late to the party again...sorry, it was a very rough week.


No...I am not an enabler in this case.

Enabling is all about motivations and expectations.

Enablers attempt to control outcomes, to force solutions, to impact another person's behavior to suit themselves.

I have long ago let go of my husband's disease and left it to him and God. It's not my job to see to it that he has consequences. It's my job to take care of my responsibilities...no one else's.

Yes, I am sure there are alot of people that think that because I choose to stay, even for the purest of motives, that it is enabling because my husband does not experience the loss of his family as a result of his drinking.

But that very point of view is an enabler's point of view. I can not go through my life making choices based on consequences that *I* deem are appropriate for other people. I can only make choices for my own life and responsibilities, and live my own life with integrity.

My husband, and the consequences or lack thereof....are left to God.

As for the whole fear thing...

I don't really get all the distinctions being discussed here.

It's simple to me.

Whether it is from fear of sinning (not being good enough for God) or fear of humiliation (fear of others seeing that you are not good enough) or lack of self esteem (fear that one is not good enough) - its all fear.

I am sure that one can learn enabling as a habit because everyone does it. But I would challenge a "habitual enabler" to look beyond the behavior to the truths learned underlying that habit. And I will be willing to bet...that truth is the old nasty fear raising its head again.

Enablers are controllers. Controlling is a response to fear.


By acting as if.

Fake it til you make it.

Courage is not a lack of fear.

Courage is acting in the face of fear.

So if you are afraid that you are not worthy or deserving you simply ignore the fear and act with love and respect to yourself, and ask for what you deserve.

Before you know it, self-worth and self-respect will become your new habit, with an underlying truth that believes you ARE enough.

BR, I recognise that you don't.

I also think that you're rolling 'enabling' and 'controlling' into the same idea, because the concept of non-controlling enabling is perhaps alien to you.



I'd define 'enabling' as 'habitually doing things for someone else that allows them to avoid the consequences of their own inaction'. Note that I say 'that allows them', rather than 'in order to allow them'. Why a person would act that way is the crux of the argument here.


Can I run a few scenarios past you?

Scenario 1: You're driving home and notice the car is low on fuel. Your spouse needs the car first thing in the morning. You could a) tell your spouse about the situation so that they can leave in time to fill the car themselves, or b) fill the car yourself since you've got time. Would you see option b as kind and loving, or enabling?

Scenario 2) Your spouse arrives home from work dripping with flu. You pack him/her off to bed, take cups of hot lemon upstairs, phone round to cancel his/her social engagements, and perform the spouse's household tasks by yourself for a few days. The spouse is ill but not terminal; they could just about have medicated themselves and made the calls. Are your actions a) tender and loving or b) enabling?

In many families the (a) actions are seen as loving and supportive. The people who act in this way are doing it from what they feel to be a deep sense of compassion and tenderness. The family culture sees it as a responsibility to 'do for' each other as an act of love, and to offer protection to a temporarily vulnerable member.

Do you see such behaviour as healthy or unhealthy?

If you can accept that many families behave in this way, from a sense that it is good and right to protect family members, then consider this scenario...

Scenario 3: your spouse comes home blind drunk. You pack him off to bed, bring him glasses of water, do his household tasks and phone his employer the next day to say that he's got flu.

Now, this clearly crosses a line, of allowing the spouse to avoid the consequences of his own lack of self-discipline. But for many people, Scenario 2 and Scenario 3 will be essentially the same thing. They will have been habituated to accept that drunkenness is standard behaviour for men in the family, and that it is an inevitable consequence of necessary social situations. Caring tenderly for the family member, and protecting him from the outside world, is as good and supportive a thing to do as it would be if he had flu.

Can you see that, for many people, enabling is done from a place of love, as they have been taught to understand love by their family? They are not seeking to control the situation, but to obey an inner urge towards 'goodness'. Enablers are not always controllers.


If something has been built into your conscience as a good thing to do - pure and pleasing to God - then challenging that seems pretty much the same thing to me as challenging your sense that murder is wrong and bad, that adultery is wrong and bad, that honesty is right and good, that respecting others is right and good. Challenging the belief that it is right and good to support family members is like persuading yourself that it's OK to whip your children.

If you're going to challenge your ingrained habit of 'beneficial enabling', it's not initially about confronting fear. It's about rebuilding your conscience from the ground up, asking yourself deep questions about the concepts of right and wrong, getting to grips with the concept of boundaries. It's only as you begin to recognise that your emerging understanding is in conflict with your family's values that fear arises. And at that point you do have to make a decision about whether you face that fear or not.

From the point of view of someone looking to see whether they're enabling or not, they might look for the places where they feel a strong sense of anxiety, of fear of specific outcomes - those are likely to be the places where they're controlling-enabling. But for a 'beneficial enabler', there may be no such anxieties. It's not fear of outcome that hangs over their lives. For these people, their enabling behaviours are likely to manifest as a feeling of helplessness and paralysis, because they're trained to behave in ways that perpetuate poor outcomes.

