Getting Approval

Day before yesterday, my soon to be ex-wife and I were supposedly talking about finances - actually taxes.

She began blaming me for the divorce and actually started accusing me of making her drink. She went on to citing an example of me trying to create stress that would cause her to drink.

I listened and my defensiveness started to rise. But another part of my disease, the desire to seek approval and be deemed as "worthy" and "nice" and "good" also kicked in.

In my disease - I want to be "accepted" and deemed "a good person." In my heart, most of the time, I know I am a nice/good guy. I know intellectually that I do not need to be "accepted." But old habits are hard to break.

As my wife went on a rage on the phone with me, I was pretty calm - a surprising thing as I type this to you. In the past, I would have raged back - I think. But still, I tried to interrupt and tell her she was putting perceptions of what occurred and making them facts in her mind. I tried several times to tell her that I did not do those specific things and certainly did not do them with the intention to drive her to drink. (This is the first thing I did that I didn't have to do)

I told her - then and there - that this is part of the disease, blaming someone else and not accepting responsibility. (This is the second thing I did that I didn't have to do).

She hung up the phone.

In my disease, I was now hooked. So I called her back. I was getting obsessed with fixing this wrong perception and trying to show that I am OK (not right - I am 99% sure I wasn't trying to be right).

We spoke briefly and she hung up. It was like she knew she had me.

I - of course - redialed. She did not pick up and I left a message on the answering machine.

I started to call her cell phone, when the program kicked in. It said, "You are obsessed. Stop. You are trying to gain acceptance from someone who can't give it. Second and more importantly, you don't need it - you are already accepted and okay."

But there was an anger underneath the surface too. So the program kicked in again and said, "Call your sponsor."

So I called my sponsor. As soon as I started telling him what had happened, I was laughing at my behavior.

I get hooked each time by not getting some one's approval. Maybe not always. But it is there - right under the surface.

Damn. I want to be liked by everyone and thought highly of. Well, at least I recognize it and I have a program!