feeling sorry for him!!!

Started by Dodo, July 08, 2020, 11:03:05 AM

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Dodo

Is it right to stay in a relationship when you feel sorry for your partner......I know the answer is no but I can't help but feel that this man that I have chosen to live with and have had nothing but issues with I must say I feel bad for his problems.  He has heart skipping and anxiety problems he has been dealing with for years.  He use to have a lot of responsibility with a stay at home wife, 3 kids and a business he built on his own, I can see his stress issues then but now I don't get it. I have written in the past about our problems and myself having to do anything that is not in his bubble by myself and I was struggling with that and have had to come to the conclusion that he will never change.  We keep breaking up and then I decide to stay as it is such a huge hassle to split (my god how crazy is that). I am hanging on here because I want to wait closer to when our lease is up and I can't get over the feeling of feeling sorry for him......help

notrightinthehead

But Dodo you don't have to leave him. You can stay if you want. You can choose to stay and be annoyed with him often, or not.  You can choose to stay and leave later or only when it becomes unbearable.  If it is more convenient for you to stay, you stay. Nobody's judgement but your own counts. All of this is your choice. You can even choose to be desperately unhappy and still stay, nobody but you will have to pay for that.
I don't think people on this forum will judge you for whatever you choose to do. You will still find support.
I can't hate my way into loving myself.

1footouttadefog

And of you do leave, you can still care. 

tragedy or hope

Quote from: notrightinthehead on July 08, 2020, 01:29:31 PM
But Dodo you don't have to leave him....
I don't think people on this forum will judge you for whatever you choose to do. You will still find support.
When you are ready you will walk out the door with complete peace. It sounds as if you feel you must. Life has so many twist and turns. I have contemplated the same. I chose to stay. I have good times too. I am not a saint either. Living with insanity after so many years... i kind of loose it sometimes too.
You are smart to consider consequences. I feel sorry for my unpdh that he is missing all the good parts of me and life in general. But he is still loveable. I had 3 kids now 5 great grandkids during the insanity and I have some really great memories. I feel sad for him that he misses so much. But you know he doesn't care and to him "he's good." (his go to response to all.)
You must be getting better as it is it so clear to you to see enough to have pitty.
Be good to yourself.Consider the consequences to yourself. Family gatherings, holidays, daily habits with each other, the quiet times etc. Maybe make a list of pro and con and evaluate which are more important to you to act on. No hurry. YOU go out the door when and if you are ready.
IMO Al Anon or even a codepent group is free and has so much to offer. It will help you alone. The programs are for you and they are free. There is usually someone in a similar and even worse position.
Help and hope are there. You can even zoom meetings now if you wish. Just sit in and say nothing but hear what people talk about. You may hear your story.
:bighug:
"When people show you who they are, believe them."
~Maya Angelou

Believe it the first time, or you will spend the rest of your life in disbelief of what they can/will do; to you. T/H

Family systems are like spider webs. It takes years to get untangled from them.  T/H

Dodo

You all make so much sense, I guess I complain so much about him I feel weak for not leaving, but the truth is he does have some fine qualities, if you didn't know he had so many issues, you would think he was the funniest most well adjusted guy around,  but when you know him like I do you realize he is deeply flawed and doesn't give me what I want, doesn't even try.  But I do have my freedom if I want it, that's for me to choose, I even have my freedom with him as he knows I want to travel and do my own thing and he realizes now that he won't keep me around if he tries to stop me. I've always just wanted in my golden years (i hate that I'm saying that, but I am 63) someone to share these things with me, and I don't know if I can accept that he won't and never will.  I guess I'm just comfortable for now, till the next episode.

GettingOOTF

I came to see that a large part of why I stayed with my ex was that it was easier to focus on him and all the things that were wrong in the relationship (which I blamed him for) than it was to see my own issues and do the work to overcome them.

I took pride in how much I sacrificed to make him happy, how good a person I was to stay with a man who was totally unsuited to me and not at all interested in following the advice that I took such pride in offering, the work I was doing to “fix” him. My life became about getting him to do what I thought best for him. This was classic codependent behavior. I worked on this as well as the abandonment trauma I carried with me.

Do you think you will actually leave when the lease is up? I too also used to tell myself “I will leave when ...” and then something would come up and I’d stay. I’d tell myself it was because he was out of work or had just started a job or he’d never be able to afford to stay in this area on his own.  It was never about him,
It was about me.

Poison Ivy

 :yeahthat: Truthfully, it was not hard to end the marriage once I began acknowledging and accepting the many ways I had contributed to it being a not good relationship and the many things about myself I needed to (and still need to) work on.

Lookin 2 B Free

Thanks, Getting Out of the FOG.  You're speaking my truth.  I wasn't a member here when you wrote this, but I was seeing what you spoke of.  Once I got out and had NC for awhile, I started realizing some of the payoff I'd had for staying in that PD relationship, an unhealthy way of getting me to feel better about me.    Now I'm faced with actually healing my relationship with myself.  I've been in therapy and Alanon for many years and never saw it until awhile after things ended.  Stepping out of the unhealthy relationship laid bare the real work. I'm right behind you.  Not to say my path is everyone's.  But it's so heartening to hear your validation, GOOTF.

tragedy or hope

And one more thing,
I do think age has a lot to do with decisions. Older people (you be the judge on that one) have many more financial things to consider... ie; retirement and things that affect quality of life.

Not everyone can afford to venture out into self-discovery territory alone. It will make them impoverished. OR, they will spend years of their "golden age" fighting for what is theirs if the SO has any PD. So... there is not an easy solution for anyone who is facing these things. Health issues also come into the picture.

I think it depends on the age of the relationship also. I speak from my own perspective. When I learned after decades that my H was unpdh... it was way into a very stable life otherwise. Health issues have already been in the mix, grandchildren etc. Spiritual conviction kept me here.

There are many things I still need to work on so I am a better person for my own well-being. If I ever get there, maybe I would throw caution to the wind and live on the street if I had to. Right now... I like my cushy life. If some drama comes my way via an unstable partner, I am a big girl now. Many worse situations can occur. I would not trade my troubles for anyone else's. I know what I am facing and continue to acquire tools to deal with it. I don't believe I am here on earth just to make sure I am happy.

I would also say, living alone, being alone is ideal. We don't have to share life with anyone and by far, there would be less chaos. Intimacy is messy, or lack of it. We all get to decide what we can best live with or without. These are big decisions that are very personal and affect life in a very big way.

I learned to look at other peoples lives, what did they have, what did they loose... are they at peace now? Are they in a new relationship? Do they have problems?What was the payoff exchanging one for the other?

I always came back to what I had. Perfection is for the PD. It does not exist in the real world.



"When people show you who they are, believe them."
~Maya Angelou

Believe it the first time, or you will spend the rest of your life in disbelief of what they can/will do; to you. T/H

Family systems are like spider webs. It takes years to get untangled from them.  T/H