I've answered this at such length because it worries me immensely that readers may be brought to believe that any enabling behaviour they identify in themselves, is inevitably down to avoidance of unwanted personal consequences. They may search forever for what it is they're 'avoiding' - and come up with spurious and wrong diagnoses - when what they really need to look at is the DNA of their basic belief system. That's a much harder task. Breaking free of family values is very much tougher than acknowledging personal weakness.

TA

By acting as if.
Fake it til you make it.
Courage is not a lack of fear.
Courage is acting in the face of fear.

So if you are afraid that you are not worthy or deserving you simply ignore the fear and act with love and respect to yourself, and ask for what you deserve.

Before you know it, self-worth and self-respect will become your new habit, with an underlying truth that believes you ARE enough. [/quote]

I agree with most of what you said here. However, it's VERY hard when you've been this way your entire life. I'm trying, it tends to feel selfish though.

It's not selfish, mvg, it's survival.

You can't see how to help others remove the splinters from their eyes until you remove the log from your own.

Also, you can't help someone else unless you've taken care of yourself first (put the oxygen mask on you first so you don't pass out before you put one on your child.)

I'm dealing with the same thing.....eventually it will click. I'm learning how to say 'no' when asked to do favors and it feels good. Felt selfish at first, tho. <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/frown.gif" alt="" /> But it sure cuts down on the overwhelming sensation of being ....as my FWH says "OOC"...(Out Of Control).

Ace

Yes it does feel better! I'm learning to say no. It's still a foreign concept at times.

BR, TA, mvg, others:




In a nutshell, this could explain what helped my WH choose to de-fog after D-day #4. He must have realized that I would not enable his fantasy anymore....that I deserved (and demanded) better, and that I was worth it.

Was I fearful....YES! It took all the courage in me to say those words. But I truly meant them and pictured myself alone, surviving...but alone.

I was shocked when he nearly collapsed and begged for strike 5. But he knew I meant it, and apparently, he means it, too. He shudders now to think how stupid he was.

mvg, hang around and take in all the input you can.....LA helped me tremendously as I see she has you on your other thread....and take baby steps. Above all, ask questions......the only stupid question is the one you do
NOT ask.

I'm anxious to continue hearing the dialog regarding enabling/controlling/cheerleading/conflict avoiding and also co-dependency. I'm learning so much...thank you TA and BR, too.

How does the last one fit in compared to the other 4 behaviors?

Ace

TA ~ It is not that I don't get it and need it explained to me. It is that my understanding of enabling makes the rest of this discussion unnecessarily complex.

I think that mountains are being made out of molehills.

I disagree with your definition of enabling. I think that my motivations for ANY choice should not include consideration of 'consequences' or lack thereof for other people.

The very act of deciding to act or not to act, based on MY judgement of someone else, is enabling and controlling. It sets me up as judge and jury and parent.

Mind your own business is a powerful tool for the enabler...traumatized or habitual.

There is a profound difference between working as a couple, helping each other out, from enabling behavior.

To use the gas in the car analogy - which fits - I am notoriously bad at remembering to put gas in my truck. I ususally drive it until its on fumes. Its honestly just not on my radar screen, I have so many other things to cram into a day, stopping at a gas station is just too much trouble.

When my husband drives the truck, for example, on a Sunday night he might use it get groceries. He'll fill it up for me so that I am ready to hit the road on Monday with no distractions - as an act of LOVE - showing his care and love for me. But if he doesn't drive the truck...I'm on my own - so far I've yet to run out of gas!

Now, if he was going outside to check the fuel gauge every night, and constantly reminding me to fill up, or constantly going out at night to take it to the station after I come home from work - THAT would be enabling.

Care and love are not motivated by control. Enabling IS. Control is a response to fear.

Care and love are NOT enabling...can not be enabling...even though sometimes...people may mistakenly confuse enabling and care. I think that is what you have done here.

I certainly thought my past enabling behavior was love and care. Upon serious, deep contemplation...after hard work on the 12 steps...I discovered my control, my fear, my selfish motivations behind the enabling. I was horrified to discover that what I had deceived myself as virtue was truely disrespectful judgements, control and fear of my own lack of worth.

Enabling is not love and can not ever be. It is motivated by fear and selfishness. Even as a habit, it is still not love. People do what works, what pays off - for themselves, not for others. Enablers are getting a fix, acknowledged or not. Habits like that pay off, while denial runs deep.

BR,
Ouch! Let me see if I get this, dummies version... Enabling I'm constantly telling/demanding/reminding someone of what THEY need to do or making excuses for what they do/do not do?

What 12 steps?

(Emphasis mine.)

