My Life's VCR keeps blinking "12:00"

Actually, the real problem is that the "pause" button doesn't work.

As I've documented in this blog, I've (relatively) recently truly turned to face the demon that is my past and actually fight that monster. I'm finding that one very difficult part of the recovery process is that it doesn't happen in vacuum...life can't be "paused" while I heal. There is still "life" going on. There's still the everyday type of tasks: lawn needs to be mowed, dishes need to be washed, dog needs to be walked, etc. There's still "work" tasks: work projects don't wait for me to heal, deadlines still come, work politics are still alive and well, etc. There's still relationships: my wife needs and deserves her husband, my parents want a son, my friends want their friend, etc.

In short, I can't expect life to pause and wait patiently for me to heal, at which point I can press "play" and rejoin the party in my new, shiny, healed self.

So, since life can't pause, there's a strange line between self-care and selfishness.

I've recently fallen too far on the side of selfishness and I am sorry for that.

Part of the problem, too, is that my history of not ~really~ dealing with my demon led me to be a horrendously selfish person. I was acting as a victim, expecting everyone to do anything and everything for me, because I had been so hurt and damaged. "I went through Hell...it's time someone took care of me" was my unspoken charge. People in my life became sick of me...I pushed my wife, my parents, my in-laws, and my friends away by my "Pigpen-from-Peanuts"-like cloud of woe that followed me everywhere. It was easier for most to avoid me altogether than to be around me. The distance only fueled my quest for people to pay attention to me. Not pretty.

So, I'm actually fighting now, but the self-care/selfishness line is so hard to "get". I have spent several of the last days inundating my wife with talk, with very little actual results. I've been selfish. I don't want to wallow in the victim role at all, but thinking about the past, reconnecting, etc is a dangerous, slippery slope towards that pitfall. Overcorrection isn't the answer either: declaring that "this block of time isn't going to be invaded by my healing" isn't realistic. This part of my healing path feels like mud that I'm trying to run through.

I unfortunately don't have a clever VCR analogy to tidy this up. No "replace the remote batteries and away we go" type of line. Rather, I hate that I've been selfish and I am fighting to remain in self-care without hurting those around me with my ignorance of them. To my amazing wife: I'm so sorry that I've been so selfish...I will do better. To all of my brothers in pain out there, I'm betting that you find "life" overwhelming when you attempt to heal. I don't think there's a silver bullet answer, but my gut tells me to keep fighting. That's all there really is. I pray for strength to keep fighting for me, and for you.