Broken and dysfunctional relationships
can trigger the onset of bipolar disorder mood swings. The following
information has been provided with permission by Robert Burney and
Joy to You and Me Enterprises for the purposes of better understanding
codependency and the tremendous stress that it can cause and the danger.
There are a variety of ways to describe the condition
of codependency. Here are a few:
Codependency is:
at it's core, a dysfunctional relationship with self. We do not
know how to Love our self in healthy ways because our parents did
not know how to Love themselves. We were raised in shame-based societies
that taught us that there is something wrong with being human. The
messages we got often included that there is something wrong: with
making mistakes; with not being perfect; with being sexual; with
being emotional; with being too fat or too thin or too tall or too
short or too whatever. As children we were taught to determine our
worth in comparison with others. If we were smarter than, prettier
than, to receive better grades than, faster than, etc. - then we
were validated and got the message that we had worth.
In a codependent society everyone has to have someone to look down
on in order to feel good about themselves. And, conversely, there
is always someone we can compare ourselves to that can cause us
to not feel good enough.
Codependency could:
More accurately be called outer or external dependence. The condition
of codependence is about giving power over our self esteem to outside
sources/agencies or external manifestations. We were taught to look
outside of our selves to people, places, and things - to money,
property and prestige, to determine if we have worth. That causes
us to put false gods before us. We make money or achievement or
popularity or material possessions or the "right" marriage
the Higher Power that determines if we have worth.
We take our self-definition and self-worth from external manifestations
of our own being so that looks or talent or intelligence becomes
the Higher Power that we look to in determining if we have worth.
All outside and external conditions are temporary and could change
in a moment. If we make a temporary condition our Higher Power we
are setting ourselves up to be a victim - and, in blind devotion
to that Higher Power we are pursuing, we often victimize other people
on our way to proving we have worth.
(I believe that we are all ONE. That we all have equal worth as
Spiritual Beings, as sons and daughters of the God-Force / Goddess
Energy / Great Spirit - not because of any external manifestation
or outside condition.)
Codependency is:
a particularly vicious form of delayed stress syndrome. Instead
of being traumatized in a foreign country against an identified
enemy during a war, as soldiers who have delayed stress are - we
were traumatized in our sanctuaries by the people we loved the most.
Instead of having experienced that trauma for a year or two as a
soldier might - we experienced it on a daily basis for 16 or 17
or 18 years. A soldier has to shut down emotionally in order to
survive in a war zone. We had to shut down emotionally because we
were surrounded by adults who were emotional cripples of one sort
or another.
Codependency is:
A dysfunctional emotional and behavioral defense system. When a
society is emotionally dishonest, the people of that society are
set up to be emotionally dysfunctional. In this society being emotional
is described as falling apart, losing it, going to pieces, coming
unglued, etc. (Other cultures give more permission to be emotional
but then the emotions are usually expressed in ways that are out
of balance to the extreme of letting the emotions control. The goal
is balance between emotional and mental - between the intuitive
and the rational.)
Traditionally in this society men have been taught that anger is
the only acceptable emotion for a man to express, while women are
taught that it is not acceptable for them to be angry. If it is
not ok to own all of our emotions then we can not know who we are
as emotional beings. [Also traditionally, women are taught to be
codependent - take their self-definition (including their names)
and self-worth - from their relationships with men, while men are
taught to be codependent on their work/career/ability to produce,
and from their presumed superiority to women.]
Codependency is:
a disease of lost self. If we are not validated and affirmed for
who we are in childhood then we don't believe we are worthy or lovable.
Often we got validated and affirmed by one parent and put down by
the other. When the parent who is "loving" does not protect
us - or themselves - from the parent that is abusive, it is a betrayal
that sets us up to have low self esteem because the affirmation
we received was invalidated right in our own homes.
And being affirmed for being who we are is very
different than being affirmed for who our parents wanted us to be
- if they could not see themselves clearly then they sure could
not see us clearly. In order to survive, children adapt whatever
behavior will work best in helping them get their survival needs
met. We then grow up to be adults who don't know our self and keep
dancing the dance we learned as children.
A dysfunctional relationship is one that does not work to make us
happy.
Codependency is about having a dysfunctional relationship
with self. With our own bodies, minds, emotions, and spirits. With
our own gender and sexuality. With being human. Because we have
dysfunctional relationships internally we have dysfunctional relationships
externally. We try to fill the hole we feel inside of our self with
something or someone outside of us - it does not work.
