BrambleRose, I don't think it's necessarily true that an enabler feels like a martyr, and builds resentment as you describe. I think that's more of a personal characteristic of the enabler, wherever their enabling behaviour comes from.

I think that there's an important difference between enabling because you've been raised to believe it's a virtue, and enabling because it's the only way you can find to manage an uncomfortable situation.

The end result is possibly the same. The difference is in where you have to look to spot your own enabling.

Someone who does not come from background of enabling may find themselves in a position where the only way they can think of to maintain marital cohesion is to enable. As in...if a husband is alcoholic and the wife finds excuses to avoid social obligations, covering up the fact that the husband is too drunk or hungover to go...then she's enabling his alcoholism in order to 'protect' the family. She may, as you describe, see herself as a martyr and build resentment - but she may not. Waking up to her own enabling, for her, will be about acknowledging her own fears and cowardice. She will have to face the fact that her actions are actually selfish.

On the other hand, someone who has been raised to believe that she is selfish unless she enables, has a different problem to recognise. In covering up for her alcoholic husband, it's likely that she does not feel like a martyr, but a heroine. The more she sacrifices, the more 'good' a person she may feel. This is likely to be the person who earns the co-dependent label most easily, because she needs the other to be defective in order to earn good feelings about herself. For her, the path to enlightenment is much tougher, because it means rejecting much of what she has been taught about goodness since she was a baby - and possibly leading to her being jettisoned by her family of origin.

For one of these women, enabling is crisis management. The fear is of humiliation and failure. For the other, enabling is a religion and failing to enable is a SIN. The fear is of God's condemnation.

The second of these will be very much harder for the enabler to recognise and change.

TA

I feel like I'm on the edge of a "Now I get it" precipice!" and I am anticipating finally falling into ONE of our major dysfuctional solutions.

I am learning so much....thanks TA and BR (and Frog and LA and others) for expanded ideas to help me and hopefully many more find solid solutions with life-impacting results.

LA has hammered (said with a grateful smile <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />) many of these ideas to me, but it takes awhile to permeate solid ingraining of one's environmental conditioning.

THOUGHTS.....what a disaster they can produce.......and what a major tool of recovery. EVERY affair starts with Wrong Thinking. I'm so grateful that such thinking can be changed. That's why I (and probably most) are here on MB.

Thank you MB Veterans for hanging around to be such a huge part of this potential solution. <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

Ace

(((((Acey)))))

Hugs to you Ace!

Hi FH,

Thanks for the hug (and for poppin' back on the boards!!!!) Missed ya! You've helped me tremendously, too...thanks for being patient. <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

Could this be the record for the shortest FH post on MB? <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/blush.gif" alt="" />

Acey

I have yet to meet an enabler who does not have stuffed resentment. Maybe there is such a creature - but I believe, just like the script of the affair - enabling has its own script. Details may be different, but the behaviors and emotions are not unique.

Enablers enable with expectations that are rarely fulfilled. This causes incredible anger.


Yes, well I was raised to believe it was a virtue. I was taught that it was my moral obligation to interfere with other people and to sacrifice for others.

The golden rule in my home was: Always do unto others before and better than you do unto yourself. Oh and if you see anyone 'sinning' you must stop them.

The result was incredible anger that took me years to work through. I felt unappreciated, worthless, I knew I was a failure...because no matter how much I covered up, sacrificed and controlled....my life was still out of control and no one thought I was a good person.

Learning to enable in my childhood home meant that I was a prime candidate for seeking and marrying an alcoholic husband.

Which left me in the second position you describe.

I've done both and I can tell you that in my experience...both "sources" of behaviors are rooted in fear.

Everything you have described is fear. Fear of being seen as less. Fear of being less. Selfishness (covering up for the drinker) driven by fear (of being seen as less by others). Controlling (arrogance and selfishness) driving by fear (of a bad outcome - such as someone seeing the real situation or fear of an unamed disaster). All of it is fear.


I sincerely don't believe this.


Having done both I can tell you that it is not so black and white. It is far more complex and yet so much more simple.

Whether it is either learned as a virtue or as a coping mechanism, it is from the same source.

Fear of sinning, fear of failing, fear of humiliation - these are ALL facets of Fear of Not Being Enough.

BrambleRose, there is such a creature, surely?

YOU.

As I understand it, you have made a choice to sustain a marriage with an active alcoholic, having judged that it is better for your children to have a two-parent family, even where one is an addict, than to disrupt their lives with a broken marriage.

It seems to me that you have consciously chosen to enable your husband to act destructively, in order to preserve what you see as the security of your family.

You enable him by absorbing the consequences of his addiction such that their effect on the children is minimised, and by accepting as your task, rather than his, the monitoring of his level of destructiveness.

But I don't believe you feel resentful about that. It's your conscious choice, and you have accepted the burden. You don't feel like a martyr. Yet you are enabling him.

Don't you think that others might have reached the same no-resentment accommodation?


Do you honestly feel that fear of sinning and fear of humiliation arise from the same psychological place for everyone?

