Anger and ResentmentThese are two words that keep coming up again and again for me.  I am not always sure what to do with them.  I do know that when I have made choices in anger and resentment that I seem to be the one that suffers consequences.  There have been times that my anger and resentment have caused my ego to inflate and that I think I am above the person creating those feelings and I again I do things that cause consequences for me.I have been scrubbing the house from top to bottom today, literally.  When I am in a frenzied kind of feeling I need to keep moving and doing.  And I am cleaner in that mode.  It is good for my house, bad for my kids, I make them help.  As I am doing this mindless work I am thinking constantly.  And those two words keep coming up.For my recovery to work and for me to walk through the steps of the immense loss we have suffered, I need to work on my anger and resentment.  How can I do that?  I am trying to look at my husband and see the things that he gave to my life and not the things he tried to take away.  His anger and resentment hurt him more than it hurt us.  It took his life.  I think we were just innocent bystanders that got caught in the vortex and we suffered as well.  But he the most.So I am left with anger and resentment as well.  I would always direct those emotions at the choices that he made and try to counter them.  When I did that it never worked out for me.  When I detached and tried to let go and could see things for what they were, his issues, I was able to make better choices.  Having said that, don't think any of it was easy, it wasn't and still isn't.I just know that I have to look at him and be grateful he was in my life.  He took me to my first AA meeting and got me started in the program and 20 years later I am still sober and grateful for it.  It was one of the biggest gifts his life gave to mine.  He gave me three beautiful children that I adore and that drive me crazy.  He couldn't appreciate the gift of them until it was too late but I have always done that.  Another thing to be grateful for.He hated his job and refused to leave it.  It made him miserable but because he stayed we have a pension and health insurance for the rest of my life.  I am grateful for both of those things.  He was always worried about money but he made sure that he had life insurance.  Part of him always worried he would die and he wanted me to be able to pay off the house if it happened.  It happened and now I have the money to keep a roof over the kids heads.  And it is a nice roof in a good neigborhood close to all of my family.  I am grateful for that.As I write this and hear the words in my head, I feel the sorrow that engulfs me that he is not here to appreciate some of these things.  I feel sorrow that he never could when he was alive and frustration that there was nothing I could do about that.  But the underlying and most prevalant emotion is one of gratitude.  In his way, he took care of us and I can't resent that or be angry about it.I need to be grateful for the gift of his life because it gave mine more than I could have had on my own.