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First off I NEVER feel guilty about anything. Life is a live & learn process which means there will ALWAYS be a conflict of some kind we can definitely learn from, make the changes we feel are appropriate & necessary from what we learn....then get on with living life with the changes we have adapted into our life.
That being said....I always fought with my parents & I always fought with my husband (thank heavens, now EX-H). So everyone said....common denominator was ME....but I got along very well with everyone else....hmm.
By the time I left my husband (after 33 years of being married to him) I realized I was so fed up that I was being as abusive to him as he was being to me.....so yes, I was reacting with full force anger by that time. My mom died from cancer & I took my inheritance & left my marriage because he was fighting getting a divorce. I moved 2100 miles away & realized how wonderfully peaceful & quiet my every day life was & that I REALLY didn't have to fight to survive in life. It was an awakening to what being around "NORMAL" people actually was like without ALL the dysfunction I had lived around for 54 years. I had a computer engineering career & was around those normal people at work but my 24/7 home life I was always dealing with was always there in the background or foreground. When I left, it was gone or at least 2100 miles away even though I am still dealing with legal issues because of my EX.
It took therapy to put the pieces together & realize my angry (toxic) reactions were more NORMAL than they (parents & H) wanted me to think they were. Actually they all had similar related undiagnosed issues that when analyzed it made sense how I reacted. Could I have had better coping skills & not reacted in a toxic way?.....you bettcha I could have but growing up in all that dysfunction, those were the coping skills I taught myself. I learned better ones before going back there for a court case 3 years ago. I was afraid seeing him after 11 years would trigger the same angry/toxic response from me.....BUT IT DIDN'T!!!! I was finally in full control of my reaction & the conversations & I never allowed them to go in a direction that would create a toxic response from me. I also learned to walk away & it is ok. I don't always have to have the "last word" & that was usually where my anger & toxic behavior would want me to be. Getting in control of your own responses & behaviors & being mindful of how you are feeling like responding at all times is really the key to making the change whether you are the originator of the behavior or responding to toxic with toxic.....it works the same
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Leo's favorite place was in the passenger seat of my truck. We went everywhere together like this.
Leo my soulmate will live in my heart FOREVER Nov 1, 2002 - Dec 16, 2018
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