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Stop Enabling Codependence

Chains around couples hands to represent codependence

For those with substance use or mental health conditions, a codependent relationship can make overcoming and managing symptoms even more difficult. Not all close friends and family members are supportive of someone pursuing a more healthy and productive lifestyle. In fact, these close relationships are often the ones that enable unhealthy behaviors and can make the substance use disorder even more severe, as well as any co-occurring mental health conditions. Relationship therapy can help in ending unhealthy codependent relationships and arm people with the tools to build healthy and supportive relationships going forward. Call Zelus Recovery at 208.518.0797 today to learn more about how to stop enabling codependency. We help teens and adults alike develop healthy relationships in their lives.

What Is Relationship Codependency?

In general, codependency describes an unhealthy relationship. It is characterized by being unbalanced, where one person is taken advantage of. Two individuals in a codependent relationship may be defined as a giver, and the other a taker. This kind of relationship can be especially dangerous when at least one of the people in the relationship has a substance use disorder. Codependency can be between significant others, family members, or close friends.

Codependency can be illustrated through:

  • Obsessive and unhealthy focus on everything another person does
  • Inability to effectively communicate
  • Lack of emotion
  • Controlling behavior
  • Letting your own needs suffer to meet someone else’s needs
  • Fear of rejection
  • Enabling someone by giving them money for their drug or alcohol misuse
  • Excusing your own, or someone else’s, bad behavior

Codependency is an unhealthy type of relationship that those with addictive behaviors can easily fall into. Getting help for a substance use disorder is the first step to identifying and building healthy relationships versus destructive ones.

How to Stop Enabling Codependency

You might be wondering, how do I stop being an enabler? If someone in your life has a substance use disorder and you want to stop enabling codependency, there are some actions you can take:

Show them that their actions have consequences

Instead of stepping in to cover up something negative that they did as a result of their dependence on drugs or alcohol, let them feel the full weight of their actions without your intervention.

Set clear boundaries

These boundaries are for yourself and the affected person that you care about. Know what you are willing to do and not do, and make sure your loved one understands this as well. With these expectations set, you can release yourself from feeling responsible for every little thing the other person does.

Feel all the feels

You are allowed to be emotional, too. When you are constantly excusing someone else’s behavior, it’s hard to allow yourself to feel bad as well. Feeling sad, scared, and uncomfortable is not what you wish for, but it can be necessary to break the cycle of codependency.

Remove any financial support

If part of the enabling behavior has been monetary, then cutting that off sends a clear message. This boundary is beneficial for both people in the relationship, as it is easily understandable. Forcing the other person to have to fund their own way may change their behavior as well.

Detach yourself

This can be one of the hardest things to do, albeit necessary. This does not mean you don’t care about the person or take responsibility for their well-being; it just means you recognize that your life and well-being are equally as important.

Remain calm

When you start to sever the ties of a codependent relationship, the other person will most likely be angry and act out in negative ways to get you to try and change your mind. Don’t allow them to pull you back into unhealthy patterns that enable them.

Shift your focus

When you stop enabling codependency, it allows you time to focus on yourself. Find your true purpose and your sense of self. Prioritize your own physical, mental, and emotional health in order to find your own balance.

For help with ending a codependent relationship, call on experts at a professional treatment center like Zelus Recovery to help guide you.

Call Zelus Recovery for Relationship Therapy Today

A relationship therapy program can be a critical component of a substance use disorder treatment program, especially if a codependent relationship exists. With drug use and abuse, it is quite common for healthy relationships to become strained or damaged and for unhealthy relationships that enable drug use to remain.

Learning how to effectively manage triggers on your own and avoid situations and people that enable substance use is the goal of a treatment program. Addiction does not discriminate, and when young people fall victim to the disease, they are even more impressionable and prone to unhealthy, codependent relationships. Call Zelus Recovery today at 208.518.0797 or reach out through our online form to learn more about treatment options for both teens and adults.