Unless you view God as the Great Punisher, then fear of sinning arises from your conscience, from all that is best and most compassionate in you. Sinning is about the sadness of letting God down by failing to be as good a person as you would like to be for Him.

Of course, many view sinning as doing something that will get you punished by an angry God, in which case fear of God and fear of other people are pretty much the same thing.

There are many who genuinely believe that they are acting compassionately when they offer false alibis to rescue their child from prosecution, or tell friends that their mother has a recurring illness when in fact she is addicted to drugs, or welcome their son's mistress into their home and fail to tell their son's wife, or constantly bail their daughter out of financial crisis, or borrow money to cover up Dad's gambling debts.

Some of the people who do this may feel resentment, because they expect some kind of return on investment that they don't get, but from my experience there are many people who happily sacrifice till the end of their lives. They are 'addicted' to the sense of themselves as good people, and their enabling behaviour feeds that addiction no matter what the response they get from the other. They genuinely believe they are acting lovingly.

When your family gives the same moral weight to things such as
- it's wrong to tell lies;
- it's wrong to hurt your father by telling your teacher that he touches you inappropriately;
- it's wrong to steal;
- it's right to bail your brother out financially when he's in debt yet again

and so on, it's hard for a child to discriminate between the right messages and the wrong. So they tend to accept them all as right.

When you enable out of fear of humiliation, you're telling a lie to yourself. When you've been trained to enable by your family, you're being honest with yourself, but you've been made to believe a lie by others.

Accepting responsibility for your own lie is a different task from accepting that you've been deceived by people you love and trust.

TA

This is the premise I'm intrigued about also.

Ace

TA, BR, others:



Still wondering. It seems that this very concept (not all think from the same perspective) could single-handedly produce (or reform) an enabler.....or NOT. <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/confused.gif" alt="" />

Thanks,
Ace

hey ace, i haven't forgotten to respond...I've just been overwhelmed with some family events and work. I'll get to this in a day or so I hope.

Ace,

No response from me because I don't agree with the statement.

I am not an overly religious person. So I don't have a great fear of sinning therefore I don't think it comes from the same place as my fear of humiliation.

I think of sins more as a moral compass. I am not afraid to sin for the religious reason. I am not afraid to sin at all. I do have a moral compass that says it is not ok to Kill or steal or comitt adultry.

To me I don't do these things for a variety of reasons. I don't want to go to Jail being one of them.

This comes from a different place then humiliation.

Again for me as an enabler it wasnt' fear that caused my enabling.

IT WAS what I learned. It WAS my reality. It is no different then a non enabler having a normal view which is their reality.

If you grow up in a family where FARTING is ok you will go out into the world and fart with no embarassment. If you grow up in a family where Farting is done in the bathroom with the fan on that is what you will do. It is just what you learn.

The answer is unlearning the behavior.

hey Frog...thanks for your response...


I tend to agree that environment plays a larger role in what behavior is acceptable or unacceptable...especially when both behaviors are learned.

The larger question, however, might be how does one motivate another to WANT to unlearn a behavior perceived to be negative by some but "just what mama did" by another?

For example, I loved my Dad. He loved to fish. I thought fishing was boring. I did not like to fish because I learned at an early age to perceive it as boring.

Forty years later......

My H had an EA.....much of his EA was when he was fishing. Instead of making him quit fishing, I decided that I wanted to WANT to go fishing with him.

I asked Mark to help me and he started the "Let's go Fishing" thread on the recreation forum. Now I WANT to go fishing with my FWH. We did. I caught a fish and nearly went nuts! I want to do it again....because I chose to WANT to WANT to go.

Why?

My desire to improve our RC (and ultimately our M) overrode my perceived learned impression that fishing was boring so I would not like it.

Not a real good example of enabling, but the best I could do. Anyone else have any thoughts?

Ace

I don't know that anyone can motivate someone to unlearn it.

The motivation has to come from within after recognizing the learned behavior is "wrong".(for lack of a better term)

I can tell someone all day everyday that their action is "wrong" they can disagree with me and continue on. I can find books and reference material but if they still don't beleive me they will continue.

If at one point they realize the learned behavior is "wrong" then there is a chance.

Some behaviors are deeply entrenched. I am fighting still to unlearn this behavior. It isn't easy.

My FWW and I are having a really tough time because I am not enabling her. Other reasons too but that is a big one.

The main thing to remember is if you are enabling you are not just fighting yourself you are fighting the person you have been enabling.

They like enablers it is a shock when you don't want to be that person anymore.

Hey Frog,



Never really thought about this. Yikes! <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/eek.gif" alt="" />

Ace

Ace,


This is the wrong direction.

The minute you start trying to figure out how to change what someone "wants, thinks, or believes" you've stepped across the boundary of that person's self.

People want what they want. If someone wants to be enabled — that's what they want. It doesn't mean that's what they'll GET, of course. For example... I've wanted a pony for years and I still don't have one. <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/frown.gif" alt="" />

The key isn't to try to shuffle around what your partner wants.. it's to learn to negotiate so that your partner is enthusiastic about doing things he doesn't necessarily "want" to do in exchange for something he feels has greater or equal value. In this process -- you have to accept that he's doing <whatever> out of a sense of partnership/sharing/desire to get his own needs met and RESPECT that. He may never want to do <whatever> it is... but he enthusiastically willing because you do <whatever you do> and he wants that more than he doesn't want to do the other thing.

