This really touched me
Read this earlier on another site, and it really helped me see things in a new light....
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We try guilt, manipulation, direct confrontation, attack, threats, ultimatums all to no avail. We don't understand how our loved one can't love us enough to put us out of our pain and stop drinking or taking drugs. But, here's the thing, the addict's addiction isn't about us at all. It is about him or her and his or her pain, environmental upbringing, perspectives, life-lessons, challenges, etc. It's not up to us to force them to learn their lesson faster to make us happy. We try to help in so many ways by maybe rearranging our schedules, making excuses to save them from embarrassment, we take on some of their accountabilities because we know they are sick, we soften the blows the consequences of their addictions are intended to deliver. We, unwittingly, make it easier for them to stay addicted and then at the same time, keep trying to change them, we keep trying to make their addiction about us because it hurts us.
When you attack someone who is already in pain, what do you think that does to that person? It makes them feel worse. When you manipulate and guilt someone who knows that their addiction is a problem, what do you think that does to that person? It makes them feel worse.
"Okay smarty pants, if I cant guilt, manipulate, attack or soften the blow for my addicted loved one, what can I do?" The answer might sound simple but here it is: Help yourself. Focus on healing your pain from the addiction. Work on healing your negative behavior that resulted from interaction with the addicted loved one. They say alcoholism in particular, is a family disease. They don't say that just because there are cases of genetic passing on of the disease from parent to child. They say that because the people around the alcoholic develop behaviors to cope with the alcoholic or addict's addiction. Often, those behaviors are negative and reinforce the addiction and make us co-dependent.
In some adult relationships, for reasons that relate to our own environmental psychology, we need to be needed. When we're involved with an alcoholic or drug addict, we get an ego boost when the alcoholic or addict needs us and we can step in and save the day...help them find an attorney for a DUI, pay their rent when they drank their paycheck and can't afford to pay it, pay their electric bill, car payment, medical bills, etc. Then, we resent having to take responsibility for someone else at some point and we start to fight back or we start to set boundaries only to be attacked because the alcoholic or addict has become dependent upon us. They don't understand why we're not helping and may perceive the setting of boundaries as an act of disloyalty or that we no longer love them.
Face it, we love our loved ones period whether they are addicted or not. But, we are not helping them at all if we intervene in their addiction, save them from consequences and soften the blows related to the choices that they make. We take on their addiction by feeling that if they loved us enough they could stop. Love between you has nothing to do with it. It's a disease that is difficult to cure but it is a disease that a co-dependent's actions can make worse or reinforce.
To get out of the tangled web of co-dependency, I recommend the following affirmation:
1. I will live my life being responsible for myself.
2. I will fix only myself.
3. I will rescue only myself.
4. I am loved and love my addicted or alcoholic loved one enough to say no to requests for help that would soften the blows of their addiction.
5. I deserve to live free from fear of the alcoholic or drug addict and will protect myself physically and psychologically by putting distance between me and the alcholic or drug addict if necessary.
6. I will respond to attacks or accusations that have something to do with me. When they don't, I will refuse to engage in an angry discussion.
7. I will not guilt, attack, manipulate or change anyone. I will seek to change only myself, my actions and my reactions.
8. I deserve to live a happy life free from the consequences of addiction.
9. I will love myself enough to seek support while I deal with the addiction in my life.
10. I will learn to love myself and others without condition.