain what's going on inside me. I like this one because of the relatively smooth gradation in colors: https://www.davidhodder.com/emotion-and-feeling-wheel/. I have a couple printed ones of those stuck up around my house. They also help my daughter too! This morning I'm printing another visual aid which is a list of coping skills. I'm printing it because then it's right in my face and will hopefully become ingrained over time. Here's that one: https://www.cbhcfl.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/Coping-Skills-web-920x1024.jpg.

I've been listening to the Porn Reboot podcast more lately as I've shifted back from the relationship towards personal responsibility and progress. I realized that I have not been counting my wins very well. This practice, call it gratitude or what have you, is important to build "reboot capital" which is basically a reservoir of positive things that you can rely on to counteract shame if it does manifest. I was doing a decent job of this a couple months ago but have fallen away from that practice. It's funny - my wife got a gratitude journal several months ago. Although I appreciated it because it was from one of my favorite educational web series, I didn't really use it and I think it was because I was not emotionally ready to use it. I feel like I am finally reaching that point.

To this community, thank you for providing a space for this type of reflection. Thank you for the support as well as challenging each other. I look forward to seeing some of you at the accountability call this week. Let's all find appreciation in at least one thing today. And hey, maybe write it down!

 

Tough night with the puppy and our son last night - lots of disturbed sleep. We've used the term "survival mode" quite a bit to refer to the early phase of parenting a young child and I think that primarily refers to long term sleep deprivation or disturbances - every night, multiple times per night, for months on end. When you get right down to it, sleep permeates every else you do in your life. It is very valuable indeed. We're thankful that our son is starting to sleep through the night much more frequently, but there are still some bad nights mixed in there.

My wife and I did the FANOS check in for the second time in a row last night. I do feel like I am experiencing some emotional safety because of it. Like somehow knowing that she can't respond is making it a little easier to be transparent with tough emotions. The exercise that we have says that when it's your turn, the other person cannot respond or ask questions and you agree to not talk about the content of the FANOS for 48 hours afterward. I'm not sure how I feel about that last part yet or really what function that serves, but we're trying to follow the exercise guidelines for a while at least.

I have been looking forward to going to group. We had this week off because the therapist is on vacation and because Monday was Valentine's Day. We did start a text group, at least a few of us who were there for the last session. I know I've wanted to have some local people to interact with even if it's only in the group setting and via text. Just in the same way that I think there is an added benefit to in-person counseling, having some people in my area feels like an added layer of security - I could run into them out in the real world, they are on my time zone, I've seen them in person and not just on Zoom. Maybe a friendship or two could grow out of there. Who knows?

I began working on my self-compassion workbook over the last couple of days. My goal is that this will address some of the issues I have with inadequacy which is emerging as a common theme in my life. I need to literally just write down all the areas in which I feel inadequate to define the scope of the issue - I know it is pervasive. Some of those things are certain to be lies that I tell myself for one reason or another. The first exercise in the book is to consider how you would treat a friend who has made a mistake or gotten into a bad situation. You think through how you would respond to/support that person and compare that to how you would treat yourself in the same situation. I realized that I treat myself horribly most of the time, occasionally including physical abuse (slapping or punching myself in the face, punching myself in the legs or stomach). This hasn't happened in a little while, but it's clearly shame-related. Definitely looking forward to discussing some of this stuff with my therapist.

Anyway, gotta get started on the day. Happy Friday and have a great weekend!

 

Friday night we did a check in where my wife said that she wasn't feeling like hugging me because that felt like being vulnerable in our relationship and she didn't want to risk being vulnerable in that way. Although that was hard to hear, I stayed with that emotion and got through the rest of our discussion. The grief and loss manifest in so many ways - sometimes it feels like being punched in the gut which I'm sure is exactly how disclosure feels for her.

Despite that, Saturday was a decent day for me. I felt myself being in that "independence" place a bit more (on the scale from independent to codependent). I got one more involved home project done and done well despite the amount of time that it took. I did feel a little disconnected throughout the early part of the day, but it seems to me that when someone tells you they don't want to connect to you, it's natural to need a little time and space to process that feeling. I wrote in my journal and had a longer call with my best friend which both really helped define how I was feeling.

I've been really trying to focus on each day because it's easy to be overwhelmed by the sadness of the past or the fear of the future. I've worn my wedding ring every day, minus maybe 10 days, for the last 6+ years. Sometimes I wonder what it would feel like to take it off. I recall the deeply strange sensation of not having it there, but that feeling is rooted in a mindless and dishonest time in our relationship. Would it carry a different emotional weight now?

I think I'm going to meditate for a few minutes before going upstairs so I can show up today.

 

My wife, daughter and I were all deeply ill on Monday and Tuesday which was not a pleasant experience. We all felt drained through the beginning of the week and that's been tough to come back from, but we're doing better day by day. I have not had a lot of time for reflection throughout that period due to being in "survival mode" and today is my first early wake up for a few days.

I am so grateful for the men in my group therapy group. Having a group of guys that are actively working to improve themselves and their relationships with whom I can communicate both during and outside of group feels great. Despite my issues with inadequacy, I can feel their acceptance and appreciation which empowers me.

One of the men brought up an instance in which he had applied the AVR technique from Help.Her.Heal in his relationship which I appreciate. This stands for Acknowledge, Validate (using primary emotions), Reassure and refers to responding to the partner's trigger/doubt/fear. Listening to his real world example made me reconsider my wife and I's disconnect about groping from a couple of weeks ago and how I would respond to a similar situation in the future. If she says "Hey I wanted to tell you that I felt uncomfortable with us touching overnight and I felt like you might have groped me", I would say "I hear you saying you felt that I groped you during the night and it made you uncomfortable (Acknowledge). I can see discussing this makes you feel sad and fearful. I can understand why you would believe I did that because I have before (Validate). I'm so sorry for the pain I caused. I want you to know that I'm working hard on my recovery to never return to that behavior." (Reassurance)

I will do my best to apply this technique to future moments of uncertainty, where appropriate. That's all for this morning. May you find peace in your recovery.

 

Yesterday, I began listening to the Helping Couples Heal podcast. This one is very clinical - it's put on by two trained CSATs and they have guest speakers who are also clinicians. They discuss the partner trauma model extensively and it's been difficult for me to hear again about all of the damage that has been done to my partner. I am trying to do this to continue my own education. Acknowledging and understanding the complexity of partner trauma is another part of living in reality. One guest speaker is Dr. Omar Minwalla who discusses his model that defines the betrayer's actions as emotional and psychological abuse. I need to do some more research on abuse to understand the ins and outs of that. One of the very first Google listings has the following example:
"Withholding is another form of denying. Withholding includes refusing to listen, refusing to communicate, and emotionally withdrawing as punishment. This is sometimes called the “silent treatment.”"

This makes me realize how I have perpetrated some of the same things that I experienced as a child. I did observe my mother disconnect from relationships to punish the other person's behavior. She did this to her entire family - mother, father, and 3 siblings.

At times, it feels like my wife and I have little to no emotional connection left. This is a deeply painful place to be. At times, I'm tempted to say that I deserve it, but that's a shame narrative. I'm not sure how to build trust. I'm not sure how to build safety. I hope that working with my therapist will reveal a road for this over time.