So What Is Codependency?

Codependency is a word you may well be familiar with, but unsure exactly what it is.

I work with the definition given by Pia Mellody in her groundbreaking book ‘Facing Codependence’. A state of “dis-ease” caused by wounding we experience in childhood. A state of dysfunction that affects most of us living in Western society that prevents us living as healthy, functional and mature adults. These are the five core symptoms

• Difficulty experiencing appropriate levels of self-esteem. Feeling either “less than” or occasionally “better than” others, with self-worth often dependent on external validation, relationships, approval, sex, achievement, or being needed.

• Difficulty Setting Functional Boundaries. Problems recognising or maintaining healthy emotional, physical, sexual, intellectual or spiritual boundaries. This can include: saying yes when you mean no, tolerating mistreatment, controlling others, over-merging (enmeshing) in relationships.

• Difficulty owning one’s own reality. Struggling to identify, express or trust your own feelings, wants and perceptions. Often linked to minimising needs, people-pleasing, fear of conflict, or emotional suppression.

• Difficulty attending to one’s own dependency issues around needs and wants. Either over-dependence (“someone must rescue me ”) or anti-dependence (“I must do everything alone”). Many codependent people swing between helplessness and hyper-independence. Or they may be too ashamed to ask for help.

• Difficulty Experiencing and Expressing Reality Moderately. Emotional dysregulation — feelings become overwhelming, suppressed, numbed out, or acted out compulsively through addiction, sex, anger, caretaking, withdrawal, etc.

And tt the root of these 5 core symptoms is an unhealthy, or toxic, shame. Shame about our needs, shame about our feelings/emotions, shame about being vulnerable, shame about being “too much” or “not enough”, shame about who we are and what we’ve done.

And so a lot of the work I do with clients is reducing this shame.

Because until we learn to start valuing ourselves, we will always be going one-up or one-down on other people, we won’t value ourselves enough to start putting in healthy boundaries, we won’t see ourselves as worthy as attending to our needs and wants, we’ll continue acting out compulsively and we won’t gain a sense of our own power or be able to ask for help.