I don't find it crazy at all that we tolerate too much before we see it was too much about 100 miles back. I find it heartbreaking, rather than crazy that I was willing to sacrifice myself until it went so far I had to dissociate from reality because I had become so afraid of my son in my own home. Losing the sanctuary of my home should have been enough. Losing myself was a bridge too far. That was when I did everything I could to change.
My love for my son was greater than my love for myself. I had come to feel I could only be okay if he was okay. Like Siamese twins, in my distorted reality, my life had become contingent upon his. My heart was broken, if he was broken. Unless I could fix him, fix his life, I was broken.
NO. NO. NO.
This is a distorted view of life. But it is not crazy. We have to be able to look at this objectively. We are not broken. Our lives are not broken. It is our children who are not living well. We are okay: If we let go. It's not letting go of them. It's letting fo of the idea that we are responsible and that something we can do will fix them, or their lives.
What we have to let go is that we and they are no longer the same organism in terms of cause and effect.. I know you know that. But think about it. Do you really accept that you and your son are individuals with different needs, wants and value systems? Do you accept he has a right to choose to be a drug addict or sell drugs, or careen out of control? When our children grow up, they have independent lives and independent selves. Even when those value systems and behaviors make us recoil. It is not written that children grow up and do good, do right, and follow a positive path. It is the reality that some don't. We have to accept reality, or we suffer.
You can do this. I have always said this: If I can do this, any mother can. Every.single.person here would tell you this: It is a miracle that I finally learned to think and act correctly. I would not, could not learn. Finally, I did.
