There are a lot of schemes for the development of codependency; what I described in the last article are just 2 striking examples of the alternation of well-known roles.
But if you noticed a certain cyclical nature of the processes occurring in your couple and were able to compare the roles of the triangle with these roles, finding the alternation of the described positions, these recommendations may be useful to you.
Navigation for the article “Overcoming codependency”
- Codependency and responsibility
- What does it mean to give someone else responsibility for your life?
- Overcoming codependency: psychological nuances of behavior change
- About typical fears in codependent relationships
- How to deal with such fears in practice
- Overcoming Codependency: A Matter of Boundaries
- Ask yourself a few questions
How does codependency manifest?
The influence of a person suffering from dependence on his loved one can be so pronounced that the critical perception of reality is significantly impaired in the person who has fallen under his power. This leads to a series of erroneous thoughts and actions that begin to have a destructive impact on life. Codependency causes:
- self-deception, false reasoning and denial of existing facts;
- expressive and aggressive emotional reactions to the comments of surrounding people trying to “open the eyes” of the subject of this condition;
- increasing feelings of one’s own guilt in what is happening;
- constant control and imposition of stereotypes of reasoning and behavior, both on the patient himself and on the people around him;
- gradually ignoring one’s own needs, focusing only on the problems of the person suffering from addiction;
- increasing development of isolation, apathy, depression, decreased libido;
- suicidal thoughts.
From a psychological point of view, the behavior of a codependent person can be expressed in different ways. The main models are:
- dominant savior;
- aggressive pursuer;
- trapped victim.
Who is most likely to become codependent?
Any person who has a direct relationship with a patient with drug addiction or alcoholism can find himself in this role.
Most susceptible to codependency:
- persons who are married (husband and wife) or have close ties outside of official family relationships;
- parents of persons suffering from addiction to psychoactive substances;
- children worried about the fate of their sick father or mother;
Those people who are most susceptible to a codependent state are those who grew up in families with an atmosphere of constant psychological pressure and repressive relationships. Persons who have gone through such a “school” have a mental defect that allows those around them with pronounced dominant qualities to quickly subjugate them.
What is attachment?
There is a very simple way to distinguish between love and codependency. Roger Walsh, author of Foundations of Spirituality, gives a great example of how this can be done quickly and surely.
Let's say you love ice cream. You have it - you are happy. This is completely natural. You don't have it, you:
a) you remain calm and peaceful, it does not affect your mood;
b) you become unhappy, all your thoughts are aimed at getting ice cream - after all, only it can make you happy;
A - desire, B - attachment.
The difference here is not in the amplitude of feelings or in an abstract set of symptoms. It's about how you cope with the absence of the object of adoration.
An unfulfilled desire often disappears without a trace and painlessly. And addiction will squeeze all the juice out of you until you satisfy it.
Methods to combat codependency
Codependency is extremely difficult to overcome. First of all, a person needs to see himself as an individual, to understand that his needs require satisfaction by himself, and not through others. For example, if a person feels the need to communicate, you should not wait until your loved one is free and expresses a desire to talk. You can call another loved one (friend, relative) and chat with him, meet and sit over a cup of coffee. If a person wants to go for a walk, there is no need to limit himself by coming up with a rule to walk only with a partner. After all, you can go for a walk with friends, who will charge you with positive energy and share positivity.
You need to analyze your relationship with your love object and your needs in order to determine the connection between them. This will help the codependent find a worthy and correct replacement without harming himself and his significant other. You also need to work on your self-esteem in order to love yourself and stop looking for other people's approval and praise. It can be extremely difficult for a codependent to remain alone, so experts recommend that he constantly burden himself by doing a variety of things, doing what brings pleasure. Only by finding yourself can you become free from unhealthy relationships.
How does codependency manifest?
The influence of a person suffering from dependence on his loved one can be so pronounced that the critical perception of reality is significantly impaired in the person who has fallen under his power. This leads to a series of erroneous thoughts and actions that begin to have a destructive impact on life. Codependency causes:
- self-deception, false reasoning and denial of existing facts;
- expressive and aggressive emotional reactions to the comments of surrounding people trying to “open the eyes” of the subject of this condition;
- increasing feelings of one’s own guilt in what is happening;
- constant control and imposition of stereotypes of reasoning and behavior, both on the patient himself and on the people around him;
- gradually ignoring one’s own needs, focusing only on the problems of the person suffering from addiction;
- increasing development of isolation, apathy, depression, decreased libido;
- suicidal thoughts.
From a psychological point of view, the behavior of a codependent person can be expressed in different ways. The main models are:
- dominant savior;
- aggressive pursuer;
- trapped victim.
Overcoming codependency: psychological nuances of behavior change
If your relationship does not involve chemical/external dependence of one of the partners, but there is a repeating scenario with the mentioned roles, it makes sense to start with the same.
And it doesn’t matter which side you are - the one who started the triangle from the side of the Victim or the Rescuer. In both cases, you will have to either work on the habit of disabling the other (believing that without you he/she will “disappear”), or on the habit of expecting life’s blessings exclusively from the outside (demonstrating in every possible way your “hard life” and provoking your partner to constant pity).