Eureka! <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/laugh.gif" alt="" />

BrambleRose - this is exactly the point I am trying to make.

People often confuse enabling with love.

When we believe ourselves to be acting in a loving way, we are light-years from seeing the deep underlying fear that is actually driving us. It can take YEARS to dig our way to that realisation.

When we are acting from fear - fear of humiliation, fear of failure, etc., - that sense of fear is usually with us like a mild headache all the time. It's relatively easy to identify and expose the fear, because it's much nearer to the surface, it's a constant discomfort, and we are really rather anxious to be rid of it.

The fear of being ejected from your family is buried much, much deeper, and is very hard to get to and expose.

Someone looking to identify their own enabling behaviours must look in more than one place. Looking at the places where they have high anxiety and an uncomfortable sense of resentment tells them where they're enabling out of fear. Looking at the places where they feel powerless, paralysed and trapped - but not guilty or resentful - tells them where they're enabling out of 'love'.

It may not be 'love' in the best and truest sense, but it is the only way they have ever been taught to define love.

There comes a point where people can recognise that, in 'loving' someone, they are in fact damaging them. But getting to that point is a long slow process. And you don't start by looking at the places where you fear. You start by looking at the places where you love.

TA

TA ~ I've been there and done that, and you are making it far more complicated than it need be.

Even the words you use to describe some 'alternative enabling' are fear words - there just is no real distinction - "powerless, paralysed and trapped" are all aspects of fear.

I am not sure why you feel the need to break it down into different kinds of enabling. It really is ALL the same...

When you learn the behavior, you learn the underlying truths behind the behavior. You learn to need the payoff.

Fear of 'ejection' from the family is still Fear of Not Being Enough.

When I started uncovering my stuff. I didn't even know I was afraid - so you are not quite right about the fear being something that one might be anxious to be rid of as opposed to something else.

My fear was buried behind years of habits and anger. It was certainly how I learned to love. It did not take me YEARS to unbury, but a matter of months of hard work with someone who forced me to check my motivations and forced me to re-examine the truths by which I led my life. And there was the fear sitting there, ugly and slimey and driving my behavior.

There is nothing "special" about where someone learned it.

The same underlying truths are still believed, the same motivations are there....
Denial just runs deeper in some than others.

mvg - yes, you got it. the 12 steps are the 12 Steps of Al-Anon, adapted from the 12 Steps of AA.

BrambleRose, if I seem to you to be making this 'unnecessarily complicated', your approach seems to me to be lacking in awareness that other people may have different experiences to you.


No, it's not. Fear of 'ejection' from the family is about fear of dying - it's that primitive. Every human - in fact most social creatures - fear separation from the troop because it makes it almost certain that they will die. That survival instinct is built into the most primitive structure of the brain.

When something is at that primitive a level, you don't experience it as fear except in moments of crisis. As you mature, the constant anxiety is translated into feelings of love, loyalty and desire for closeness. We carry those feelings, and the deep underlying fear, into old age - still seeing them as 'love'.

Fear of humiliation, disgrace, exposure, failure, etc., ARE genuine fears. But those kinds of fears are much more sophisticated than the primitive fear of abandonment - there are layers of adult emotional complexity derived from living in a complex social world. A six-month old baby doesn't fear humiliation, disgrace, failure, because it will be years before he has the least idea what they are. But he does panic when his mother leaves the room, or won't look at him when he's crying, because the abandonment fear is hard-wired into his brain.

What I'm saying is that there are some fears we can see relatively easily and unpick, but the abandonment fear is so deeply ingrained that we don't see it as fear at all...and it will not respond to the same kind of intellectual analysis that we can apply to social adult fears.

If enabling comes from fear, as you state, then it's important to recognise that there are different kinds of fear and that they don't present in the same way to the person who has them.

You've made a case for your own experience of enabling and fear. I accept that this as an accurate account. But it's a long way from my own experience; frankly, there's little in your journey I recognise. My childhood and family experience was very different to yours. I did not have a tough life as you did. I was probably far more naive and trusting than you at the same stage of life. But I don't think I'm unique.

Like most people on this board, working out how I got into this mess has been of huge importance to me. Looking back, I can see hardly any instances where I enabled my husband out of fear of humiliation and disgrace. My own self-esteem and self-confidence were much too high for me to be worried about what people would think. Your whole description of a fear model rings few bells with me.

Where I DID enable was with 'love', a concept gifted to me by my (very religious)family of origin. I was trained to believe that a good and loving wife accepts her husband's marital inadequacies ('men are always poor at relationships'), takes responsibility for the emotional state of her husband, sees herself as a lazy wife if she does not make his life comfy enough to come home to every night, absolves him of responsibilities for childcare, does not complain when he comes home late without telling her, rushes to please him in everything, asks for little and works hard at being good in bed.

