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Question: Which of these characteristics have you had periodically throughout your life?  Source: Diagnostic Criteria for Codependencym Cermak, Timmen L. , Journal of Psychoactive Drugs, Vol 18(1), Jan-Mar 1986, 15-20.
Control Issues Excessive need to influence/control feelings and behavior in self and others (think carefully about this one)
Responsibility Issues Assumption of responsibility for meeting other's needs to the exclusion of acknowledging one's own needs;
Boundary Issues Anxiety and boundary distortions in situations of intimacy and separation;
Realtionship Issues Enmeshment in relationships with personality disordered, drug dependent and impulse disordered individuals
Relationship A dysfunctional primary relationship for 2+ years without seeking outside support
Three or more :  a) containment of emotions, b) depression, c) hypervigilance, d) compulsions, e) anxiety, f) excessive reliance on denial, g) substance abuse, h) physical or sexual abuse, i) stress-related medical illness

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Author Topic: SELF ASSESSMENT | Are you codependent?  (Read 25117 times)
MindfulJavaJoe
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Everything is as it is meant to be.


« Reply #90 on: September 20, 2011, 01:18:53 PM »

Co-dependent in a BPD r/s does not necessarily meaqn co-dependent for life.

You can unlearn these patterns but you need to be aware of them then you need to be proactive in wanting to change them.

Letting go, letting others learn from their mistakes, listenting instead of talking over.

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argyle
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« Reply #91 on: September 20, 2011, 01:32:58 PM »

The part I forgot... .other characteristics... .

1. Strong fear of abandonment (rooted in early death of father)

--Difficult to think rationally about leaving.

2. Belief system incorporating self-sacrifice as high goal.

--Trying to help people - even if it limits their personal growth.

3. Lack of appreciable limit-crossing in childhood.  (No parental conflict within earshot, boundaries were firmly established and never crossed.)

--':)eer in the headlights' approach to violent tirades.

4. Lack of R/S models

--Actually believed a BPD claiming that everything was 'perfectly normal.'

--Argyle
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landstar8891
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« Reply #92 on: September 20, 2011, 02:18:26 PM »

   I am finding that '':)etaching''with LOVE from the people we truly love(BPD Father,sister,g/f) is truly one of the hardest thing i have been faced with in my life.I thought Jail was tough and my drinking days were tough.not to mention all the s__t i went through.

   This Detaching with love will test every action,behavior and belief you have in your soul.It will truly test you and your Love for another person.It will make you look at yourself and ask yourself one big question.Do i truly no how to Love another or was i truly ''in love'' for some other selfish reasoning?Was i selfish,self centeered and partly to blame here?Why was i in this mess?Hmmmmmmmmm ponder that one for a while.

   It will test your true humanity and personality.It will test what you are truly all about.It truly seperates the ''MEN FROM THE BOYS''...

   So here i am missing all of them with a broken heart and trying to Let Go and let them live and learn from there own mistakes.WOW!... What a concept i have to learn...
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Nutts45
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« Reply #93 on: September 20, 2011, 02:23:10 PM »

Nope.  Or I would be trying to figure out how to make the relationship work.

I have found out through out this is that I need to validate myself equally.
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MindfulJavaJoe
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« Reply #94 on: September 20, 2011, 05:49:47 PM »

One of my personal regrets it that I did not say "no" more often. It must have something to do with the messages given to me by my parents from an early age.

Being helpful, obliging, going the extra mile had served me well in other areas of my life both socially and at work. I never imaging that anything like BPD was out there. That is something my parents never prepared me for.

I wish that I has allowed myself to be a little more angry. Not the out of control nasty and vindictive anger I endured but the type of healthy anger which would have allowed me to set boundaries and recognise when my boundaries were being trampled all over.

Now I know about BPD I realise that frustration and anger needed to be handed out with generous measures of sympathy, empathy and validation.

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ve01603
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« Reply #95 on: September 21, 2011, 05:39:08 AM »

Great posts.  I plan on getting into this much more this weekend when I have more time as it is an area that I want to explore.

I'm sure that I was and now I need to read all of this to see where I am because I know that this relationship has actually made me better and stronger just because I survived it and at the first sign of anyone treating me bad in the future, I am out.
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Auspicious
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« Reply #96 on: September 21, 2011, 09:21:32 AM »

One of my personal regrets it that I did not say "no" more often. It must have something to do with the messages given to me by my parents from an early age.

Being helpful, obliging, going the extra mile had served me well in other areas of my life both socially and at work. I never imaging that anything like BPD was out there. That is something my parents never prepared me for.

This resonates, Joe!

I can kind of divide my life into pre-2008, and post 2008. 2008 is when my wife's BPD basically kicked into super overdrive, and massive crisis.

