I’m not going to say that I’m good on this, I’m just going to say how important it is to work this out with yourself. Yesterday I was in the muck of feeling all the negatives and believing in them.. later that night I realized I was alone and haven’t had anyone worth keeping in my circle besides my spouse. She kept recommending me to work on myself instead of trying to work on the relationship. I was then left alone; tired of feeling and thinking in such ways I finally accepted that offer and began to read and read on what a person should be working on. This emotional dependency is something I’m extremely weak with and I hope to remember it as I continue my sobriety. It’s hard because I think I’m not worth much considering where I am today!!! But making the actions will be even harder along with working my fourth step again and again. I’m going to replace those negative thoughts with realistic positive or neutral thoughts, stop another bad habit just like I did drinking and drugging, read and listen to more positive material, and add one thing I like to do that’s healthy for me physically. I don’t have anyone to hold it to me it seems, but that’s going to help me become more self reliant and resilient!! Pray for me!!
I was just talking with my brother in law who is a professional therapist. I told him how I was rationalizing getting back in touch with my ex-girlfriend and how it felt like folks in AA describe a relapse. I told him I had self-diagnosed that I might be emotionally dependent on my ex-girlfriend, that I had been struggling for the past week to think of ways I might win her back instead of accepting the recent breakup and focusing on myself in order to move on. He warned me not to conflate the feelings that come with chemical dependence and what can be misconstrued as emotional dependence on another person. He said the breakup process comes with a range of confusing emotions that we can easily misdiagnose in ourselves. He says what I’m going through is most likely not technically “emotional dependence”. We have to give ourselves grace to just keep moving ahead - however slowly and however confusing the path, and know that we will get through this. I see a lot of similarities in our struggle, my friend. Happy to talk more.