Codependent Life

Living with alcoholism/addiction is daunting to say the least. For the people who live with a loved one, or someone, who struggles with an addiction the uncertainty and the helplessness of daily exposure to that environment leads to fear and resentment. As long as I was angry I pushed myself to survive. In my mind I was going win over the chaos in my life. But when I finally hit the wall of despair and helplessness, I lost hope. Even my anger could not push me to keep going. I just did not care what happened anymore. I did not believe there was anyway out of the pain and shambles of my life.

I know that this is not going to make any sense, but even though I felt hopeless, I simply could not let go and walk away from my alcoholic. At that time I did not know that my life was separate from his life. I saw myself as an extension of him. Even though I dreamed and fantasied about being free and away from him, at the same time I could not imagine my life without him. There is no doubt that I had some pretty messed up thinking. I could not explain it to myself, and I sure as heck could not explain it to all of my family and friends who were constantly trying to tell me what to do.

When I first heard that first step - “We admit that we are powerless over his addiction to alcohol - that our lives had become unmanageable” - I though great, just another nail in my coffin! I knew there was no hope. What the heck did I come to this stupid meeting for! I did not want to be told that I needed to accept powerlessness! Darn it! I wanted a message of hope and that first step was just confirming what I already faced day in and day out. There was no hope.

That type of negative thinking is just one of the reasons they encourage new people to go to meetings for 6 or 8 weeks before they make a decision about the recovery program. Back when I started they encouraged us to go a minimum of 90 meetings before we made any type of decision about whether we were going to continue or not. Believe me, I need all 90 meetings to hear the true meaning, the meaning of hope, from the first step.

It was through those 90 meetings that I “heard” that I was not an extension of him. A seed of hope had been planted. I was not only not an extension of him, but I was not responsible for him and the decisions that he made. Another ray of hope. It was also through those 90 meetings that I heard that I was responsible for me. Even though I heard it, I did not have the courage at that time to act on it. Interestingly enough they closed every meeting with the phrase “keep coming back - it works if you work it.”

So I kept going back. I really did not have anywhere else to go. I had angered and worn out all of my family and friends. They didn’t want to hear it anymore and I didn’t want to hear their advice anymore either. That was one of the things about my recovery program that I liked. No body told me what to do. They shared what their life was, or had been, like. They told me what they did to help themselves. And, they shared how they lived their life ,each day, living in the same kind of chaos that I lived in. I wasn’t judged for not “working the program.” They shared the beauty of the program and allowed me the dignity to accept it or not. They helped me stay in the moment and live One Day At A Time, and when necessary, one moment at a time.

I would get so frustrated with myself because I wanted to follow the guidelines and go from defeat and pessimism to hope and optimism overnight, but that is not how it happened for me. They explained to me how I did not get this way over night . I needed to keep and open mind and I needed be kind to myself. This type of acceptance and unconditional love carried me, and lifted me up when I was fragile and barely hanging on at times. And over time I learned that they were right - “it works if you work it.”

Codependency is definitely a survival skill. We aren't born this way; it is a learned behavior that is learned one painful lesson at a time. The negative experiences in our life don't just hurt us they change us as well. Unless we get help and reprogram how we think about life we will pass on to our children the only life we know - codependency. We teach our children by our words and our actions the world as we believe it ourselves.

I became a people pleaser very early in my life. It was a survival skill that was necessary for me to avoid hurt or pain. I learned to keep my parent happy at all cost, because when they were not happy it caused great punishment and hurt to me. I jumped through hoops, ate things I didn’t like, did things I hated doing, canceled my plans, did not make plans, did things that were not my responsibility in the first place, said and did things that I knew were wrong all to avoid physical or emotional pain.

I learned to cope two ways: Either through submission and people pleasing or by an all consuming obsessive need to control the people and events in my life. I would first try to control and when that did not work I would throw myself under the bus to win approval and acceptance. Sometimes I believed that I must be a bad person and that everything was my fault. Other times I was angry and defiant. I was on an emotional roller-coaster and I hated the feeling.