Pre-2008 ... .yeah, I just had the hardest time saying no. Oh, I'd grouse ... .I'd point out the pitfalls ... .I'd try to get her to see my point of view and agree with me.

But actually say "no, I'm not going to do that"?  Almost never. Very, very hard for me.


We've had a few discussions, post-2008, in her more insightful periods. She has said things like "I didn't try to turn you into a servant ... .you chose to do those things. You treated me like a princess. Why wouldn't I come to expect it? Why would I think anything was wrong?"


Relying on someone else to maintain our boundaries for us is a big gamble. Especially a mentally ill someone else, who has a hard time navigating emotions and relationships.

Putting it another way, I have a hard time navigating emotions and relationships too. Just a different kind of hard time.
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MindfulJavaJoe
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« Reply #97 on: September 21, 2011, 10:41:58 AM »

                                              How and what are you feeling?

I would have to say that looking back that a good indicator of the level of co-dependency and enmeschment in our marriage would be the absolute lack of any insight on my behalf as to how I was "feeling".

I had lost complete touch with my own emotions. I would say I was so attuned to the emotions of my uBPDw + uNPDw that my own emotions did not even come in to the equation.

My therapist would spend 10-15 minutes of weach session some 10 months ago just spending time with me sitting with my own emotions. This was really hard work. It took a real effort on my behalf to just sit still and calm and be open to my own feelings. This is what it took for me to reconnect with my emotions.

Think about it, how can you be seperate if you are not in touch with your own feeling?

How can you feel anger? If you cannot feel anger how can you express your anger in an appropriate way to set a boundary.

Losing touch with my own emotions was a sign that I was heavily co-dependant and that I how lost sight of myself and who I was as an indevidual.


So if you are or were co-dependent how and what are you feeling?
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havana
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« Reply #98 on: September 21, 2011, 10:53:11 AM »

I've spent pretty much my entire life putting her needs in front of mine. I now feel that I have been a caretaker since I was 20 years old. Don't get me wrong there have been good times. It's mostly been the past 10 years that things have gotten really crazy.

I got married at 20 so I had no idea why someone would have the quirks she has. There were re flags that I now understand but for the most part things were good.

As she got older & we had kids I spent a good part of the time being the en-dad. Doing whatever I could to keep the peace at the expence of the daughters. She wasn't anywhere near as bad as some of the parents I have read about here but I neglected my duty to override her behavior. I was just plain tired.

Life with a pwBPD is exhausting. I'm 41 years into this & it's only been the past 3 or 4 years that I found out what I was dealing with & ended up here.

I now have strong boundaries & am much more comfortable with my life. Hopefully in the near future I will be able to enjoy a weekend again.
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« Reply #99 on: September 21, 2011, 11:00:00 AM »

We didn't put someone's needs before or own because we are saintly, its part of a bigger picture of how we deal with relationships -- there was a perceived benefit and motivation for doing it -- we choose it -- over and over.

The question we each must ask is why - what was the payoff that drove us to do this? This is the cause.  The former is only a symptom.

Understanding the cause and dealing with it is all important to growth.

This is not about blame or defectiveness - its about understanding our inclinations that are not serving us well so that we can be mindful of them, compensate for them.

I know from reading thousands of posts that some members felt unloved in life and mistook sex or neediness  or idealization for love.  Some members felt it easier and more rewarding to fix others because they couldn't see their own inadequacies or they feared them.  There are so many different stories.
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Auspicious
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« Reply #100 on: September 21, 2011, 11:10:07 AM »

An interesting related article:

The Difference Between Being Nice and Being Kind

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landstar8891
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« Reply #101 on: September 21, 2011, 11:15:05 AM »

We didn't put someone's needs before or own because we are saintly, its part of a bigger picture of how we deal with relationships -- there was a perceived benefit and motivation for doing it -- we choose it -- over and over.

The question we each must ask is why - what was the payoff that drove us to do this? This is the cause.  The former is only a symptom.

Understanding the cause and dealing with it is all important to growth.

This is not about blame or defectiveness - its about understanding our inclinations that are not serving us well so that we can be mindful of them, compensate for them.

I feel embarresed to answer this SKIP.But i learned yesterday my payoff was about ''control'',''attention'',and i was very lonley in my own life.So i was not the ''saint'' i wanted to show the world.In fact i had my own ''self-seeking'' motives which is very dishonest.I did not no this all my life until a meeting i went to yesterday.Some woman talked about she ''gave'' to get ''something'' back.And when she did not get what she ''wanted'' holy hell broke loose.LMAO... I can relate that my love for the BPD's in my life was not given freely.True love is giving freely.I am so sorry i did this and i cry when i even think about the hurt i gave another person.As a matter of fact i have a tear in my eye for this ''behavior''.I gave my love with a ''condition''.That f----kn hurts to no i did this to the people I LOVE MOST... :'( :'( :'(
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havana
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« Reply #102 on: September 21, 2011, 11:42:49 AM »

Excerpt
what was the payoff that drove us to do this?

