A turning point maybe?

Funny and light-hearted are always so easy,but life isn't always that way.

I'm going to share something here that I haven't before.I'm sharing it because 1)I feel like we might be at a turning point and I feel good about it.2)I would appreciate ya'll in our corner;)You've all been so good to me.3) there will probably be bad days and instead of hiding I'd like to be able to be honest.4)There isn't as much help for this sorta thing as you may think

The short version is....I found out a few years ago that my guy had a gambling problem.I was shocked although I'm not sure why, the signs were all there.I thought ok I can deal with this we've dealt with other things.It didn't really work out that way.We are still sitting here three years later trying to figure this all out.There have been many ups and downs,goods and bads.Now I just want our life back!


At first we set DD aside,then brought it back,we let it go again and so on....

The past few months we haven't really communicated or been connected. I didn't want DD anymore. My heart just wasn't in it.I felt it was more hurtful than helpful.Shannon felt we needed it.When he attempted it I made it really difficult.I'm not proud of that.He also has struggled with guilt and not feeling worthy of being HOH.My being difficult just made it that much harder for him.At times he felt it wasn't worth the fight with me.Things were getting ugly. We both stopped trying and avoided each other.Other than a few occasions when things felt somewhat normal.

Recently we had a heart to heart....One of those lay it out on the table even if it's hard kinda talks.It wasn't fun but it was needed.During our talk we were able to share a lot of things that have never been mentioned. I realized some things about myself that I'm not happy with.One thing we both agreed is our family and marriage are to important to let go of.One thing I was shocked by is how most of our issues are not the gambling itself but all the little 'side effects' of the gambling.That may not makes sense to everyone.

One day at a time and one foot in front of the other....we will get there though.

One of the things I realized about myself is that I'm angry and I'm bitter and it's not helpful in moving forward.It's easy to sit back and feel like he should fix it because he messed it up.It doesn't work that way we both have to do the work and neither of us have been doing our part.

The trust and respect are damaged,not gone just damaged.I know most agree that trust and respect are very important to DD and I agree.I also think sometimes things are not normal and you have to reach outside the box for answers.With that said we agreed that DD will be here because honestly it just has to be.DD is a big part of our lives and it's helped us keep our heads above water many times.Without it our communication and connection go away and now is not the time for that.

The good part is everything is out in the open for us now and we can fix what needs fixin.How to fix it is the hard part.We know we need to talk and keep talking even when it hurts sometimes and I think finally we are both ready to do that.We've spent alot of time dancing around some of the real issues.

There has been some talk on a forum we are apart of about a six week excersise.We are doing a trial run of that so we can tweak what needs tweaking and see if it might be beneficial for us.It's mostly a connection thing for us.I'll give more info about it if we decide that it might be for us.

I want to end by saying Shannon's made a lot of progress with the gambling and I'm very proud of him.