"The word changed and evolved further after the start
of the modern Codependence movement in Arizona in the mid-eighties.
Co-Dependents Anonymous had its first meeting in October of 1986,
and books on Codependence as a disease in and of itself started
appearing at about the same time. These Codependence books were
the next generation evolved from the books on the Adult Child Syndrome
of the early eighties."
"The point that I am making is that our understanding of Codependence
has evolved to realizing that this is not just about some dysfunctional
families, our very role models, our prototypes, are dysfunctional.
Our traditional cultural concepts of what a man is, of what a woman
is, are twisted, distorted, almost comically bloated stereotypes
of what masculine and feminine really are."
"We are set up to be emotionally dysfunctional by our role
models, both parental and societal. We are taught to repress and
distort our emotional process. We are trained to be emotionally
dishonest when we are children."
So often when I am working with someone, helping them to understand
their codependency, they will say, "Why didn't I learn this
sooner. I feel so stupid that I have wasted so many years in denial
about how much my childhood experiences were running my life."
What I need to remind them of, is that the information we have now
wasn't available when they were growing up. It was in only the late
70s and early 80s that researchers were able to identify the Adult
Child Syndrome, that family dynamics researchers were starting to
speak of the concept of dysfunctional families. Before Betty Ford
had the courage to go public with her recovery from alcoholism in
the late 70s, there was very little information widely available
about alcoholism. Phil Donahue started bringing controversial topics
out of the closet in the 70s, and was followed in the 80s by Oprah
Winfrey. These were the first times that such subjects as child
abuse and incest were openly discussed in American society. Denial,
keeping secrets, had been the traditional norm in both families
and society.
Children now are being taught in school and through the media, that
it is good to have boundaries (just say no) and to talk about their
feelings. There are books and classes now in healthy parenting.
This is a major leap forward for society. It was not long ago, that
the philosophy of child raising was based upon a "this is right
and this is wrong - and you better do right or else."
Unfortunately it still is for many families. And even more unfortunately,
most of the kids that are being given healthier messages are still
not getting healthy role modeling. Role modeling is just as important
- if not more important - in the developmental process for children
than direct messages. "Do as I say, and not as I do,"
does not work when it comes to parenting.
The reality of human development is that we form the foundation
dynamics of our relationships with self, with life, and with other
people in early childhood. Our relationship patterns are pretty
embedded by the time we are 4 or 5 years old.
Since there is no integration of the human developmental process
into society - no real training of how to be healthy adults or real
ceremonies / initiation rites to mark vital milestones / passages
in development, such as puberty (junior high school as is it experienced
in society is not a celebration of adolescence) - and no culturally
approved grieving to take the emotional charge away from wounds
caused by childhood trauma, we are stuck with those early childhood
patterns.
We are trained in childhood to be emotionally and intellectually
dishonest, through both direct messages and watching our role models.
We learned that it was very important to keep up appearances - to
wear a mask. We watched out parents say nasty, judgmental things
about a person when they weren't around and then be nice to them
in person. We got told that it was not okay to speak our truth.
There was an old song I always thought described how I saw people
interacting, that went something to the effect "The games people
play now, every night and every day now, never saying what they
mean - never meaning what they say."
We were trained to be dishonest. We also got taught to be emotionally
dishonest. We got told not to feel our feelings with messages like,
don't cry, don't be afraid - at the same time we saw how our parents
lived life out of fear. We got messages that it was not okay to
be too happy when our exuberance was embarrassing to our parents.
Many of us grew up in environments where it was not okay to be curious,
or adventurous, or playful. It was not okay to be a child.
In any society where:
emotional dishonesty is not just the standard but the goal (keep
up appearances, don't show vulnerability); as children we learned
that we had power over other people's feelings (you make me angry,
you hurt my feelings, etc.); being emotional is considered negative
(falling apart, loosing it, coming unglued, etc.); gender stereotypes
set twisted, unhealthy models for acceptable emotional behavior
(real men don't cry or get scared, it is not ladylike to get angry);
parents without healthy self esteem see their children as extensions
of self that can be either assets or deficits in their own quest
for self worth; families are isolated from any true reality of community
or tribal support;
shame, manipulation, verbal and emotional abuse are considered standard
tools for behavior modification in a loving relationship; long embedded
societal attitudes support the belief that it is shameful to be
human (make mistakes, not be perfect, to be selfish, etc.); any
human being is denigrated and held to be less worthy for any inherent
characteristic (gender, race, looks, etc.); Results in a very emotionally
unhealthy society.
