Codependency

“When I consider the men (like my father) I have treated in psychotherapy, I recognize the challenge I face as a counselor. These men are in counseling due to an insistent wife, troubled child or their own addiction. They suffer a lack of connection with the people they say they love most. Chronically accused of being over controlling or emotionally absent, they feel at sea when their wives and children claim to be lonely in their presence. How can these people feel “un-loved” when (from his perspective) he has dedicated his life to their welfare?Some of these men will express their lack of vitality and emotional engagement though endless service. They are hyperaware of the moods, needs and prefer-ences of loved ones, yet their self-neglect can be profound. This text examines how a lack of secure early attachment with caregivers can result in the tendency to self-abandon while managing connections with significant others. Their anxiety and distrust of the connection of others will manifest in anxious monitoring, over-giving, passive aggressive approaches to anger and chronic worry. For them, failure to anticipate and meet the needs of others equals abandonment.”

“Once they have been affected---once "it" sets in---codependency takes on a life of its own. It is similar to catching pneumonia or picking up a destructive habit. Once you've got it, you've got it.If you want to get rid of it, YOU have to do something to make it go away. It doesn't matter whose fault it is. Your codependency becomes your problem; solving your problems is your responsibility.”

“There's always something in it for the person who is allowing to be taken advantage of. - Psychotherapist David in Type 1 Sociopath”

“It is one thing to know about your dysfunctional habits but quite another to change them.”

“We Are Lovable Even if the most important person in your world rejects you, you are still real, and you are still okay. —Codependent No More Do you ever find yourself thinking: How could anyone possibly love me? For many of us, this is a deeply ingrained belief that can become a self-fulfilling prophecy. Thinking we are unlovable can sabotage our relationships with co-workers, friends, family members, and other loved ones. This belief can cause us to choose, or stay in, relationships that are less than we deserve because we don’t believe we deserve better. We may become desperate and cling as if a particular person was our last chance at love. We may become defensive and push people away. We may withdraw or constantly overreact. While growing up, many of us did not receive the unconditional love we deserved. Many of us were abandoned or neglected by important people in our life. We may have concluded that the reason we weren’t loved was because we were unlovable. Blaming ourselves is an understandable reaction, but an inappropriate one. If others couldn’t love us, or love us in ways that worked, that’s not our fault. In recovery, we’re learning to separate ourselves from the behavior of others. And we’re learning to take responsibility for our healing, regardless of the people around us. Just as we may have believed that we’re unlovable, we can become skilled at practicing the belief that we are lovable. This new belief will improve the quality of our relationships. It will improve our most important relationship: our relationship with our self. We will be able to let others love us and become open to the love and friendship we deserve. Today, help me be aware of and release any self-defeating beliefs I have about being unlovable. Help me begin, today, to tell myself that I am lovable. Help me practice this belief until it gets into my core and manifests itself in my relationships.”

“1. We fear people because they can expose and humiliate us. 2. We fear people because they can reject, ridicule, or despise us. 3. We fear people because they can attack, oppress, or threaten us. These three reasons have one thing in common: they see people as “bigger” (that is, more powerful and significant) than God, and, out of the fear that creates in us, we give other people the power and right to tell us what to feel, think, and do.”

“A POCKET-SIZED GIRLHe keeps me in his pocket for a rainy day; he swears I'm not an object as he yo-yo's me away.A friend is what we'll call it,but my friend, he does not know,each time it rains I love him— so to his pocket, I must go.He thinks he's being clever,but I am not a fool;his love ain't worth a penny,so to my heart I must be cruel.”

“Avoiding awareness of our own reality is often an attempt to deny thoughts, desires, or intentions that we feel will threaten or contradict the needs of those with whom we feel strong attachment. We instinctively hide feelings and thoughts we assume would be threatening to other people, and might cause them to leave us. . . People who learned early in life to adapt to parental needs to an extent that we were unable to focus on our own developmental tasks and needs will often continue to play out this working mode” of conditional attachment. “You will attach to me as long as I meet your needs.”

“If we want to improve, first we have to recognize our own maladaptive coping skills, called codependency, then change.”

“MY MOONI'll always wonder what time it is there; if you're dreaming, or awake. My moon is your sun; my darkness, your light. I'm in the future, you'd jokingly say.And I know where you are, because I'm watching you from the past.”

“A WISHSometimes I wish that he will liveand I will see him.But mostly I wish that he will die, and take my memories with him.”

“Contacting and living from our True Self is the central task of personal growth.”

“With intimacy comes the possibility of “engulfment” or being taken hostage by the demands of others. We may have distorted perceptions of the “demands” and obligations placed upon us by those who claim to love us. Trusting that love to be unconditional is almost impossible for us, and we are always scanning for the unstated “subtext” or hidden “agenda” connected to this love.”

“Wounded parents often unintentionally inflict pain and suffering on their children and these childhood wounds causes a laundry list of maladaptive behaviors commonly called codependency. These habits restrict people to love-limiting relationships causing much unhappiness and distress.”

“We each can foster loving and kind relationships through meditation and repeating mantras.”

“7amThey said that I’d forget you,and I knew it wasn’t true.But sometimes I wake up now,and my heart’s no longer blue.I press the Keurig button,dancing across the room—Sometimes it’s nearly seven,before I’ve thought of you.And though we sleep together,all night side by side,one day I’ll have my coffeewithout you in my mind.”

“There's no point in fighting for a woman that is rude and boring, just because she's hot. Such woman shortens your lifespan.”

“I HOLDIf I could have had him,I could have let himgo.But withoutthe having there was nothing—so to the nothingIhold.”

“Along with our over-giving is our own conditional giving pattern, which can fuel so much of our resentment and feelings of “victimization” by the people to whom we are giving. We may be completely unaware of our expectations of those we assist, and our own anger and resentment may catch us off guard. This is why our martyrdom is so hard on those around us. They are aware of the price we are exacting, even when we are in denial about our own motives and expectations.”

“This dissociation from the body extends to emotional disengagement. Without access to his feelings a man can’t help but lose track of who he is, what his priorities are and what is normal for him.”