Just because you don’t take drugs doesn’t mean you aren’t chasing some fix to make it all ok in your own head.
I find codependency is an addiction. Does it matter if ones voice in their head is driving them to use or driving them to save, there is the same level of impulsive/compulsive need, same level of desperation and helplessness and fear, the same level of this need to control something and the denial is running the show. Codependents and addicts alike have no problem with masks.
Each side justifies its own behavior in a desperate need to shut their own head off, and alleviate the pain they feel. You lose yourself no matter which side you sit on.
Most addicts are codependent too, and codependents run a real risk of switching from people to food, to alcohol, drugs or getting wrapped up in another person…although many who are codie have seen that they have issues with just more than the addict in their life.
Oh cynical, what we allow … I so allowed, ugh.
And what you wrote needingabreak, I am so sure my codependent patterns were set early on. But I was an addict through my teen years, so leaving drugs behind and then marrying an addict … well that all tends to make sense now.
I remember days thinking omg can’t anyone see how sick he is … duh, so missing how sick I was. I also remember being in the doctors with him in the very beginning and his partial confession of a problem with pills, he left the heroin out. The doctor turned to me and asked if I need help too, maybe because I looked worse than he did?
Also I don’t think I could dismiss the fact that as soon as I really started to switch the focus back onto me, I also started drinking again. Never really left much room for this being all his fault, as if I wasn‘t there. Did show how unhealthy I was, that is for sure. I could have stayed in the anger in blame, but all that really did was keep me chained.