Here's a comment by a person struggling to understand their part in a relationship with an addict:
Today I learned that codependency can mean ‘loss of self’. … I always thought it meant, well, I don’t know what it meant, really, but I didn’t think it was something so personal or close to me. I thought it was more of a ‘personality type’ rather than a personality loss!
Helping people who have lived with and loved an addict (alcoholic, chemically dependent - same thing) has been impeded over the years by the success in popular self-help books of concepts like codependency, enabling and so on ...
Why? Because the terms have become overused and misunderstood - so much so that, according to some definitions, it would be hard to find anyone on the planet who isn't codependent or an enabler.
But these concepts are still useful because, properly understood, they describe the real experience of living with and/or loving an addict.
Family members make so many accommodations adapting to the addict's every need that they lose themselves. In other words, they spend so much energy focusing on their relationship with the addict that they lose relationship with themselves. That's codependency.
Enabling is simply the inability, or the refusal, to allow another person to experience the consequences of their behaviour.
These are learned behaviours, and they are always at the service of addiction - even though that is certainly not the intention ....
And, since they are learned, they can be unlearned.
Why? Because the terms have become overused and misunderstood - so much so that, according to some definitions, it would be hard to find anyone on the planet who isn't codependent or an enabler.
But these concepts are still useful because, properly understood, they describe the real experience of living with and/or loving an addict.
Family members make so many accommodations adapting to the addict's every need that they lose themselves. In other words, they spend so much energy focusing on their relationship with the addict that they lose relationship with themselves. That's codependency.
Enabling is simply the inability, or the refusal, to allow another person to experience the consequences of their behaviour.
These are learned behaviours, and they are always at the service of addiction - even though that is certainly not the intention ....
And, since they are learned, they can be unlearned.
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