CoDependency...

I'm reading a book, The New Codependency: Help and Guidance for Today's Generation , by Melody Beattie and I am fascinated by it. I had read her first, ground-breaking book on codependency, Codependent No More: How to Stop Controlling Others and Start Caring for Yourself, after I had gone through 10 days of codependency treatment a short while after graduating from chemical dependency treatment in the late 1980s. That experience was, in every respect, the most important experience of my life. The New Codependency brings back many memories and feelings about one of the most prevelant and deadly of all addiction-related diseases.

Codependency is a hidden condition. Whether or not is fits the classic definition of a disease is debateable, but it certainly is a chronic, life-threatening condition some people find themselves in when they are connected to someone who is chemically dependent. This is the essential way people have defined codependency, that people get enmeshed with a drug or alcohol abuser such that they are as affected by the drug as the user is, but there are other ways to be codependent on other people, places, things, or situations that can ruin a life. Melody makes this point very convincingly in the book. Since codependency has come out of the shadows of addition treatment there has been growing concern that many, many people live their lives for someone else and do not know how to take care of themselves...what Melody says is the thematic pattern of codependent people. The trouble is that few people either know about or want to admit being codependent and it lies within a person for years, leaking out its venom in behaviors that a person may engage in without real knowledge or appreciation for what causes dysfunctional relationships.

In my own case, I have always defined codependency as a condition in which a person becomes addicted to the dramatic quality of their own lives. The life of a codependent person is fraught with problems associated with the alcoholic or drug addict, and these problems often become so prominent in their daily lives that they come to expect them to happen. They become traits in the codependent person. Moreover, they become conditions of suffering that the codependent person wants to scream out to everyone, "See how bad things are for me!" Not everyone reacts this way, but by and large language and conversation of a codependent person becomes more or less related to the other, addicted person. Everything about their lives is in relation to how this addicted person behaves, treats them, creates situations that are perplexing, or dangerous and threatening to the codpendent person. The ultimate example of this is spousal abuse, both physical and mental, in which a codependent victim - unwilling to detach from the addicted perpetrator - becomes victim to that person's rage and dies at their hands. There are active deaths in which the person is killed, or slow deaths in which, over decades, a codependent contracts other illnesses of stress, bodily dysfunction, and mental problems that isolates them and ultimately kills them. All of this due to the drama in their lives.

I am a codependent, having lived in a situation for years that I could not manage but had to cope with daily and threatened my life. This has led me to another aphorism I believe: Not every codependent is an addict, but certainly every addict is a codependent. It's a fact of life that addicts live in relation to others, either through the lying and manipualtion they do or through the enmeshment with others that is caused by the addiction itself, and this often keeps them involved with the drug and the lifestyle of a drug addict. I was once addicted to the drama such that I needed to know there was drama and reaffirm it to everyone in order to justify my drug use. As a result, I dragged everyone in my life down with me.

Melody makes larger and better arguments about these points much more eloquently. I would invite anyone who lives with an addicted person, or anyone who feels they must care for and nurture an addicted person, thing, or situation to read her book. At the same time, I would learn the principles of constructive detachment from that addict and begin the process of self-care so as to escape the addict's gravitational pull that wants to drive you into the ground. Your life depends on this awareness and plan.

All the best, Roger W.