Marijuana Addiction & Recovery Support Group

So this is how it is. We're coming apart. I pray for illumination. I ask the angels. All I want from you for my birthday is to be honest with yourself. That wasn't what you wanted to give me. You wanted me to still worship your lingam, and lean on your support and protection. Well I can't. You've been between me and God for too long.
When I stood in the living room and looked at all my stuff from the business I thought, this feels wrong, this part shows it's wrong. It is how it is, so that's how it is, but it's not the way it could have been. Our goals were the same. We could have built something beautiful together. We could have carried light together. That was what we wanted, wasn't it? But all of our dreams stayed dreams. Everything we started seemed to fall short. We always had our excuses, and turned our attention elsewhere. But what was the real reason our efforts lost steam? So much passion, love, and hope. So much prayer and divination. How could it possibly go wrong?
Yes, I feel a burden has been lifted. Yes, I am learning how to love and care for myself. And I'm grateful for that. But I have this tattoo to always remind me of what I believed in between us. Another dream that always stayed out of reach.
Yes, I am learning that I am enough. I'm happy to know that I am my own best guide, spiritual friend, and lover, and that I don't need another to be whole.
But this grief I feel is because I wanted you to be my next-best friend. We've shared and seen and felt so much together. I've always had awe, love, and respect for you. I was happy to stop looking. But something started to build up in me. Sadness, loneliness, mistrust, and hot anger. Why should I feel these feelings toward my beloved? I hated to see them. I pushed them away.
I am pausing to feel the light as I write this, sometimes for a long time before words come. I am praying that light will come out of my pen. What can I say that you will let in? If anything triggers you, please know I'm doing my best to just share my truth, but these things are still so emotional for me.
All I can say is what happened to me. Co dependence is something I learned from my family. But I couldn't do it by myself. Who would be willing to support me in the ways I felt weak? Only someone who needed something in return. Something I was totally new and open to. When I enjoyed your ganja, I was showered with the love, approval, and acceptance that my little child was so hungry for. Just like a puppy, I became conditioned to please, and not to provoke. All I had to do was adopt your way of seeing things. That was fine with me, because I was afraid to decide what was true for myself. So your story became my story. And when that little voice inside me started to disagree...well that is where the bad stuff accumulated. I tried not to see.
I slowly became so tailored to what it seemed you wanted, and so dependent on you for the daily news of how things are, for love, guidance, and support, and protection from that voice inside me that grew louder and more angry every day, that I couldn't imagine not being with you, regardless of whether I was happy in the relationship.
And at the same time, the love and affection grew less and less. Maybe we were getting tired of giving what we weren't meant to give. But I had become isolated from my friends and family who didn't smoke, and so was even more desperate to do what pleased you, what caused you to give me increasingly smaller amounts of affection and admiration.
Then, there came a very scary time. A time a part of me wishes didn't have to happen. The little voice finally broke through. My heart froze when I realized I couldn't deny what was happening any longer. Weed was completely ruling my life. Who I had for friends, who's teachings I believed, what music I played, what language I used, who was or wasn't welcome in my house, what pilgrimages I went on, and where my free, or sometimes not so free, money was spent, it was all decided by weed. And it was dampening my soul. For some reason I hadn't been able to understand, I just didn't have the energy for these things I used to love; painting, having creative projects and adventures, connecting with nature, being a fearlessly open and honest person, and most of all; genuinely and intimately connecting with my beloved.
Why did you stop wanting to snuggle with me?
Why did you stop looking into my eyes?
Why did I start to feel more like a sex object than a beloved Goddess?
And the home that I dreamed of, desperately needed, tried to create again and again in place after place...that was another thing sacrificed to the Ganja Goddess. Why couldn't we keep things clean? Why couldn't we consistently eat and live in the ayurvedic way that we taught about? Why was the buying of basic comforts and home furnishings continuously postponed? Why did I have to borrow so much money from my mom? Why did there never seem to be enough time to do much sadhana, even though we worked less than other people because we wanted to live a yogic lifestyle? Why was I unable to answer my phone calls? We said it was because we were so busy, not mentioning a big chunk of what we were busy doing. I felt it was my job not to notice how much time was spent finding, calling, driving, buying, smoking, and sleeping off weed. Or to think about what I was sacrificing these little comforts for, which really weren't expensive, and that I had been able to afford when I lived on my own. But those were only material things, a real yogi needn't worry about them. I was convinced it was all a problem with me.