Part of a co-dependent personality is wanting everyone to "like you" or "agree with you" or "not be bothered by you", etc. When you learn that it's OK to want something even though it's an inconvenience because you're worthy and willing to compensate .. then you move away from the codependent/enabler/controller type of relationship and towards a true partnership.

That's what POJA is for .. and why it's so important. It allows two people who want different things to figure out a way to learn to live together and be happy.

Mys

Hi Mys,

Thanks for making time and effort to post in the midst of your hectic schedule:


My FWH is making such an effort in his willingness to help me heal and our M recover, that I want to do things to make him happy, too....like fishing. This does make sense.


We are progessing towards this but are not there yet. I do see what you mean.

Do you think fear is the reason for (or related in any way to) these enabler/controller/codependent behaviors?

Ace

Ace,


It probably depends on the time and the person. I grew up in a family that taught me these behaviors through abuse and dysfunction. By the time I got married, these things were habitual with me.

So, I still did them for a few years until I gradually quit. Well, I still wig out occasionally and go on a control spree but I try to limit that.

Anyway, at some point, I think they just become a habit. An engrained way that you manage and deal with the world. I think fear/anxiety comes in to play when you start trying to extricate yourself from these behaviors because it's hard to let go of what you think you are controlling.

In reality, of course, you'll find out you never really had control the whole time. It was the illusion of it that comforted you -- and possibly others (or at least made their lives easier so why complain).

Mys

Ace,

I think the bottom line about this type of behavior and the problems it causes all around is that it's not reality based behavior. The reality is that lots of things about your life (I'm speaking in the generic you) that are out of your control. People who enable/control/co-dependent try to create the illusion that they have more control over their own lives and what's going on around them than they actually do.

That works as long as everyone else plays along. When someone steps out of the dance, the person goes into a tail spin trying to figure out what s/he did wrong and how to fix it. Sometimes this manifests as guilty driven behavior "I must be defective" and sometimes it manifests as anger driven behavior "What's wrong with YOU and why aren't YOU acting the way I expect you to?"

Most of the time you see both.. with the enabler on one end and the enabled on the other. Both sides struggle to re-achieve the illusion and reassert the roles. Then, things wobble along again until the next time.

Living in reality means having to accept that life is messy a lot of time. People do things that you don't like and sometimes people are unhappy and you can't cheer them up. Sometimes people are even unhappy with YOU (that's an uncomfortable thought for most co-dependents). Anger, frustration, annoyance, aren't the end of a relationship or even the hallmark of a bad one unless it is always going on. And, I generally see more of the perpetual anger/resentment in co-dependent relationships, anyway.

A certain amount of conflict is necessary for a relationship.

Mys

For me, coming to gripes with Worth and Deserving are HARD. I've never felt I was worth anything unless I was the giver, never the taker. I also NEVER realized or thought I deserved good things. Sure was glad I got them, but never because I was worth deserving them, just coincidence.

How do you work thru realizing you do have a worth and deserve love/respect/etc.?

No easy answer here. I'm still working on it. I have terrible problems with self esteem/self worth. I'm in IC.


Mys

Ohhhh MVG,

((((((((mvg))))))))

I see by your timeline that you are in my shoes a year later. I'll have to check out your story....is it on one thread you can link? If not, I'll dig later.

I have the same 'self-disrespect' as you do but I know where it came from.


Here's what's working for me. To preface, we are in MC and sometimes I wish I was in IC, too......with our MC, but that's not gonna happen. (I do have free IC through work, but I don't want to have to go through the process again.)

My mother ingrained an 'inferiority complex' in all of us kids due to her circumstances....it's what she knew and she did the best she could.

It created a drive in me to succeed and prove her wrong. I married out of fear (thought I'd be left behind) and the ensuing 30 years of detachment reinforced my perception that I was unworthy of happiness. (My bad choices didn't help either. <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/frown.gif" alt="" />)

Fast forward to H's 6 month EA and his need to be confronted....not once, twice, thrice, but 4 times. That'll set one's self-esteem back a few notches.

Anyhow, back to what I do to overcome this:

I picture the impact that one act of my kindness has made on one other person, and how that might multiply to affect others positively. Seeing It's a Wonderful Life repeatedly helped me see that this would help me. Have you seen it?

When feelings of despair and worthlessness overcome me, I grab onto to ONE thing that I did to make a positive impact....and it usually snowballs and overtakes those negative thoughts.

When I nearly committed suicide by slamming my car into a concrete bridge abutment, an angel must have flashed the faces of my DS and DD and BF and Jesus before my eyes in time for me to slow down and swerve. Not only could I not do that to them, but they reminded me of the good things my life has represented.

But I'm still an enabler trying to reform because of my learned behavior...I think. BR said she'd return when she can to elaborate on the 'fear factor' LOL.... <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/rolleyes.gif" alt="" /> of enabling and controlling. I'm looking forward to that.

Thanks for your thoughts,

Ace