codependency & detachment

quotes from codependence and the power of detachment by karen casey

"i also began to understand that my need for control - control over what another person was thinking about me. it was a constant need in nearly every relationship in my life, as much as i did not want to admit it. as diligently as i tried, i continued to scan the expressions of others, particularly the expressions of my boss and my significant other, for my 'control fix'. getting the fix one needs in order to continue living from one minute to the next, whether from a drug or from the praise of a person, is a debilitating way to live. i wouldn't say that the addiction of codependency is more harmful than addiction to alcohol or other mood-altering chemicals, but i can't say that it is less harmful either."

"she was aware that for many years, men had been projects for her. when she couldn't change the man, she would change herself to make the two of them appear more compatible as a couple. that habit rings true for many of us in al-anon. it's one of the classic symptoms of our disease. no matter what circumstance we find ourselves in, we will try to change it or us to provide the outcome we think we deserve."

"but to simply detach, to draw a boundary around herself and believe that 'what they do is not a reflection on me,' wasn't possible for her right away. another challenge was that she had been raised to think it was her job to take care of others, children as well as husbands. letting them take care of themselves was against her grain. caretaking was a key part of her identity. if she were to let them take care of themselves, what would she do with her time? she was afraid she would feel irrelevant to her family."

"rose also said it was important for her to distinguish between being negatively passive and making a conscious choice to disengage from a situation that had snagged her emotions. it was and is her inclination to acquiesce, she said. however, she learned the difference between quietly detaching from a situation versus shutting down her feelings. we, too, can learn to be disengaged without being passive."

"rose learned not to do for others what they need to do for themselves. even though her husband did not stay sober, his disease was his to shoulder. she did not cause it, nor could she cure it. not doing for others what they need to do for themselves sounds so simple. no doubt many of us think, 'well, i don't do that.' but if we are honest and examine our behavior, we may discover that in myriad ways we are picking up the slack or the mess, around our homes or elsewhere, rather than letting the perpetrator take responsibility. . . the unfortunate fact is that every time we take one someone else's responsibility, we are keeping them stuck, and in the process making a hostage of both of us. it is not easy to let the addict mature, but we must. we are harming them every time we step in and bring order to the chaos they created."

"one of the main difficulties anna had was dealing with her feelings of superiority, which made her judgmental toward others. because she was far less emotional than howie, she saw his frequent tears as a sign of weakness, thus inferiority. being vulnerable was simply not an option for anna. . . she learned how her habit of judging others kept her attached to the behavior of everyone around her."

"barbara is through with being a victim. in our interview, she said she had almost relished that role for years because it had allowed her to refuse responsibility for every detail of her own life. now she defines detachment as 'not claiming to be a victim.' she has learned that detachment with love means choosing to separate herself from the situations over which she has no control. she says it also means being free of the need to make an emotional response, or any response at all, to a troubling person or a situation. she is able, now, to sense herself moving into her adult observer role. she has become adept at objectifying the details of her life."

"like harry, many of us in al-anon joined this journey because of our addiction to controlling the many people, places, and situations in our lives."

"when janet talks about letting go with love, she put it in unique terms. she says, 'to let go with love means allowing the other person their dignity.' she believes that everyone must find his or her own way, and if at first they fail, so be it."

"when she went to her first meeting, the terminology she heard people using - caretaker, codependent, sicker than the alcoholic - made her uncomfortable. she felt that her own life was moving along successfully, and she didn't want to change it."

"he had grown too accustomed to letting her decide everything for both of them, and she could see he needed to be responsible for himself. . . interestingly, her focus on people other than herself has continued to be one of sara's issues. because defining themselves according to their interactions with other people is second nature to codependents, leaving her marriage doesn't mean sara has escaped codependency. leaving any relationship doesn't automatically lead to detachment. one can be just as attached emotionally after getting out of a primary relationship as when still in it. physical proximity to or distance from the significant other has little to do with how entrapped one feels by the behaviors of another person."

"the very first thing an old-timer will say is that we are here for ourselves - period. . . like sara, most men and women who come to al-anon have been constantly managing, or trying to manage, the lives of others. what we eventually come to understand is that our obsession with the actions of everyone else allows little time to peacefully plan our own actions. our lives are unmanageable, not because we don't know how to manage them, but because we have so little time to pay attention to [them]."

"she never really felt connected to others, so doing favors for them allowed her to feel that she was necessary to their lives."

"taking care of someone else's needs so that our needs are met or so that we feel secure of indispensable is never the right thing to do. this behavior keeps us stuck. it cements our unhealthy attachment to another. it imprisons us, and our growth is deadlocked. giving it lovingly and willingly and freely is great; giving our attention as a way to control the actions of anyone else is never loving."

"familiar patterns are hard to walk away from, even when they are very painful. relapse is a reality for codependents just as surely as it is for alcoholics. some may think relapse is not as dangerous for the codependent as for the alcoholic, since codependents will generally not be driving drunk or fighting violently with another person. but emotionally, a codependent's relapse is every bit as devastating. it instantly revives those old feelings of insecurity and unworthiness."

"step one also asks us to recognize the unmanageability of our lives. for most codependents this is a bitter pill to swallow. didn't we do our own work and still manage to cover for the alcoholic? how about all of the situations that we handled entirely alone, day in and day out? taking on extra work wasn't unusual for many of us. we wanted to be noticed for our efforts. we needed as much approval from others as we could garner. it's not easy to understand how our lives could be considered unmanageable when we had as many balls in the air as most of us were juggling. this part of step one was very hard for me to admit to. i had a full-time teaching job at a university, was a straight-A graduate student, and had a busy social life. unmanageable? my life? what had not occurred to me was that parts of my life were unmanageable. my emotions, for example, ran my life. i did not take charge of them. when anyone anywhere interacted with me, i let the tenor of that experience decide how i would feel and thus perceive myself."

"one of the most common themes that runs through the head of the codependent is, 'i have done so much to keep this relationship alive and working! how dare you not do your part!' . . . caretakers, as a matter of course, put others first. putting herself at the top of her own caretaking list took an effort on beth's part."

"one of beth's techniques for staying detached is a visualization. when beth feels a drama about to unfold, she sees herself standing off to the side, away from the fishhook that is being tossed in her direction. rather than getting snagged by it, she steps back. she uses this visualization with her kids and with others who want to suck her in emotionally. with it, she can look on her kids or others with love and walk away, unhooked. and she feels no guilt. that's the real reward.

'clean relationships' is the term beth used to describe those interactions that are most common to her now. she knows that detaching doesn't equal a lack of love. it equals, in fact, greater love. letting someone else be whoever they need to be, whether that's the person we hope they'll be or not, is what's right. we think we should be in charge of another's journey only because we fear that their journey might take them away from us. but if it does, so be it."

"the best part of this acceptance is that she no longer takes their choices personally. she learned from experience that you cannot detach when you are feeling responsible for someone else's behavior or taking their behavior personally. either way you are a hostage. . . carolyn says one of her greatest joys is that she can 'let things rest.' in other words, she doesn't have to resolve every situation or conflict immediately anymore."

"what she had discovered, though, in her pursuit of getting away, was that alcohol allowed her to close off her mind to what family members were doing and saying. she could 'get away' rather than be always under their thumb. while drinking she was able to exist relatively unmoved by the emotional turmoil that was caused by their overinvolvement in each others' lives. we might not call this method healthy detachment, but for shelley it was effective, nonetheless. . . shelley says that for her, detachment first begins with that connected sense of attachment. only then can she see the need she also has for separateness."