I Don’t Buy It

[Anonymous]

What a great article this is. I wish I had learned this lesson many years ago. I used to personalize almost everything and drove myself nuts (and my family as well). My daughter is bi-polar and we did not know that growing up. I took everything she said and did so personally while the next day she acted like it was no big deal. What a horrible roller coaster ride I was on. I used to blame myself for everything. So, when my oldest son did a suicide attempt at 13, I cried for a year. When we found out our youngest son was gay, I anguished over all the things my husband and I must have done wrong. When my husband no longer wanted intimacy with me I blamed myself for being over weight etc. Instead we later find out that I had little to do with any of my families problems. It took me a long time to learn not to make others responsible for my happiness and become a more independent person. A book, I really liked that I believe God led me to was called:

“Living Successfully with Screwed-Up People” http://www.amazon.com/Living-Successfully-Screwed-Up-People-Elizabeth/dp/0800757084

The cover of the book really caught my eye and the book showed me how to not let others mess up my life. It’s a process internalizing all these lessons and practicing them, but its great when you succeed once in a while.

[Anonymous]

swimordie wrote:

Tom Haws wrote:

So if we never rebelled in my family, we were co-dependent?

Rix will have good insight but I’ll take a stab.

It’s not always the way we act that demonstrates co-dependency. It’s how we think, mostly about ourselves, but also, in part, how we think that other people think about us.

The idea is that if someone is co-dependent, they derive all or part of their approval, validation, acceptance, reward system from others, rather than from themselves. So, it’s a question of motivation. Why are you doing what you’re doing? Why are you feeling the way you’re feeling? Why are you thinking the way you’re thinking?

Obviously, to talk in these terms we must focus on the inner-life. If you’re acting because of an external reward, or for fear of an external consequence, you may be doing it for co-dependent reasons. Which, of course, makes us all at least a little bit co-dependent.

So, if you didn’t rebel, was it because you knew in your heart that it was the wrong thing to do, regardless of whether you were going to get praise for not rebelling or fear of the consequences, at least the external consequences?

I think that’s the key: why do you do it or not do it? If the answer has something to do with someone else, it may be co-dependent.

If we know and believe in our hearts that we are good people and will always try to make the right decisions, then we’re not acting under the influence of some external source. Hence, the term “dependent”.

Perfect! Couldn’ta said it better myself!

[Author]

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