I’m Not Co-Dependent

Posted: 27th July 2008 3:23 ∞ Categories: Friends and Work partners, Psychology, Therapy ∞ Comment RSS: RSS 2.0

I’ve been reading up on language and cognition while intending to do an article for RTV this issue, but have decided that it’s going to take longer than I have to spare to research it, and I might want to postpone it indefinitely as I appear to be somewhat ill-informed on the matter. I was talking to Patrick Dunn yesterday about his newest book, Magic Power Language Symbol: A Magician’s Exploration of Linguistics, which is the second time that we’ve had a topic-related synchronicity. However, it’s safe to say he is better equipped to write on the topic than I am.

This bebopping around the Internet led me to thinking (due to various website encounters) about my psychotherapy and the suggestions of friends regarding my potential issues. One of my friends believes that I am a perfect candidate for Asperger’s Syndrome, but upon reading over the criteria I have to disagree. I do seem to fit something vaguer, called “Social Avoidance Disorder” or something like that. I have a deep belief that, in any social situation I find myself in, I’m going to be judged and found unworthy to be in attendance. This belief is either due to fairly consistent experiences in my past (of which there are many) or the consistent experiences are due to my belief. I believe the former, obviously, and my therapist believes the latter. We’ll see how that ends up.

Another issue I read up on was co-dependence, which is “loosely defined as someone who exhibits too much, and often inappropriate, caring for persons who depend on him or her. A ‘codependent’ is one side of a relationship between mutually needy people. The dependent, or obviously needy party(s) may have emotional, physical, financial difficulties, or addictions they seemingly are unable to surmount. The ‘codependent’ party exhibits behaviour which controls, makes excuses for, pities, and takes other actions to perpetuate the obviously needy party’s condition, because of their desire to be needed and fear of doing anything that would change the relationship (Reference.com).”

I don’t fit this description at all, and I was much relieved by this fact. I am a lousy enabler, in fact. I have all too often been accused of demanding too much from my friends, though this often follows a period of demanding nothing due to fear of rejection. The latter doesn’t seem to fit the psychobabble “co-dependent” label because I still don’t enable anyone’s issue or make excuses for them, but I allow them to express themselves freely without judgment and I express myself the same way. It just doesn’t occur to me to set boundaries until much later, and then I set them too harshly and alienate people.

Part of this pattern for me is true open-mindedness and true generosity – it doesn’t enter my mind that someone will take advantage of me or my generosity until they have already gone well past the point at which others would have drawn the line. When they fail to reciprocate my methods of dismissing debts and buying gifts and openly communicating problems, then I notice something is amiss and start feeling concern about the lack of reciprocation. But the generosity is in my nature, and that’s something I need to learn not to do without a lot more caution.

The other part of the pattern is my lifelong quest for the “best friend forever” person that can match my intensity and my willingness to take it to the limit (and my limit is pretty far out there, evidently). No one has ever successfully matched me on either one, though many have come close in various ways. But over the past four or five years, I’ve learned a great deal of caution in listening to this pathological need, and while I am grateful for that I’m also resentful of the pain that has prompted the learning. I know I have more to learn, but I’m trying now to take a more proactive route to this end rather than allowing myself to be convinced that caution is not necessary. A friend recently suggested that I should consider different friends for different facets of who I am, and I think that is a very healthy attitude – just disappointing to my inner idealist. lol. I am definitely letting that simmer, though.

I think that a nicely moderated sharing style is in order, absolutely. I seem to have a real problem limiting myself once things are set in motion, and that’s most apparent when I’ve crossed the line between “friend” and “best friend.” It’ll save a lot of friendships, I’m thinking, to keep it all very slow, steady, and confined to a particular spectrum.

But the phenomenon itself is intriguing.

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