My A – Z Codependency Challenge – D

Denial, Delusional, Deceit, Debacle 

Oh good grief! When I started this little A-Z challenge I don’t think I really thought it through well. I’m laughing at myself now because it’s only day 4 and who wants to admit these damn words?

Delusional: having false or unrealistic beliefs or opinions – Yep, I had false and unrealistic beliefs of my life. I believed my life was good for the most part. I believed I was truly helping people who needed me. I believed someone loved me when they told me they loved me. I believed I was put here to help others regardless of what it did to me. I believed my needs, wants, hurts, disappointments, even successes were not as important as yours. Oh good Lord was I delusional!

Denial: disbelief in the existence or reality of a thing – Yep, I lived in denial. I did not believe how the hurts and disappointments of my life shaped me and drove every bad decision I made. I did not believe I was worthy of good things in life. I did not believe I created the problems in my life – they did.

Let me tell you one little story (in a nutshell) about my delusional life and the massive denial I clung to when a dear friend tried to point it out to me. You see, at one point in my life, I started writing to a man who was in prison (he was an addict in for drug charges). He told me everything I thought I needed to hear; everything I wanted to hear. He was handsome and intelligent and kind. Our relationship developed quickly and when he proposed, I accepted.

I shared this news with one of my closest friends whose husband was incarcerated in the same prison. She knew of our relationship and, every once in a while, would encourage me to “be careful”. One day she told me straight up, “He’s using you, Terri”, along with all the various ways he was doing it. But no, I could not and would not believe that. I was delusional, thinking he loved and needed me and I was in complete denial when it was pointed out to me that he didn’t.

Deceit: the action or practice of deceiving someone by concealing or misrepresenting the truth – Yep, in my head, I knew that what I was doing was not normal and because I didn’t want to be judged by others or hear their opinions or concerns, I concealed the fact that I was engaged to an inmate (and a drug addict at that). Some people knew I was seeing someone but I lied about who he was, where he lived, etc.

Well, I continued with my delusions, denial and deceit and got married at the prison in March 1999. He was paroled in 2004 at that is when the debacle began.

Debacle: Crushing defeat , a complete failure, disaster – Yep, a crushing defeat, a complete failure and an unimaginable disaster are how I can describe the years of our marriage which was finally ended in March 2006.

There were only two good things that came out of that marriage: I found God and it is what catapulted me into the rooms of recovery and that is where “my life” began.  What I can say today is that I believe in myself and who I am. I can see reality for what it is. I am no longer driven by my emotions but can and do focus myself in reality. I do not try to deceive anyone any longer. My life is my life and it is a wonderful life. If someone does not approve or disagrees about something in my life, that’s okay, they are entitled to their opinion and it does not have to affect me.

Today my life is Delightful, Desirable, Doable, Dulcet. (Had to lift myself up after all that negative:) )