Oct 10, 2019
Codependency is a really important one as when it comes to taking back the power and our place in life, we can so easily find ourselves in relationships where we relinquish who we are in favour of propping someone else up – it’s a clever little monster as it sneaks up on us and masquerades as true love then before you know it, you’re crushed, exhausted, and you’ve completely lost direction, you’ve no idea of who you are any more and you have no sense of self, you’ve chosen to sacrifice yourself by taking responsibility for someone else who can’t or won’t, often for very valid reasons, take responsibility for themselves.
So, what is co-dependency? It can be defined as any relationship in which two people become so invested in each other that they can’t function independently anymore – and whilst you might think that's isn’t necessarily a bad thing, when it means one person has got lost, or when it means that one person props up or facilitates abusive behaviour, or addiction, or locks you in a severely dysfunctional relationship, then it is bad, most definitely.
It’s easy to see from the outside but when you’re in the middle of it, it’s incredibly hard to identify as it grows subtly and that’s what this episode is all about.....
The book I refer to on codependence is called The Dance of Wounded Souls, by Robert Burney and in it he says the battle cry of codependence is: “I’ll show you! I’ll get me!”