It's easy for me to see quacking in others, difficult to see it in myself
The difficulty in me seeing my own quacking is why I turn to a support group and a sponsor, what happens is I get involved with "the problem", or "the story", and the more I fight the more I lose, because I am engaging with "the problem" not "the solution"
It helps to know what the problem is, one of the most profound and helpful posts I have ever seen on this forum was by LTD awhile back, I keep a copy of it on my desktop and refer to it frequently when I begin having difficulties with others:
These are all symptoms of a dysfunctional alcoholic/codependent
relationship. You are in the middle of a power struggle. You still
believe, either consciously or subconsciously, you can get what you
want. Him to stop drinking and be the husband and father you want him
to be. He is proving to you every day that he is not willing to do
that, so you ratchet up the pressure to make it more and more
difficult for him to keep drinking. Yet he continues drinking.
So, honestly, why are you staying? I'll know you'll say you need his
income, you don't want to break up the family, etc. These are all the
things I said, too. The real answer is you still think you can win.
You believe that if you just hold your ground long enough, he will
finally break and do things your way. Until you are willing to give up
the idea that you have any control over him at all, you will continue
reacting, struggling, and resenting.
I say all this not as a judgment, but from my own experience. I know
how it feels to be where you are and it very much sucks. I hope you
get to the acceptance stage sooner than I did.
When I got here, although I had been around sobriety and recovery for many many years, I found myself in a codependent power struggle, it helped me immensely to learn what I was up against, the "textbook" on "her" I found here:
Physical & Emotional Abuse Discussions at DailyStrength: Worth Reading and re-posting...
If you are in a relationship where you have a sick sense that SOMETHING is wrong, but somehow it's always YOUR fault, and you find yourself always tring to "fix" things, this article may be for you.
Emotional abusers are very insidious - some of them are much harder to spot than others, because they mingle their abuse in between acts of generosity, and often employ emotionally manipulative tactics, and passive-aggressive behavior. Not all emotional abusers overtly belittle and verbally harangue their partners - some are much more perfidious and as such, their partners may not realize that the source of their distress and an unease over the relationship has been coming from abuse for quite some time. The longer a woman remains under the grip of an emotional abuser, the more she will start to question herself, her actions and her beliefs. It is the abuser's goal to make her believe that she deserves his cruelty and that only through her actions can she make it stop. It is his intent to get her to feel that she is the cause of any relationship problems, and that his (abusive) behavior is simply a response to her, and therefore acceptable. It is true, that only through her actions can she make it stop - she must have the courage to leave the relationship and avoid further contact with the abuser.
Abusers, physical or emotional, are abusive because of their own self-hate and internal issues - not because of anything their partner did. No amount of work or attempting to please will stop an abuser from abusing. They have to be willing to recognize and actually work on their own issues before they can stop inflicting cruelty on the people who love them. In many cases, they don't even love their partners, because they can't even love themselves, and don't feel that they deserve love, even though they crave it. Abusers may genuinely feel bad that they committed another act of abuse, not because they have any real compassion for the person they hurt, but because they get angry at themselves for "screwing up" again. This drives them further into self-loathing, and further into a cycle of abusive behavior.
Once I learned these things, and once I learned and admitted I was powerless over her and her behavior, it was my responsibility whenever I re-engaged, and when I "blamed" her for "hurting me" I was just quacking, because all I was doing was repeating my behaviors.
It was explained to me, once I knew what 'the problem" was, any time I repeated my behavior it was on a lie, and the lie was to myself. Once I admitted I was powerless over alcohol and alcoholism, if I drank it would be because in some way shape or form I was lying to myself, and the same was true about engaging with "the alcoholic"
The three C's are:
I didn't cause it
I can't cure it
I can't control it
What I learned FOR ME was anytime I got angry, hurt or frustrated with "the alcoholic" in my life it was because I was trying to control them or control the situation, the outcome, no matter how much I fought, the more I lost, because control over another human being or their actions is an illusion.
Anything that came out of my mouth during my efforts to control another human being was "quacking", all my "look at she did to me" etc ad nauseum, once I admitted powerlessness was quacking.
So quacking is easy to see in others, and gives me a sense of superiority to do so, when the truth of the matter is unless I am watching for it in myself, and not others, I am getting sicker and sicker in my codependent tendencies and "disease"
This is just me, and where I am in my process, it doesn't reflect anyone else, my recovery IS a process and where I am is where I am, that applies for everyone here, part of my process was educating myself about alcoholism behaviors and it's adverse impacts on those around them, the next stage for me was learning how to protect and heal myself from those behaviors, and move the focus on me.