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A journey of love – finding me
I recently realized that the journey I am on is a journey of love. A journey to find myself and overcome my past and my codependence. My whole life has been that way; a journey of discovery. I believe things happened in my life to give me the heart I have and the ability to reach into other people’s hearts to help them see the love they have in their own heart.
God gave me a mountain to climb as he does with most people. At a young age he gave me situations to face that forced me to understand the differences in people. As a small child I was very trusting. I could never imagine someone would intentionally harm someone else. I could never imagine they would only consider their own needs and not the pain they would inflict on someone else. I am a survivor of sexual abuse. At a very young age, an older relative molested me. It went on for years. My parents were not the offenders but they did not protect me either. Putting his head in the sand and keeping up appearances was more important to my father than facing something so horrible. My mother never challenged my father so she would go along with his decisions. For him I imagine it would be like admitting failure. And my father could never admit failure. So I was left at 6 years old to suffer abuse and try to avoid my abuser at all costs. Avoidance did not work very well. The abuse continued for several years.
I don’t tell you that story for sympathy. I have forgiven all the hurt that was done to me. I grew from those experiences, which I will share when appropriate, to understand my own heart. I still remember everything that happened, but I do not feel it anymore. I can no longer touch the pain or anger or guilt I carried. It took many events in my life to understand that as result of what I experienced that I would never and could never intentionally hurt another human being. To understand that when I was upset with someone or said things in anger, it tore me apart, even when I was standing up for myself. It took my journey to understand that I can feel pain in others and that by extending a kindness or showing compassion and love, I can help them to feel the forgiveness in their own heart. I write this in the hope that others that have similar experiences understand there is a journey of love they can experience themselves.
It took me decades to understand the trauma and dysfunction I lived with. Decades to work through the pain and forgive, truly forgive what happened and put it behind me. It was a pretty rocky journey and until recently I realized I was carrying the mountain I mentioned that God gave me. That mountain that was only meant for me to climb, not carry.
As a result of my childhood, I realized when I was in my thirties that I felt different in close, personal relationships. I had trouble trusting; I was angry a lot and I withdrew and ran away from emotional situations. I still do at times. I still have a hard time trusting and my knee jerk response to emotional pain is to run away. I am still working on me every day but I am not perfect, and sometimes it is hard to decipher my own fear in simply an emotional situation versus an unhealthy situation. I struggle at times, but I have to remind myself to forgive my mistakes and that I am an amazing person that genuinely loves and cares about people.
I wasn’t until about 15 years ago that I heard the word codependent. I looked it up and read about it and realized a lot of what they were saying about feelings and behaviors applied to me and to how I felt. I started watching my own behavior; paying attention to how I reacted in difficult situations and I started talking about how I felt to people I thought I could trust. I say, thought I could trust because many of those people betrayed that trust and used my own weaknesses against me. I will expand on those another time as all is forgiven.
People who know me at work, my friends and even family have said to me – What is a codependent? When I tell them what the definition of a codependent is, that we depend on others for our self-worth and to feel like we are loved, everyone says ‘Not you – you are nothing like that. You are independent and strong. You handle so much all the time”.
There is a misconception of what a codependent person is. All relationships have some forms of codependency, even healthy ones. Where the problem arises is when the emotional and behavioral interaction and conditions affect having a healthy and mutually satisfying relationship. It can be when one person relies on the other or expects that person to meet all of their emotional needs, including self-esteem. It is not merely being dependent on someone, which is not in and of itself codependent; emotional codependency hinders the ability to maintain a healthy relationship with yourself and others. It is behavior you have to work at the rest of your life. And any situation or relationship can trigger those feelings. Therefore I am always overthinking and over analyzing situations to see how they “feel”. Sometimes too much.
Codependents are not weak or clingy or demanding individuals as a rule. Most people I have met that are codependent are intelligent, caring, strong minded individuals. I have met doctors, lawyers, psychiatrists, accountants, factory workers, writers, you name it, which are codependent in their most important relationships. We all have one thing in common though; we have a very hard time feeling that we have value as a person and we have a very hard time loving and respecting ourselves.
So understanding that codependence is prevalent in dysfunctional families where various forms of abuse or neglect take place, makes us realize that as children we did not get the nurturing we needed. We were abused, neglected and even made to grow up and be the “parent” in familial situations when the actual parents were non-existent or substance abusers. Children of alcoholics usually top the list, but it includes many different forms of abuse or neglect. When your sense of self-worth is constantly questioned, ridiculed or you are consistently shamed/made to feel guilty or your value as a person is even flat out disregarded, you learn to survive in those environments. You do not survive very well, but you survive. You learn coping mechanisms and behaviors to counteract what is happening or to get whatever nurturing and love you can.
These behaviors are learned and ultimately considered normal. Self-sabotage or self-abuse, feeling out of
control, feeling no sense of self and emotional dependence are ways we beat ourselves up – and emotional dependence or emotional withdrawal are coping mechanisms; not to get what they want – but to feel normal; to feel valued and to feel loved. Pretty skewed thinking.
That is why codependents feel valued when they are helping others or “fixing” relationships within their families or with their friends. It is the way we can accept love. You need me. I can fix you or your situation and you will then give me love back. Love is rarely given back as needed because the expectation is that by doing something for someone else, by giving love to someone else, it will make me whole.
Giving Love and kindness to others is not codependent. I have learned to understand the difference. If I do a kindness or give love to someone in a healthy way, I am never asking for anything in return. Example: If I buy a gift for someone, I do not expect a gift back. If I complement someone, I do not expect a complement in return. If I help someone by doing them a favor, I do not keep score to get that favor returned. True kindness and love is paying it forward all the time.
Conversely, if I do all those things above, buy a gift, give a complement or do a favor for someone else and I expect anything, even a thank you, I am not doing a kindness, and I am doing business. There is no love or kindness in an action that expects the same in return.
Are we always trying to fix ourselves or waiting for someone to fix us? Maybe. I used to think that way a long time ago. Now I understand I am the one that can make me happy. Logic dictates that we can simply take care of ourselves; do the work and tend our own garden. Unfortunately, codependents rarely take care of themselves first. I have a saying on my desk “You Cannot Pour Coffee from an Empty Cup”. I am reminded each day that I cannot help anyone else unless I take care of my needs and my well-being first.
I am certainly not perfect. I will never graduate or “get over” some of those characteristics I adopted to cope. But I can work on myself every day. I can extend kindness and love wherever I can. I can forgive when someone hurts me, intentionally or not and make amends and forgive myself when I hurt someone else. I learned the difference between running away from myself and others when I am afraid and walking away from an unhealthy situation. I try to understand and address those situations that cause me to feel I am unloved and unwanted in someone else’s life, whether they are true or not. And most of all I can remember to love myself. Every day.
Butch