I'm ruminating on something a medical professional told me the other day about co-dependency. A very bad word, you know. It means you do too much for other people at the expense of your own well-being. Ok. I get it. I should not take on the world's problems, especially right now when my own situation is so precarious.
But let me ask you something? What if that's how you're wired? What if what's important to you . . . what gives your LIFE meaning . . . is taking care of other people? If helping, nurturing, linking, loving, giving to, and befriending people come naturally to you? If those activities are what make your life complete?
Are you a hopeless co-dependent? And if you quit doing that, what DO you do? The opposite is selfish ass-hat. I can only make myself so many f*cking tablecloths.
At the expense of spending eternity in hell (and let me qualify here that I don't believe there's a hell after this; this is hell, specifically, the main parking garage at MD Anderson), I'd like to point out that the life actions of Jesus Christ and other figures whose tenets inform the religions of the world could be perceived as co-dependent.
Discuss.
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I used to have a friend that you would really have liked for lots of different reasons. She used to tell me how co-dependent I was all the time and it really made me think. I even have a couple of books on the subject. Here's how I see it. If you're co-dependent, you can't make a decision without having someone else's approval. It's not about giving SERVICE to someone else. I just took a test to learn what my core values are, and as boring as it made me think I was during the test, it told me that I apparently live to provide service to others. Maybe what we all want to achieve is to give service to others because we genuinely want to share our gifts. It's not about sharing or even giving until there's nothing left because we NEED people to like us.
If you're giving and not expecting anything in return, then you're being Christlike and there's certainly nothing wrong with that. If you're giving with the intention of making someone feel indebted to you, that's something else.
I've always thought you were very generous with others. I never thought of you as co-dependent.
What brought this up with the doctor? Maybe this is just a time when you need to allow people to provide service to YOU!
Well I do need people to like me. But I don't think I am in service to others IN ORDER TO get them to like me. I do it because I like THEM and because I can help in ways that other people often cannot. Or at least I'm faster.
And I DO need help right now, and I think I'm getting it, but it may be that this problem can't be solved to my satisfaction.
Here's a set of characteristics of co-dependency that I found by Googling. It ain't you, babe.
1. External referencing: distrusting own perceptions, lacking boundaries, believing one cannot survive without a relationship/addicted to relationships, fearing abandonment, believing in the perfect union.
2. Caretaking: become indispensable, become a martyr
3. Self-centeredness: personalizing all events, assuming responsibility for other's behavior.
4. Over-controlling: increasing control efforts when chaos increases, attempting to control everything and everyone, controlling without caring for those controlled, believing that with more effort you can fix the addict/family.
5. Feelings: unaware of feelings, distorting emotional experiences/accepting only acceptable feelings, fearfulness.
6. Dishonesty: managing all impressions made, omitting/lying about the truth, rigidity.
7. Gullibility: being a bad judge of character, unwillingness to confront, over-trusting, accepting what fits the way on wishes the way things were.
Having a caring, giving instinct is a wonderful trait and should not be confused with being co-dependent. I don't even think they share the same stage.
Life is a balance--being our best so we can give our best to others. James 2:8 "You must love and help your neighbors just as much as you love and take care of yourself."
Nice work. I came across your blog while “blog surfing” using the “Next Blog” button in the Nav Bar at the top of my blogspot blog. I occasionally just check out other blogs to see what others are doing.
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