I think the payoff is being able to avoid the real problem.
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landstar8891
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« Reply #103 on: September 21, 2011, 11:58:53 AM »

Excerpt
what was the payoff that drove us to do this?

I think the payoff is being able to avoid the real problem.

And low and behold the real problem was ''us''... .OUCHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH
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schwing
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« Reply #104 on: September 21, 2011, 04:06:52 PM »

We didn't put someone's needs before or own because we are saintly, its part of a bigger picture of how we deal with relationships -- there was a perceived benefit and motivation for doing it -- we choose it -- over and over.

The question we each must ask is why - what was the payoff that drove us to do this? This is the cause.  The former is only a symptom.

Speaking from my own experience, I had a (bad) habit of putting (some) other people's needs before my own.  What I *thought* was my motivation was that I was a "nice" guy.  Specifically I was this way towards a specific subset of the people I met; there were some people I was more inclined to be "nice" towards.

I did think I was a "saint."  I did think I was doing the "right" thing.  What took me some time to realize was that my choice of who I was "nice" to, or open to, were people who seemed familiar to me.  And coming from a family of origin (FoO) where some family members exhibited personality disorders, what was/is familiar to me, isn't all that great to be around.

What was my payoff?  My payoff was being able to reconstruct an interpersonal relationship that resembled my disordered familial relationship, probably in an effort to "solve" the internal issues I felt about these dysfunctional relationships.  So I would pursue women who were similar to my mother in order to "win over" the maternal love and validation I'd always sought but never received.  Or I would befriend those who were similarly narcissistic as my father, in an effort to "win over" the approval that my own father could never give.

My problem was that I was selecting these people too well.  I kept picking borderlines and narcissists; probably because those were the specific dynamics to which I was familiar.  It was easier to come to terms with this with friendships, I was able to be more objective and I was less attached; eventually I started to select friends who treated me the way I wanted to be treated, and not only based on how I *felt* about them.  When it came to courtship, this was harder to come to terms with.  To this day I operate for granted, that if I am attracted to someone for no obvious reasons, or for some reason I cannot specify, then chances are they are personality disordered in some way with which I am sensitized towards; not everyone person towards whom I feel attracted, but one specific kind of attraction which others might qualify as "good chemistry." For me, chemistry = chemisery.  And in those relationships, that was the specific payoff, the "falling head over heels in love" feeling.  For a die hard romantic, this is not an easy thing to give up.  

Understanding the cause and dealing with it is all important to growth.

This is not about blame or defectiveness - its about understanding our inclinations that are not serving us well so that we can be mindful of them, compensate for them.

I remember carrying a lot of judgement for a long time.  Enough that I projected it outside myself all the time.  I would equate miscellaneous looks from complete strangers as gazes of criticism or judgement.  I was worried about appearing to be "correct" or "compliant."  I kept thinking I was this way because of other people; in truth, I was this way because of my own internal processes.  

I wanted to avoid blame because inside I felt defective.  And to be honest, I probably still feel this way to some degree and will always feel this way.  But so long as I work towards taking care of myself, seeing to my own needs, doing what ten years ago I would have accused myself of being self-absorbed or self-indulgent; so long as I continue to be my own best advocate, I feel less defective, and I don't care so much about what other people *might* think about me.  

My recovery process involves coming to terms with my own co-dependent traits.  It might not be the case for other people.  It doesn't matter what the specifics are, just as long as you know what you need to work on.  Because happiness is not dependent solely on external factors; it is perhaps more dependent on our thinking and relationship with ourselves.
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Surnia
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« Reply #105 on: February 15, 2012, 04:44:00 AM »

Thanx for bumping up this.

And


Yes, very interesting article. There is a lot in there to think about for me.  Doing the right thing (click to insert in post)

S.
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« Reply #106 on: May 27, 2012, 11:56:27 AM »

https://bpdfamily.com/message_board/index.php?topic=175320.msg12049879#msg12049879 <-- I tend to hit more on those.

Hey LoveNCY

Recovering codependent here.  Being cool (click to insert in post)  First of all, it's not a death sentence. Codependency is all about learned behaviors you can turn around with time and honesty with yourself.  

I have a list I have used to check against my behaviors from the past that may be helpful here. It was very true to alot of my old behaviors. Maybe not every one but alot for me.  

Denial Patterns:

_
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