So I realized that I was in love with, and totally dependent upon, someone who was totally dependent upon weed. As much as we praised glorified, enjoyed, and defended it, it was the line that connected all the dots. Still, I tried to tell myself that we could still be happy. I just had to make myself healthy, it didn't have to mean anything about our relationship. I just had to quietly extract myself while loving you. First to stop feeling that I had to smoke whenever you did. Then to stop going to such lengths to enable you. It proved more difficult than I had hoped. I think you felt the shift in me. It was very soon after that you got fascinated with Caeli. I started to get little tastes of the punishment I'd get for not holding up my end of the bargain. Panic in my heart, my love has such venom for me! What did I do to deserve this?
The Goddess treatment stopped. Spontaneous affection stopped. Real lovemaking mostly stopped. The little biting comments started. Every progress I made toward taking my power back seemed mirrored by your withdrawal from me. Often I changed my mind and backtracked, I was too afraid to lose you, I wanted to go back to the way things were when you still accepted me. Even as I did everything I could to show you love, to send loving energy to you, to work on our relationship, to see you as my divine god, to please you, nothing seemed to work. I believe that under your veil of denial, you knew what I was up to, and it wasn't okay with you.
So finally, you ended it. And I have to thank you, because I wouldn't have been able to tear myself from you, no matter how hurt or lonely I became. I still saw that spark of divine love we once had, and still believed it could come back. I wonder now if it was real. Would you trade me in like this if it was?
So now we're both free to do whatever we want. It's good for us. We'll both try to move toward our own goals. And if you fall short of what you wanted, will you alter what your goals were? Will you try to forget what we meant to each other, replace me with the easiest girl that will take my place in supporting your habit, and distracting you from your problems? I know I can't change you now, it's all up to you. I know I have to let go of you. But I can't step away from you without first doing my best to show you who I really am, how I really feel.
I overflow with love for you. Just to hear your voice from over Caeli's phone, everything in me is softened. Or to see your face, even with hair that you haven't washed in days, my heart stirs deeply. When you're so stoned that you're mumbling and I can't understand you, I still love you. When you were icy cold to me in the living room near the end, when you let me know you cared about weed more than you care about me, even then, I searched frantically for a way to reach you. I love every part of your body, it makes my body sing. It makes me so sad to think I'll never kiss and caress it again. I love to fold and touch your clothes. I love feeding you. And most of all, I love to see you shine. See you doing what you were put on earth to do; spread light. It makes me cry. I would do anything just to see more of that, J----, lit up, embodying your purpose in the world. And J---- to come home with me. But it's not in my power, I have nothing to do with it.
But please know that it's not about my not loving or accepting you...it hurts me that you believe that. I married you for a reason. I wanted to be with you forever, even with all the pain it caused me. I will always love you, and I can accept you as you are if I'm not attached to being with you. You can live however you want, I know you could go on this way for many years, that's the nature of it. But now I know that I can't live that way, I tried everything I could to stay with you, and it made me not want to live.
I am so grieved that we can't be together. I've cried so much since you left today. It doesn't make any sense to me. I feel like we were made for each other. It will take a while for me to really let go of you. I will keep hoping you'll change your mind. I will keep praying and loving. But eventually I will have to move on.
Do you not believe me? You don't have to. The truth is in your own heart. Will you take time to really listen to it? Or are you making lightening fast excuses with that brilliant mind of yours? I want you to know that I'm here for you. The divine is there for you. There are lots of resources, even online you could learn about the nature of addiction, denial, and co dependence, and I bet you would recognize it like I do. If you ever really want to have a vibrant, sattvic life, if you want to be free of addiction and denial, if you want to play with me again and be my real lover, then let me know. Only if you really mean it. I wanted us to recover together, to slowly and carefully rebuild a relationship on healthy terms, while we work on ourselves. But that's the only way I can be with you. I'm afraid you'll wait too long to see, and then it'll be too late, I could get involved with someone else who is already healthy and wants to create a life like this. But I guess what's destined to happen, will. I hope that it's you. Otherwise I have to keep explaining this tattoo :). I wish the best and most beautiful for you, J-----. The highest good for you, and strength for you, and brightness and freedom for you.

Loving you always,
O---
Posted on 10/24/09, 11:10 pm