I will always be grateful for the alcoholic in my life because that broken relationship was what I needed to push me right over the edge. I finally reached a breaking point and ended up in one of those 12 Step Recovery meetings and my life changed dramatically forever to something so good I could not even imagine something this good on my own. It wasn’t over night and there were many obstacles along the way, but the sweet sweet reward of self-love and acceptance was worth it.

Through my recovery program I learned to be at peace with myself. I have learned that I will never please some people no matter how much I may want too. It does not matter how successful I am, how much money I make, who I hang out with, or what I do, I am just not going to please them. I have also learned that no one’s acceptance is worth me not being true to myself. Anytime I have to try to be something I am not to win approval I am in big trouble.

One of the first things I had to do was let go of the past. I simply could not afford to be haunted by all of the what ifs. I had to purposely choose happiness over pain and suffering. I had to choose to be happy instead of depressed. I had to choose to laugh instead of cry. I had to choose to enjoy my life for the first time in my life. One of the hardest things was to put the real me out there and let the chips fall where they may. No more fake or insincere or hypocritical relationships. When I am true to myself it does not matter if someone else approves of me.

Now don’t get me wrong. I am a work in progress. I do know that it has been necessary for me to change in my life’s journey, but not for the purpose to please someone else so that they will approve or like me, but so that I could be at peace with myself and so I could be the best me I could be. Sometimes it is two steps forward. Sometimes it is one step back. When that happens I try to learn from it and move on.

I believe that phrase “the road to hell is paved with good intentions” has a double meaning that applies to our alcoholic/addict in one way and to ourselves in a completely different way. Originally it’s meaning is that a person may have the best intentions in the world, but they just don’t follow through and get it done. There intentions are good. They just don’t do what it takes to make those intentions a reality. You could easily say that phrase applies to all the empty promises of the alcoholic. “I promise it won’t happen again.” “I’ll be home on time.” etc.

Then the flip side of the coin has our picture on it. Our road to hell - is all of the times we believe we are trying to help and it backfires on us. In our program they call it enabling. In our mind we believe that we are only trying to help solve their problem, but in reality we are simply perpetuating the problem and sometimes - we are even making it worse. Our intentions were good and we did follow through- but in the long run our results were bad.

When you think about it, there is not much difference between enabling and meddling. For some reason, to me, enabling doesn’t seem as offensive as meddling. In my mind, enabling is a misguided attempt to help. But meddling has the stigma of being a busy body interfering in someone else’s business when it is non of our business to do so. I never saw myself as meddling. I was only trying to help. But, is there really a difference? What is enabling anyway?

Enabling:
Is doing something for someone that they could and should be doing for themselves.
Deprives them of their responsibilities.
Allows them to continue what they have been doing comfortably without having to pay the consequences for their bad behavior and poor choices.
Is an attempt at control of someone else’s life.
Only contributes to the problem.

Our rights end where someone else’s begin, and their rights end where ours begin. Sometimes the lines between us seem blurred. So how do we know we are enabling? My sponsor had me first look at my motive. Am I doing something for them that they should be doing for themselves? Am I trying to interfere with their consequences? Who am I really doing this for - Is this really the best thing for me? Is this the best thing for them? Is our helping not really helping?

When you think about it when we enable it is like cosigning a loan for someone else. We are putting ourselves up as collateral to guarantee their behavior. We are underwriting their speculative risk - and covering for an alcoholic is definitely a risk. We are saying if they default we will taking on all responsibility - physical, emotional and financial for their behavior. We are saying if they go down - so will we. And in some circumstances, especially financially, we are saying that they could walk a way and we will pay. When we start cosigning a note for their bad behavior they own us. We have choices to make about how we want to live our life and so do they. We can choose to live and let live.

