Codependency is a learned behavior pattern of forsaking your own needs and wellbeing at the cost of prioritising others’ needs and wellbeing.

It can show up in multiple relational structures: in romantic relationships you may strongly believe and want to “save” or “fix” the other person, or it may look like intense distress and inability to cope with the emptiness of your teen moving out for college. Someone who is codependent may ignore their own boundaries when they are called for help or when someone needs them and they may put all their energy into fulfilling and supporting others.

Codependency can be a challenging behavior pattern to come to terms with and change. It can take sustained effort to become aware and identify behavior patterns and slowly make adaptive changes.

Unhealthy Codependency versus Healthy Interdependence

Humans are social beings that live and thrive in connection to others. Often it becomes tricky to distinguish between harmful and healthy connections and the first step in healing from codependency is to learn these differences.

In a codependent relationship, there is a pattern of putting others’ needs before yours. You may let your friend borrow money despite experiencing financial difficulties yourself. You may also make excuses for their behavior or try to ensure they don’t get in trouble with teachers/bosses/legal authorities. Denying and rationalizing their problem behavior becomes a part of your relationship dynamic with them. It is hard to envision who you would be without the people you are codependent upon in your life- perhaps you only find meaning in your identity as a partner or as a mother!

A healthy, interdependent relationship has mutual respect and reliance, reciprocation, and managing distress when a disagreement occurs. You rely on your community (family, friends, colleagues, or partner) for mutual support, but you have a developed sense of self and a unique identity as an individual.

Stages of Codependency

Early Stage

increased attention and dependency, and a desire to please them
deny/excuse problematic behavior like gambling, substance addictions
failure to maintain healthy boundaries
giving up own hobbies/friendships

Middle Stage

Enabling their behaviors through compliance, coercion, or manipulation
Anger, resentment, and guilt to accept negative aspects of the relationship
May hide the problems or withdraw from supportive relationships while self-esteem suffers
Coping using eating, substance use, working, shopping
Late Stage

Socioemotional issues start affecting health via muscle tension, headaches, sleep disturbances
Increased feelings of hopelessness and anger
Reduced self-care and self-esteem

Recovering from Codependency

It can be a difficult and time consuming process with ups and downs, but it can be done! Here are some guidelines to healing from codependency.

Centering Self in Relationships

If you find yourself giving up your hobbies, friends, and things you love doing, it may be time to slowly make changes to intentionally make time for them. Self care can be as simple as wanting to go on evening walks by yourself rather than going with your spouse. Centering yourself a little more means you value yourself, your wants, and needs again.

Nurturing Healthy Social Relationships

Now that you have learnt to distinguish what healthy interdependence looks like, start initiating or deepening relationships where you feel valued, respected, and supported and those in which you can do the same for others. This helps combat the tendency to withdraw and isolate from healthy relationships when you are codependent.

Finding Healthy Ways to Cope and Regulate

When your sibling, parent, child, or partner is facing a problem, remind yourself it is not your responsibility to fix the problem! It is normal to want reassurance and connection when upset and you can always reassure yourself and them. Your support without making moves to “fix” the problem is very valuable.

Practice Self-Soothing

If you feel stressed after drawing boundaries or dealing with stressors in your relationship, it is helpful to develop ways to reduce the stress by engaging in mindfulness exercises like deep breathing or yoga. You can also spend more time in healthy relationships to help find the support you need.

Therapy

A trained therapist can help you identify the signs of codependency that may not be so obvious, and they can help with exploring your sense of self. You can learn to set boundaries, identify behavioral patterns, and change maladaptive behaviors that enable codependency.

Codependency can be hard to catch in relationships and alarm bells can go off once you find yourself focusing too much on others’ needs and disregarding your wellbeing. While connection in relationships is natural it is important to feel safe, respected, and supported in your relationships.

If you are having a hard time dealing with codependency by yourself, reach out to a trained professional to help you navigate it with sustained consistency and support!

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