subject: Codependency and Addictive Relationships [print this page] Codependency and Addictive Relationships Codependency and Addictive Relationships
CODEPENDENCY AND ADDICTIVE RELATIONSHIPS
Codependency is a fairly new word, but it's a behaviortrait as old as Adam and Eve. Dysfunctional familiesproduce codependent behavior, which is defined in manyways: Codependence is focusing one's life on anotherperson and calling it caring. It is doing things for others they can and should do for themselves. It is slavery by mutual agreement: two needy people don't want to focuson their own problems so they obsess on each other's. It'sgiving away your whole pie and leaving nothing for yourself.
My favorite definition of codependent people is:when they die, someone else's life flashes before theireyes!
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"No man is an island." Everyone in this world isdependent on other people. Codependency is a matter ofdegree, and usually that degree is lopsided: one persongives 80 percent and the other 20. Here's a joke illustrating codependency: There was a mouse who asked anelephant if he could make love to her. She said, "Okay."While the mouse went at it, a coconut fell on the ele phant's head. "Ouch," she said, and the mouse replied, "Oh! Did I hurt you?" That's a codependent talking.
No relationship is ever fifty-fifty all the time, but if thepercentages are way off center, it's codependencyone isgiving far too much and the other far too little. The personwho cares too much is often staying in the relationshipnot because of the benefits derived from it but the fear ofwhat would happen if faced with being alone. That fear faroutweighs any pain suffered in the lopsided give-and-takeof the codependent relationship.
The paradox is, in order for two people to be close,they have to be separate. The most comfortable relationship occurs when two people can live alone with eachother. That's interdependency. If one needs the other too much, codependency results. If I must give up me to beloved by you, the price is too great. If I have never learnedto love myself. Ican't love you. That's the tragedy of mostcodependent relationships.
The subject of codependency comes up in the treatment of addiction because for many addicts it is thebottom-line obsession. I know many people who wentinto a 12-step program to stop drinking, only to becomeaddicted to food. Then, when they went into recoveryfrom that addiction, they turned to a relationship to ob sess on. It's the addicts' dilemma to be constantly compelled to fill themselves up with an external. Relationshipsare the most difficult addiction of all; we don't expectfood, alcohol, or other substances to love us back! Weexperience feelings related to love, but in relationships it'sgive, give, give.
Addicts have a tendency to codependent relationships. They may manage to function intellectually, andeven be highly esteemed in their profession and in theircommunity. Terrified they have no real identity of theirown, they often bond with people who are emotional "takers" and are grateful for the chance to obsess onsomeone else rather than on their own seeming insignificance. They have a tendency to think the source of the stress is work or other external factors, but the source isalways internal, and comes out of relationships.
No amount of relaxation techniques, meditation, as-sertiveness training, or affirmations will remove the stresscaused by a codependent relationship. That doesn't meanwe put off practicing them until recovery. We just have toknow they are not going to take away stress. Only developing boundaries so that the flow of the relationshipgoes in as well as out will reduce stress to the degree ofmanageability.
Relationship addiction is really about someone else making you feel okay. It's needing another person to fillyour cup. If you have low self-esteem and difficulty lovingyourself, and if someone else is necessary to make youfeel whole or alive, then you will undoubtedly suffer se vere withdrawal symptoms if the loved one leaves, especially abruptly. It is then that the addiction can really beseen for what it is.
There are plenty of people caught up in relationshipaddictions, men and women alike. They go from onerelationship to another, on emotional bender after emotional bender, to keep from having to face themselves andtheir terrifying inner emptiness. As someone 1 knowpointed out, it's one thing to have a love affair with food orbooze, but at least you don't expect it to call you on thephone.
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