This post is about getting through the Holidays for people in recovery. I am a woman of faith and this post will include a couple of scriptures. This post and all the other ones I post are based on my own personal recovery journey and my own personal beliefs. You don’t have to agree with me. My feelings will not be hurt.

I don’t know what it is about the holidays that brings out the best and the worse in people. Often times the phone calls and emails we receive seem to triple during the holidays. The key for those of us in recovery is to not allow the chaos and drama of other people suck us in.

The Serenity Prayer has been my life line during these times. It reminds me to mind my own business. There are things that I can and cannot change. Just because it is the holidays and we are thrown together with a lot of different personalities that we don’t usually have together all at one time, does not mean that we have to sacrifice our serenity being the police of the family gatherings.

The things that I cannot change are the untreated dependent and codependent personalities in the room. I can’t change how they think or what they do with their life, but I do have the power to stop myself from getting sucked into their sickness. There are certain key words and phrases that I use a lot - like “really,” “you don’t say,” “no kidding,” I’ll think about it.” I am not agreeing or disagreeing and am I not engaging in the sickness either.

I also use the slogan “How Important Is It” to remind myself that just because someone is trying to push my buttons it does not mean that I have to respond. If what they are saying has no impact or influence on my life it is not important enough for me to challenge what they are saying. What difference does it make anyway. Foolish talk is foolish talk. Proverbs 26: 4-5 tells us, “Do not answer a fool according to his folly, or you will also be like him.” In other words If I engage or defend myself To foolish talk then I am foolish too. I know what I think, what I believe and what I feel. I do not have to explain, defend or justify it to someone who is still messing up their life.

Our slogan “Let it begin with me” reminds me that my actions say more than my words can ever say. Engaging in rude and unacceptable behavior of others only adds fuel to the fire. I have learned to first minimize my exposure to miserable people. Second, I try not to sit next to them at the table. If possible I avoid engaging in a conversation that is more than a few minutes before I excuse myself to go to the bathroom or do something that will disentangle myself from spending time talking with that person. Sometimes when exposure can’t be avoided I keep reminding myself that they are the sick one and I am the one in recovery. Proverbs 29: 9-11, “there’s no use arguing with a fool. He only rages and scoffs, and tempers flare. The Godly pray for those who long to kill them. A rebel shouts in anger; a wise man holds his temper in and cools it.” While they are running their mouth I pray for them and somehow it helps me get through it. I have also learned that kindness goes a long way. Many times a simple act of kindness has neutralized a difficult situation.

Of course some people are so caustic that not any of those things work. Proverbs 18: 2-3, “fools have no interest in understanding; they only want to air their own opinions.That is when I am pleasant but firm in my dealings with them. My grandma always said you cannot hug a porcupine and she is right. I don’t even try.

When I first started my recovery journey I was on a pink cloud and I wanted everyone to learn what I was learning in my recovery programs. No one wanted to hear it. They thought I had become a fanatic. I know now that it is not my words but my actions that is important. I also know that no one will accept this journey until they are ready and it is their idea.

Guidelines to consider for the holidays: This list is not original but taken from serval different post and articles about getting through the holidays.

******* Pray and seek God’s wisdom and guidance.

1 - Put the fun in dysfunction.

2 - Don’t expect people to change.

3 - Control what you can control - you and your reaction- and don’t stress yourself out trying to control the uncontrollable.

4 - Find reasons to be grateful.

5 - Brush it off - it seems that the holidays bring out the best and the worst in people - in other words - in the grand scheme of things how important is it.

6 - Stay away from off potentially upsetting topics.

7 - Throw guilt out the window.

8 - Don’t try to fix difficult people - God is still in control.

9 - Be willing to walk away.

10 - Seek out people who value you.

11 - Keep your expectations realistic.

12 - Keep in mind you are in charge of what you do.

13 - Be kind but firm.

14 - Stay grateful.

15 - Recognize the insanity and don’t participate.

16 - When all else fails......Hide.