We were set up to be codependent. We were trained and programmed
in childhood to be dishonest with ourselves and others. We were
taught false, dysfunctional concepts of success, romance, love,
life. We could not have lived our lives differently because there
was no one to teach us how to be healthy. We were doing the best
we knew how with the tools, beliefs, and definitions we had - just
as our parents were doing the best they knew how.
We have new tools now. We have information and knowledge that was
not available until recently. We can change the way we live our
lives. It is important to stop shaming ourselves for living life
the way we were programmed to live, in order to start learning how
to live in a way that is more functional - in a way that works to
help us have some peace and happiness in our lives. The only way
to be free of the past is to start seeing it more clearly - without
shame and judgment - so that we can take advantage of this wonderful
time of healing that has begun.
Codependency has been the human condition. We now have the knowledge
and power to change our relationship with ourselves. That is how
we can change the human condition.
"Codependence and interdependence are two very different dynamics.
Codependence is about giving away power over our self-esteem. .
. . Interdependence is about making allies, forming partnerships.
It is about forming connections with other beings."
***
"The disease of Codependence causes us to keep repeating patterns
that are familiar. So we pick untrustworthy people to trust, undependable
people to depend on, unavailable people to love. By healing our
emotional wounds and changing our intellectual programming we can
start to practice discernment in our choices so that we can change
our patterns and learn to trust ourselves."
***
"The way to healthy interdependence is to be able to see things
clearly - to see people, situations, life dynamics and most of all
ourselves clearly. If we are not working on healing our childhood
wounds and changing our childhood programming then we cannot begin
to see ourselves clearly let alone anything else in life."
"Emotional abuse is underneath all other types of abuse - the
most damaging aspect of physical, sexual, mental, etc. abuse is
the trauma to our hearts and souls from being betrayed by the people
that we love and trust."
"Our parents were emotionally abused in childhood
because their parents were emotionally abused in childhood. Our
parents were our role models who taught us how to relate to ourselves
and our own emotions."
"The most destructive emotional abuse is the
emotional abuse we learned to inflict upon ourselves. We formed
our core relationship with self in early childhood and have been
judging and shaming ourselves ever since. The most destructive thing
about the emotional abuse we suffered because our parents were wounded,
was that we incorporated the messages we got from their behavior
into our relationship with self. We emotionally abuse ourselves
on a daily basis.
Anyone in recovery, on a healing/Spiritual path,
is ultimately trying to find their way home to LOVE - in my belief.
LOVE is the Higher Power - the True nature of the God-Force/Goddess
Energy/Great Spirit. LOVE is the fabric from which we are woven.
LOVE is the answer. And in order to start finding my way home to
LOVE - I first had to start awakening to what Love is not. Here
are a few things that I have learned, and believe, are not part
of the True nature of Love.
Love is not:
Critical
Shaming
Abusive
Controlling
Manipulative
Demeaning
Humiliating
Separating
Discounting
Diminishing
Belittling
Negative
Traumatic
Painful most of the time.
Love is also not an addiction. It is not taking
a hostage or being taken hostage. The type of romantic love that
I learned about growing is a form of toxic love. The "I can't
smile without out you," "Can't live without you."
"You are my everything," "You are not whole until
you find your prince/princess" messages that I learned in relationship
to romantic love in childhood are not descriptions of Love - they
are descriptions of drug of choice, of someone who is a higher power/false
god.
Additionally, Love is not being a doormat. Love
does not entail sacrificing your self on the altar of martyrdom
- because one cannot consciously choose to sacrifice self if they
have never Truly had a self that they felt was Lovable and worthy.
If we do not know how to Love our self, how to show respect and
honor for our self - then we have no self to sacrifice. We are then
sacrificing in order to try to prove to ourselves that we are lovable
and worthy - that is not giving from the heart, that is codependently
manipulative, controlling, and dishonest.
