“How empty of me to be so full of you” –John Lennon
Codependency is a maladaptive relational orientation that focuses attention and care almost exclusively on a partner and not on the self. A codependent partner is a caretaker. The term originated out of the family addiction model to describe the behaviors of non-addicted spouses and how they contributed to the family disease of addiction. Codependency was the term given to the enabling behaviors of the non-addicted spouse: covering for work absences, paying for substances, begging and controlling to “try to get you to stop drinking/drugging”.
Codependency can be found within any intimate relationship: between partners, parents and children, siblings, friends, coworkers. Any time there is an intimate social emotional connection, codependency may rule at least one side of the interactions. Codependent behaviors are myriad, but all of them privilege the desires, needs, and feelings of the “other”. Codependency is a practice of chronic emotional self-abandonment within intimate relationships that communicates to the other: “Your needs take precedence over mine and define the relationship. Your opinion of me determines my self-worth.”
Anytime there is a perception that the partner is withdrawing love or approval, codependent behaviors may be triggered. These behaviors are a set of learned trauma responses such as over attention and over solicitation toward the other, sacrificing important time/energy pursuits to meet the priorities of the other, and a default elevation of the needs/feelings of the other while devaluing or denying the needs, desires, or feelings of the self.
Codependency develops when the parent/child relationship has a primary skew. This skew is called “parentification”. A parentified child is one whose job it is to take care of her/his parents. This care might be emotional (listening to one parent complain or dump anger or resentment about the other parent) or instrumental (being forced to drive a parent home because they were too drunk to drive) or both (taking care of younger siblings/household duties when still a child oneself). When children are highly parentified, a child’s identity may become fused with that of a caretaker. Children may find their lives get a tiny bit easier when they make no demands and learn to deny or disappear their very real needs for parental attention and guidance in order to further inhabit the (safer) role of the caretaker.
When parents approve of their child’s selflessness by noticing or complimenting children about their caretaking, this identity is further reinforced: “I’m good if I’m helpful” vs “I’m bad to have needs like money for school stuff”. As this relational positioning is practiced over and over, it becomes habitual: If I care about you, I must take care of you by privileging your needs over mine, so much so that I may not know what I need. This habitual external focus in codependent relationships leaves the self without an emotional rudder— feelings about the relationship, and more importantly about the self, shift dramatically depending upon the needs, feelings, or moods of the other.
The most common symptoms of codependency include:
- Poor interpersonal boundaries—codependents often enmesh with their partners feelings, and either aren’t willing to share their true feelings or cannot discern them.
- Assertiveness issues—codependents have a great deal of trouble saying “no” or self-advocating.
- Shame and self-judgement—codependency is the struggle to create self-worth by rescuing another or by being needed by the other. When not needed, a codependent partner might fall into deep depression and feelings of worthlessness and toxic shame
- Caretaking in relationships—feeling responsible for causing emotions in a partner so completely that the only recourse is to “fix” by abandoning (deny, denigrate, deflate, disappear) one’s own need for help, support, and care from a partner.
- Resentment and anger issues—becoming consumed with judgement toward the partner if codependent caretaking did not “make” the other change. That “outer critic” judgment creates internalized anger and chronic resentment.
- Control issues—codependency is sometimes described as an addiction to control. However, what codependency is trying to control is essentially uncontrollable: the thoughts, needs, feelings and behaviors of the other.
- Black and white thinking—seeing the world in “all good, all bad” kinds of ways. This B & W thinking creates perfectionist expectations of others and of the self.
- Chronic anxiety and fear—when the focus of attention is on the uncontrollable (other people) anxiety will remain high while fears of losing the relationship will trigger further emotional self-abandonment.
Codependency is the attempt to create safety for a child growing up in an atmosphere of harsh, critical, unforgiving judgement and parental abandonment. If those caretaking behaviors “worked” in terms of reducing harsh criticism or punishment or increasing occasional positive parent attention, they were highly reinforced. Codependency has also been referred to in the literature as “fawning”, i.e., “fight, flight, freeze or fawn”. Fawning refers to the codependent compulsion to deny feelings, needs and wants while privileging the needs, feelings and desires of the partner.
Codependency has a spectrum—from lightly codependent to fused identities in relationship (there is no “me” there is only “we”). If you identify with most of these symptoms, you may have codependency. What should you do?
Recovery from codependency is the recovery of the authentic self, which could have been lost when too young to remember. It is a process of untangling the automatic attention to a partner’s feelings while learning how to tend to your own. People often enter therapy when they realize their relationships are highly codependent. Codependent Anonymous (CoDA), a 12-step group, helps people identify and heal codependent behaviors while experiencing (maybe for the first time) support from others who are working on similar issues. This kind of group support can be highly effective because people see they aren’t alone in their suffering, while healthier relational habits can be nurtured within a group. Group support is a remedy for the self-isolation of most codependent relationships. Therapy and group support can work together to synergize healing from codependency.
Codependency is a relational black hole, where caring becomes caretaking and care of the self is MIA. Awareness of fawning behaviors won’t stop them, but awareness is a critical first step, as is beginning a more friendly and curious emotional orientation towards the self.
Practice: “Staying in Your Lane”
Staying in your lane is a helpful metaphor when we have trouble discerning our emotional focus due to codependency. My lane contains that which I have control over: my thoughts, beliefs, behaviors, choices etc. If I can control it, it is in my lane. If I can’t control it, it is not in my lane. This is a template that can be applied anytime we feel confused or have trouble with boundaries. If I find myself anxious or worried about what another might do, I can remind myself this is not my lane and focus on calming and comforting myself. Practice applying this powerful metaphor to your life and relationships. It is shorthand for the serenity prayer:
“Grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change (your lane)
The courage to change the things I can (my lane)
And the wisdom to know the difference (staying in my lane)”
Resources
CoDA meetings – Find a Meeting
BOOKS:
Facing Codependency: Pia Mellody
The New Codependent: Mellody Beattie
The Language of Letting Go: Mellody Beattie
You’re Not Crazy, You’re Codependent: Jeannette Elisabeth Menter
Co-Dependents Anonymous by CODA