I’m OK if you’re OK

Do you find yourself sacrificing your wants and desires for those of your partner? Is your happiness and sense of fulfillment tied to your partners, family, or friends? Do you find yourself sacrificing your own emotional, physical, or spiritual self in order to take care of another’s needs? If you answered ‘yes’ to any of these questions it is possible that you are engaged in a codependent relationship.

It can be difficult to define the line between love, support, and codependence. A good indicator of a codependent relationship is an underlying feeling of anxiety around your ability to make another happy. Your emotions are tied to those of others and you feel as though you are riding a roller-coaster which is driven by the mood fluctuations of your partner. You may try to control and shift some of the behaviors of your partner, such as their substance use. You may have a feeling that you are responsible and able to control these negative behaviors and that if you could just do more, things would be OK. Codependent people do not have a solid sense of self or self esteem.

So how do we know what a healthy relationship with healthy boundaries looks like? A good indicator of a healthy relationship is one in which the giving and receiving are mutual. In addition, the support and giving that are exchanged promote the growth and wellbeing of both parties. Oftentimes a codependent relationship feels one sided and lonely as opposed to mutual and connected.

If you feel that you are codependent or engaged in a codependent relationship, an important first step is to set some personal boundaries. Get to know yourself again. Understand that you are two separate people with different needs and emotions. Create some space to reevaluate what is important to you, including activities, hobbies, other friends and family relationships, and start to re-engage in these. Work on reconnecting with your own emotions and start to communicate these emotions to your partner. Don’t allow their mood to dictate how you feel and avoid engaging with them from a place of fear that your emotions might trigger something in them. Your emotions are your own, as are your partners, no one has caused you to feel a particular way just as you have not caused your partner to feel a particular way. It is possible to be assertive and sensitive at the same time.

It is important to make a commitment to yourself, your self-esteem and your happiness. When you are able to do this you can come to a relationship as a complete person, with resources and energy to give and space to receive, because you will know that you are worth it. Codependent people often feel depleted from constantly giving and never getting anything in return. This fosters resentment in a relationship, rather than love. True connection with another person can only come when two whole individuals come together in a mutually loving and supportive way.