Unconditional Love is not being a self-sacrificing
doormat - Unconditional Love begins with Loving self enough to protect
our self from the people we Love if that is necessary. Until we
start Loving, honoring, and respecting our self, we are not Truly
giving - we are attempting to take self worth from others by being
compliant in our behavior towards them." - The True Nature
of Love - what Love is not
Any kind of physical, verbal, mental, sexual abuse
is also emotionally abusive. Any attitudes or behaviors that convey
a message that the other is less than a being who deserves to be
treated with respect and dignity - including objectifying and stereotyping
- are emotionally abusive.
The overt forms of abuse are often much more readily
identifiable than the more covert forms. It is relatively easy for
most people to see that raging and yelling are emotionally abusive.
That name calling and verbal put downs are emotionally abusive.
It can be hard to identify some of the more passive aggressive forms
as being just as wounding - as being abusive and damaging.
"Passive-aggressive behavior is the expression of anger indirectly.
This happens because we got the message one way or another in childhood
that it was not OK to express anger.
"Because we were discounted and invalidated in childhood (and
for most of our adult lives due to our repeating patterns); because
we were taught not to trust our own feelings and perceptions; because
we learned to have twisted, distorted relationships with ourselves
and our own emotions; we need validation from other people that
what we are awakening to is in fact real and not some product of
our defective, shameful self image.
At the same time, it is a codependent pattern to gather allies.
To have people to complain to, who will sympathize with us and tell
us how awful the other person/people were for abusing us. We gather
allies that will give their approval to our self righteous indignation.
When we are feeling self righteous indignation we are buying into
a victim perspective."
"Anytime that we are focusing on the situation at hand and
giving power to the belief that we are victims of the situation/people
we have just interacted with, without looking at ow that situation
is connected to our childhood wounds - we are not being honest with
ourselves.
We will feel like victims - because we have been abused. But feeling
like a victim and giving power to the belief in victimization are
two completely different things."
"I have often told clients that going from feeling suicidal
to feeling homicidal is a step of progress. It is a stage of the
recovery process that we will move into - and then at some later
point will move beyond. An incest victim transforms into an incest
survivor. Owning the anger is an important part of pulling ourselves
out of the depression that turning the anger back on ourselves has
created. It is often necessary to own the anger before we can get
in touch with the grief in a clean and healthy way. If we haven't
owned our right to be angry, it is possible to get stuck in a victim
place of self-pity and martyrdom, of complaining and gathering sympathetic
allies - instead of taking action to change."
"The purpose of having boundaries is to protect and take care
of ourselves. We need to be able to tell other people when they
are acting in ways that are not acceptable to us. A first step is
starting to know that we have a right to protect and defend ourselves.
That we have not only the right, but the duty to take responsibility
for how we allow others to treat us."
"It is important to state our feelings out
loud, and to precede the feeling with "I feel." (When
we say "I am angry, I'm hurt, etc." we are stating that
the feeling is who we are. Emotions do not define us, they are a
form of internal communication that help us to understand ourselves.
They are a vital part of our being - as a component of the whole.)
This is owning the feeling. It is important to do for ourselves.
By stating the feeling out loud we are affirming that we have a
right to feelings. We are affirming it to ourselves - and taking
responsibility for owning ourselves and our reality. Rather the
other person can hear us and understand is not as important as hearing
ourselves and understanding that we have a right to our feelings.
It is vitally important to own our own voice. To own our right to
speak up for ourselves."
"Setting boundaries is not a more sophisticated
way of manipulation - although some people will say they are setting
boundaries, when in fact they are attempting to manipulate. The
difference between setting a boundary in a healthy way and manipulating
is: when we set a boundary we let go of the outcome."
"It is impossible to have a healthy relationship with someone
who has no boundaries, with someone who cannot communicate directly,
and honestly. Learning how to set boundaries is a necessary step
in learning to be a friend to ourselves. It is our responsibility
to take care of ourselves - to protect ourselves when it is necessary.
It is impossible to learn to be Loving to ourselves without owning
our self - and owning our rights and responsibilities as co-creators
of our lives."
"Codependence is a dysfunctional defense system that was built
in reaction to feeling unlovable and unworthy - because our parents
were wounded codependents who didn't know how to love themselves.
We grew up in environments that were emotionally dishonest, Spiritually
hostile, and shame based. Our relationship with ourselves (and all
the different parts of our self: emotions, gender, spirit, etc.)
got twisted and distorted in order to survive in our particular
dysfunctional environment."
