Where Are You Spending Your Attention?
Do you complain to complain? Are you addicted to the trauma of your stepfamily drama? Are you just waiting for your stepkids to screw up or for their mom to go off the deep end so you can go “see…I told you so!” How are you and your husband egging the crazy-go-round on?
Do I have your attention?
What would your life look like if you stopped complaining? How would you fill your days if you couldn’t blame anyone for your life circumstances? Can you describe a day when you no longer spend energy thinking about the ex-wife?
Do you truly desire the peace and calm you say you seek for you and your family? What are you doing to achieve that?
Once upon a time I lived a drama filled, stress filled, overwhelming life. My first husband left me for another woman (did I say drama? TNT has nothing on my past drama!) Nineteen years of true feelings and underlying issues erupted like Mt. Vesuvius. I felt humiliated. Kicked to the curb with my heart torn apart. Anger. Vengeance. Getting even. Obsessive thinking. Feeling like a complete and total failure. Rejected. Abandoned. Left alone.
My ex-husband taught me an important lesson. The gift of his affair, the gift of our divorce, was a test for me to learn how to be me when I no longer was who I thought I was.
For all I know, you could be married to my ex-husband. Good for you. Neither of us are the same people we were when we were married to each other. He’s not an asshole and I’m not a bitch. He treats you better than he ever did me. But guess what – he learned how to treat you better because of me. Because his behavior with me didn’t work. And he doesn’t want his marriage to you to end up like his marriage to me – in the gutter.
My advice to you: focus on you and your marriage instead of me or how awful my kids are. Or how much better you think you are than me. Or what a better parent you think you are than me. You’re not. We may be different in style, personality and core values but we have more in common then you’d like to admit: We married the same guy.
I’ll make a deal with you: I’ll stop horriblizing you and you stop horribilizing me. Deal? Let’s start today.
*This article does not pertain to those with diagnosed mental illness or the truly unreasonable – on both sides.
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This is so important! Until we rise above the blaming and complaining, our lives will NEVER get better! You can complain all you want, but where does it get you? A big, fat nowhere. You must decide you’re worth the change in focus. Look inward toward your own heart and your own immediate family. That’s where the good stuff is. Everything else is just everything else and is better left alone.
Wonderful article, Peggy!
Teresa Thompson´s last [type] ..Self-Discovery
Great post! One of my goals is to stop complaining! I found that I was complaining about my husband’s ex and his kids so much and it was robbing me of the energy I needed to accomplish the things I wanted to in MY life. I truly no longer care about what their thoughts are concerning me. I am simply going to live the best life and be the best version of myself and let everyone else worry about themselves.
Wonderful post. I enjoyed it and the gentle reminder is nice too!
Thank you for adding the asterisk (*) at the end of this well-written article, because that’s what I was just about to comment! The ex-wife in our situation has been diagnosed with Narcissistic Personality Disorder, but refuses treatment because the two, separate therapists who diagnosed her were, in her words, “incompetent hacks.” Therefore, a good deal of our energy goes into helping my teenage SD learn and practice the coping skills necessary to deal with her mother’s mental illness. Sometimes, I feel almost “addicted” to this drama, simply because it is so persistent and never-ending. However, I do know that all of this time and energy is well-spent, if it means that my SD can become a happy, well-adjusted young woman, despite her mother’s condition.
“Look inward toward your own heart and your own immediate family. That’s where the good stuff is.” AMEN to that!!
Hi Talia – one of the lessons I learned was what other people think of me is really none of my business. It’s their business. Our job is “to live our best life and be the best version of ourselves that we can be!”
Hi Kathi and thank you for your comment. I had to learn a lot about NPD as my ex was diagnosed with it as well. Unfortunately there is no cure. There is no magic pill that makes them better. They can be in a lifetime of therapy and they don’t get better. I am here to tell you that you can break the addiction to the trauma of NPD drama. I had to. And I had to teach my daughters how to best manage their dad. You can still teach your SD what she needs to do in order to manage her mother without getting wrapped up in it.
Thanks, Peggy, for your reply! With each passing day, all three of us- my husband, my SD and I- are doing are level best to “unwrap” ourselves. Thankfully, there are many wonderful resources out there to help us best navigate these crazy waters (no pun intended!).
Hi Kathi,
I’m not sure if you’ve come across Dr. Sam Vaknin – but finding his research on his own NPD and a support group really helped me. Just in case you haven’t found Dr. Vaknin, here’s the link http://samvak.tripod.com/
Again, thanks! I had heard of him, but haven’t read into his research in any kind of an in-depth way… I’ll definitely bookmark the website.
I am so glad to be able to read your posts. I am working on this very issue right now. It is hard because my husband was driving his ex-wife from work four nights a week. He would get up and walk away from me and be gone for an hour. She did not pay gas money and when I went with him to pick her up to “see that there was nothing between them”. She stated that she was still spiritually married to my husband, he was her best friend, and in her mind they were not divorced. He sat in SCILENCE! I left him. He told his ex wife he would not give her a ride. I came back. She threatened to take visitation of his son from him and claimed I was evil. He has been asking me if he can take his ex-wife to work. I said no. I am trying not to fight with him about it, but it is really hard for me to stop complaining to him about his ex-wife, or his son who dominates my daughter for that matter. I will try harder.
Dear Dawn,
I strongly encourage marriage counseling for you and your husband. His behavior and lack of boundaries with his ex-wife are awful. His ex is controlling, manipulative, and holding him over a barrel with his son. Do they have a court ordered visitation schedule? Do they have a parenting plan? Does your husband know how to stand up to his ex? If not, he’s destroying his marriage to you.
This isn’t about his ex-wife so much as it is about your husband and what he’s doing. He’s causing problems for himself and his marriage to you.
Wow!! This post is great! Puts things in perspective. I’ve had that issue where I complain so much about her and wait for her to do something that when it happened it didn’t make me feel good at all. I almost felt like I spent so much energy on her that I wished it upon myself if that makes sense.
it does make sense Renee. Where thought goes – energy flows! Now, what would happen if you thought about other things, things that filled you up rather than drained you? What if you thought about things or people that you loved, that you have fun with – where then would your energy flow? How would your life look? How would you feel?
I guess my problem (the place I feel I expend most of my energy and thought) is wondering if all of the Ex-wife stress and drama in my life is just all in my head or caused by my behavior. Are my reactions coming from jealousy or feelings of insecurity or even of superiority? Am I being difficult and unreasonable?? Am I the one making my husband’s relationship with his Ex-wife difficult? Or is the Ex-wife really, truly the “unreasonable, possibly mentally ill” type you are talking about? How do I know?
I would ask you this:
Are you jealous of her?
Are you insecure when it comes to your husband and the fact that he was previously married? Are you generally insecure about who you are?
Do you feel superior to the ex-wife?
Most of our issues are brought on by our own minds. Our egos play a huge part in relationship dynamics. However, you have taken a step many are afraid to take – you are questioning which is the beginning of awareness. Once you allow awareness to seep in, you’ll know when it’s you being difficult or unreasonable. Nice work!!