5 Ways Codependency Gets Confused With Love
“If I just love him enough, he will stop his self-destructive behavior.” “I can’t say no to her because I don’t want her to think I don’t love her.” “I know I need to get out of this unhealthy relationship, but I can’t leave because I love them too much.” If these phrases sound familiar, then you may be confusing love with an unhealthily enmeshed and enabling relationship. It can be difficult to distinguish the difference between love and codependency because codependency can often be a distortion of love’s true components.
Below are 5 ways codependency parades
as love:
1. Love does not enable bad behavior. Love does not excuse the
destruction of the beloved. It is difficult to navigate care for someone who is
hurting themselves, others, and us. Often, we don’t realize that our attempts
at loving someone can be contributing to their destructive behavior. For
example, we may try to provide for the emotional, physical, or monetary needs
of someone making poor decisions in hopes it will change their behavior. But
after repeated attempts to keep the person from suffering the natural
consequences of their choices, we become a partner with them in making bad
decisions. This is also true on an emotional level. Becoming partners in chaos
with the other person is not a sign of deep love. However, this does not mean
we do not feel deeply when someone we love is hurting, but it does require us
to separate our personal selves from taking on their chaos as our own.
2. Love does not erase the self, but rather brings you more fully into
who you are. Self-sacrifice is necessary for healthy relationships. But
self-sacrificing can get confused with giving up ourselves entirely and
absorbing into the other person. When this happens, the relationship becomes
enmeshed, meaning a person loses who they are and the ability to define
themselves separately in healthy ways from the other person. While real love
does connect us in profound ways with another, it also maintains healthy
boundaries that create an environment of safety- encouraging the beloved to
grow into their best self. This is difficult to do when we detach from our own
emotions and become overly invested in the emotions of another. Without access
to how we feel, we lose touch with ourselves and the things around us. Real
love has movement, it helps us grow and mature. When we lose ourselves in
someone else, we stop growing personally because there is no “self” available
to grow.
3. Love does not people please but is willing to upset another in
honor of what is healthiest for each person. Love is not exemplified by saying
yes to everything all the time. Real love utilizes wisdom for its yes and no.
Sometimes we think it is unloving to say no to a request or plea from someone
we love. It can still be hard to say no even when it is detrimental for the one
being asked. We may feel guilty for saying no to staying up talking on the
phone or going to help when we really need rest. We may feel bad saying what we
really want when knowing it will contrast with what the other prefers. It may
cause us to feel bad and resort to people pleasing when someone wants something
from us that we feel we should give, even though it will be detrimental to
ourselves. Sometimes love does say yes, even when there is a cost. But it must
be considered with wisdom and done because we choose self-sacrifice over
people-pleasing.
4. Love is not a facade. It is not to be used as a way of
numbing in a chaotic situation. Sometimes we can use the idea of loving someone
to run away from dealing with painful realities in a relationship. For example,
we may stay connected to someone longer than is healthy but use the excuse of
loving them to keep us from dealing with the painful realities of the
relationship. Love is willing to slow down, take an honest look at the
relationship and acknowledge the disordered areas. Only then can we make good
decisions about next steps to work on the problem areas identified.
5. Love is not responsible for another’s feelings, but takes responsibility for its own. When we become enmeshed with another, we lose the ability to know what we feel and instead, take on the feelings of another. When we take on too much responsibility for how someone else feels, it causes us to disconnect from our own emotions and lose touch with ourselves. Taking emotional responsibility for someone means we put all our energy into rescuing the person from the emotions they have. While it can feel loving on the surface to become hyper aware of how another feels, it is harmful to both people involved. It does not allow the other to take responsibility for themselves and causes us to lose access to ourselves. When we do not have access to our own feelings, we are blinded to how we are impacted by the relationship itself. Acknowledging how we feel sometimes requires change and action. Real love approaches the beloved with open eyes and access to the self.
Real love incorporates wisdom, healthy
boundaries, and a whole self with which to engage the beloved. Real love takes
a lot of practice. So next time you catch yourself people pleasing, enabling
bad behavior, disconnecting from yourself, or feeling responsible for another's
thoughts, feelings and actions, take a step back and reflect on what a more
genuine love would do.
To schedule an appointment
with Megan Brewer,
Please call our office at
407-647-7005.
www.lifeworksgroup.org
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