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LoveWithBoundaries

Recovery from Codependency: Self-Awareness Is the Key

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Here we all are, drawing closer to leaving 2021 behind and beginning a new year. These past 12 months have been momentous in so many ways – and I know that you don’t need me to go into much detail about that. For some of us, this year that’s ending has included much loss and grieving – of people we loved, of businesses and jobs that evaporated because of Covid-19 and other factors. For other people, there were opportunities for growth and well-being – with all kinds of shades of grey in between for so many of us.

But what holds true for all of us is that our lives are made up of a combination of experiences, how we perceive them and how we choose to handle them. Some days, during this past year, we felt like we were trudging through darkness with the weight of the world upon us, with no light in sight. Some days we either stayed as busy as we could or dipped even further into already-present addictions, not wanting to think (or perhaps feel) too much about what was happening. And yet, here we all are again, being asked about our New Year’s resolutions – something we don’t seem to be able to get away from pondering at this time of year.

For the past few Decembers, I’ve written articles about the difference between ‘resolutions’ and ‘intentions’ – and although I still feel this is a very important distinction worth discussing, I now want to explore it from a different angle – specifically from the perspective of codependency and recovery.

While there is nothing wrong with reassessing yourself from time to time and exploring changes you would like to make, the problems come when you allow yourself to over-identify with the “hype” of the season. It’s one thing to make the overblown and often unrealistic New Year’s resolutions that you think you should make at this time of year, and quite a different process to take stock of where you are, in present time, to see what you might like to be doing instead so that you can live your best life.

In short, it’s important to increase our level of self-awareness so that we can successfully make distinctions such as these. [Read more…]

Addiction and Codependency: The Top 10 Reasons to Stop Enabling the Addict You Love, Part 1

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We all know that addiction is rampant—it’s a horrific problem for far too many people, all over the world. And even though ‘addiction’ can take many forms, from mind-altering substances to mood-altering behaviours, one thing is for sure: Most everyone on the planet today is either affected by addiction—their own or somebody else’s—or they know someone who is.

These days, I work primarily with the loved ones of addicts because that is where the changes need to happen first—or at the very least, in tandem with the changes needing to be made by the addict. Until friends and family members modify what they’re doing in these very difficult situations, it is quite unlikely that the addict in their lives is going to come to them and say, “Please set some boundaries for me! Please let there be some consequences for my behaviour!”

Rather, it is the loved ones who need to be the people who say to the addict, “We love you enough to no longer support you in active addiction. When you’re really ready to be in active recovery of some kind, let us know and we will do whatever we can to help you make that happen.”

But this is a very scary prospect for most loved ones—for many different reasons, which we will explore here. I have been an Addictions Therapist for over 25 years, a recovering drug addict with close to 30 years in active recovery, and a person affected by other people’s addictions for my entire lifetime—and this is what I know to be true: When loved ones can develop the wisdom and the courage to stop enabling addicts, changes start to happen—and often not a moment before.

Just in case you still have a question about why we need to stop enabling addicts and begin to truly help them, here is my Top 10 list of reasons—a la David Letterman.

Drum roll please! [Read more…]