If you started your journey into the triangle as a Rescuer
try to understand what problems of yours you solve by constantly helping another and devaluing his ability to be separate, to solve his own problems, to be strong enough to do this.
Perhaps you want to increase your importance, gain reasons to respect yourself to a greater extent. If this is the case, try to find some other ways of self-realization that you understand, in which you could feel respect for yourself. Work through your self-esteem, try to find those places in your personality that you consider problematic, and make an effort to solve them without constantly involving your partner in these areas. As a rule, working with self-esteem and personal value is one of the first and most productive steps towards overcoming codependency.
You will have to reconsider the concept of your personality, accept that you cannot be good to everyone all the time, you cannot be a model of nobility and strength, you also have your own “dark side”, and the other person is actually able to accept you together with her.
If you have doubts about this, talk openly with your partner about what kind of negative assessment from him you are afraid of, for what reason, where you feel your weakness.
Perhaps your partner will try to support you, and you will not have to endlessly move around the roles of the triangle to live up to the “ideal” that you have drawn for yourself with the help of your parents and society.
Making your partner more dependent on your constant help is not the best way to strengthen your self-confidence. You are creating a big problem, first of all, for yourself: by refusing to believe in your partner’s completeness and independence, you are hindering his development.
And the period may not be far off when your partner, who has completely stopped showing initiative and self-interest, will simply become uninteresting to you. You may suffer from this even more than from your own insecurities.
If you more often started your journey in the triangle from the position of the Victim
try to accept it as a fact: you are an independent and full-fledged person. No one has to spend their whole life focused only on solving your problems. And your self-esteem can be raised in other ways.
Try to stop looking for those to blame for your troubles and consider that the course of life does not depend on you. If you don’t know how to achieve what you want, and you hide from it behind your partner, and then make him “guilty” for not helping you enough, try to face your real obstacles within yourself. Fears, beliefs, internal limitations.
Try to take responsibility for what you have achieved and what you are striving for. Yes, it’s not your fault that childhood left its mark on you, but now you are already an adult, and only you can deal with this legacy. If you blame someone else for your troubles, that someone will still not come to fix something.
In this case, a constructive step towards overcoming codependency is to revise not only your perception of yourself, but your picture of the world: who in your picture of the world is responsible for the fact that this or that event happens to you? How do you yourself participate in shaping events?
And if you find that you yourself decide little in your life, and everything is ruled by “chance,” “fate,” “circumstances,” etc., ask yourself a question: are you comfortable constantly being a victim of circumstances?
And if you often choose the position of the victim
you definitely want to receive sympathy, support, approval and even admiration from others. There is nothing wrong with that, but is it necessary to be a victim and maintain codependency in the family ?
Or can you find other, constructive, and most importantly, ways that depend on you to receive all of the above? And everything that prevents you from finding them is inside you. And if you carefully study yourself, you will understand what is stopping you on this path, and why you do not want to believe in your own strength.
Who is most likely to become codependent?
Any person who has a direct relationship with a patient with drug addiction or alcoholism can find himself in this role.
Most susceptible to codependency:
- persons who are married (husband and wife) or have close ties outside of official family relationships;
- parents of persons suffering from addiction to psychoactive substances;
- children worried about the fate of their sick father or mother;
Those people who are most susceptible to a codependent state are those who grew up in families with an atmosphere of constant psychological pressure and repressive relationships. Persons who have gone through such a “school” have a mental defect that allows those around them with pronounced dominant qualities to quickly subjugate them.
How to get rid of codependency
Getting away from this problem on your own is quite difficult. A positive result can only be obtained at an early stage with the help of people around you who, with an authoritative opinion, can help “open your eyes.” But most often, a codependent person needs the help of a psychologist. In the middle and late stages, it is no longer possible to fully understand the existing problem. The specialist, having determined the presence of codependency, must ensure the client’s desire to undergo a course of psychotherapy with him. Having received such consent, the psychotherapist applies:
- rational psychotherapy, which integrates elements of suggestion and persuasion;
- hypnotic practices that remove the dominant components of persistent pathological reflexes;
- group psychotherapy.
These measures are quite enough to bring a codependent person out of the state into which she had to find herself. The specialists of the Gornarcologist clinics have sufficient experience in these types of problems and are able to gently eliminate them without wasting extra time.
The condition, which in modern psychiatry is defined as “codependency,” began to be talked about quite recently. The manifestation of special behavior of people near a sick drug addict or alcoholic has become the subject of special attention from doctors. It soon became clear that we were talking about a painful phenomenon that required specific diagnosis and treatment. What kind of violation is this, how to identify it and what measures to take to get rid of it. Codependency is understood as excessive and painful immersion in the problems of a person with an illness or one of his loved ones. In this case, pathological relationships are formed in which the patient uses the codependent to achieve his goals. A person who is overly preoccupied with the misfortune of his loved one himself becomes a source of mental abnormalities.