"We need to take the shame and judgment out of the process
on a personal level. It is vitally important to stop listening and
giving power to that critical place within us that tells us that
we are bad and wrong and shameful.
That "critical parent" voice in our head is the disease
lying to us. . . . This healing is a long gradual process - the
goal is progress, not perfection. What we are learning about is
unconditional Love. Unconditional Love means no judgment, no shame."
"The critical parent voice keeps us from relaxing and enjoying
life, and from loving our self. We need to own that we have the
power to choose where to focus our mind. We can consciously start
viewing ourselves from the "witness" perspective."
Inner Child Healing = a path to freedom,
serenity, and empowerment
"It is through healing our inner child, our inner children,
by grieving the wounds that we suffered, that we can change our
behavior patterns and clear our emotional process. We can release
the grief with its pent-up rage, shame, terror, and pain from those
feeling places which exist within us."
"Because of our broken hearts, our emotional wounds, and our
scrambled minds, our subconscious programming, what the disease
of Codependence causes us to do is abandon ourselves. It causes
the abandonment of self, the abandonment of our own inner child
- and that inner child is the gateway to our channel to the Higher
Self.
The one who betrayed us and abandoned and abused us the most was
ourselves. That is how the emotional defense system that is Codependence
works. The battle cry of Codependence is "I'll show you - I'll
get me."
"We need to rescue and nurture and Love our inner children
- and STOP them from controlling our lives. STOP them from driving
the bus! Children are not supposed to drive, they are not supposed
to be in control. And they are not supposed to be abused and abandoned.
We have been doing it backwards. We abandoned and abused our inner
children. Locked them in a dark place within us. And at the same
time let the children drive the bus - let the children's wounds
dictate our lives."
"It is necessary to own and honor the child who we were in
order to Love the person we are. And the only way to do that is
to own that child's experiences, honor that child's feelings, and
release the emotional grief energy that we are still carrying around."
Spiritual Teacher and Codependency Therapist and Author Robert Burney,
whose work has been compared to John Bradshaw's "except much
more spiritual" and described as "taking inner child healing
to a new level," has developed a unique approach to emotional
healing that is the next level of recovery from codependency so
many people have been seeking. He has pioneered an inner child healing
paradigm that offers a powerful, life changing formula for integrating
Love, Spiritual Truth, and intellectual knowledge of healthy behavior
into one's emotional experience of life - a blueprint for individuals
to transform their core relationship with self and life.
Robert, whose process is firmly grounded on twelve
step recovery principles and emotional energy release / grief process
therapy, specializes in teaching individuals how to become empowered
to have internal boundaries so they can learn to relax and enjoy
life in the moment while healing. It is the unique approach and
application of the concept of internal boundaries, coupled with
a Loving Spiritual belief system, that make the work so innovative
and effective.
His personal belief is that we are Spiritual Beings
having a human experience that is unfolding perfectly from a Cosmic
perspective - with no accidents, coincidences, or mistakes. He considers
Spirituality to be a word that describes one's relationship with
life - and anyone, regardless of religious belief or lack of it
(who is not completely closed minded), can apply the approach he
shares on this web site and in his book, to help them transform
their experience of life into an easier, more Loving and enjoyable
journey.
In his book Codependence: The Dance of Wounded
Souls "A Cosmic Perspective on Codependence and the Human Condition"
he postulates that Codependence (i.e. outer or external dependence)
is The Human Condition - and that we have now entered a new Age
of Healing and Joy in which it is possible to heal the planet through
healing our relationships with self. He combines Twelve Step Recovery
Principles, Metaphysical Truth, and Native American Spirituality
with quantum physics and molecular biology in presenting his belief
that we are all connected, we are all extensions of the Divine,
and that ultimately Love is our True essence.
Codependence: The Dance of Wounded Souls by Robert
Burney is copyright 1995
Information on Surviving Bipolar.Com or Community of
Hope forums is intended as an informational tool only and should not
be relied upon as and are not a substitute for consultation with your
counselor, therapist, doctor, psychiatrist or other health care provider.
. Consult your healthcare professional regarding health issues and advice
on treatment. Views and contributions expressed and posted to Surviving
Bipolar.Com or Community of Hope forums, are the views of the poster
and not necessarily the views of Mariant Enterprises, Inc., Surviving
Bipolar.Com or Community of Hope forums. To view our complete disclaimer
CLICK HERE.