I did all of that perfectly. I was BRILLIANT at it. My husband appreciated it all, and told me so, frequently. I wasn't doing it out of fear; I was doing it out of love. If wanting your spouse to be contented, for no other reason than that their contentment pleases you and makes you feel warm and good, is 'controlling', then consider me controlling. But I don't think that working to make a spouse happy for that reason is controlling at all.

Of course, despite my brilliant performance, my husband had been straying from the very start of the marriage. He was more than happy to soak up all that wonderful loving behaviour from me, and go out to supplement his excitement levels elsewhere.

As with most of us here, d-day forced me to ask 'why?'

From your own description, I think you identified behaviours of your own which might have alienated your husband. Many people here have done the same thing - it's largely why the EN model works well for so many.

But I hadn't alienated my husband, or controlled him to manage my own fears. If I had behaved less 'lovingly', I would not have expected him to stray, but I would have thought that the quality of the marriage would suffer for both of us and therefore for the children. I wasn't behaving as I did in order to avoid some fearful outcome for myself; I was acting in that way because I thought I was doing the very best I could as a mother.


I HAD allowed my husband to treat me disrespectfully, because I had been trained not to recognise it as disrespect. I had failed to demand full participation in the marriage from him, because I had been trained to believe that men aren't capable of much participation. I failed to spot that our marriage was hopelessly unfair, because my own parents' marriage had been even worse. I thought I was doing much better than them. I failed to see my own sadness, because I had been trained not to see it. I failed to recognise the lack of real intimacy.

For me, the journey to personal health has been about making myself believe that I am actually entitled to respect, fair treatment and kindness. It has been about learning to ask for what I need - and about learning to know what that might be. It has been about refusing to accept poor treatment. It has been about recognising that 'enabling' someone else's bad behaviour is not loving to them or me, and that being loving to myself is not selfish or arrogant.

It has been about redefining the meaning of 'love' from the very ground up.

It was only when I started to realise that my journey was taking me into conflict with my parents' views that I felt any fear at all. THAT seemed taboo, unthinkable, wrong. Because of course the fear of alientating one's parents triggers the abandonment fears we've had since birth.

That fear was almost paralysing, and it took a lot of work to face up to it. The result is that my parents haven't spoken to me in nearly two years. My fears were actually quite justified. I did get ejected from the family for holding different views to them.

I DID enable my husband to behave badly. But I didn't do it out of fear of Not Being Enough. I did it because I liked the feelings it gave me to be a 'good' wife. I thought I was doing God's Will (read: family's will), and I was very satisfied with that.

I had no fears to face up to. It was 'love' I had to confront.

TA

TA ~ I am very aware that other people may have different experiences. Although you might not recognize much from mine, I find it interesting because I recognize much of mine in yours.

I wish you could see what I do in your post and how much fear of not being enough is there...as much as you deny it.

It's alright though - lets just agree to disagree, ok?

Thank you both for this very enlightening discussion. I have learned just how much more I have to learn....and that is a good thing......I think! <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/blush.gif" alt="" />

I appreciate lifechoices for mentioning this topic and everyone who posted thoughts and questions. Frog....mvg....others.....hope you've all benefited like I have.....and many more who've read but not commented.

Again, thanks for all the time and effort spent on these excellent posts. I wish all 'discussions' were conducted so eloquently. <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

Ace

Oh definately enlightening, confusing a bit too for "us" that are trying to grasp so much at one time, but a GREAT thread!

TA, your last post hit so close to home in how YOUR M worked. I see alot of what I was/am doing in your post and the reasons why.

I also can relate to BR's posts and how she sees things from her perspective and agree with quite alot.

I appreciate ALL the posters here! I'm learning...feeling more and more like a rubixcube tho...just when you think you've "got it" the other side isn't right! <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/eek.gif" alt="" />

<img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

TA

You know, Ace, the board used to abound in in-depth, thought-provoking discussions. I learned an awful lot from them. It would be nice to see them back again.

TA

Mel, TA, BR, Frog, mvg, others....

You have helped me tremendously and I will read this thread a few more times to 'get it'......so I can 'use it' to improve our M and my entire life.

Lifechoice/Rock, thanks for inspiring this topic....you guys have all contributed to a thread that I think should have gold stars so others will benefit from it.

How do you post those stars? Can someone else do it, or do I have to since I created it? If so, tell me how....sorry.....I'm still such a newbie in soooo many ways! <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/blush.gif" alt="" />

Ace <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/cool.gif" alt="" />

Whoooooah! I didn't even see this post from you, TA, until I hit 'submit' on my above 'stars' post.



So what happened to change the discussions' "depth"....and how do WE get them back?

As a bonafide MB Veteran, might you consider hosting a thread on that topic? Speaking for Newbies, 'we' would truly benefit and appreciate it. Please consider it.

Ace

BR

I am late to the party too but a note.


This is the text book definition of enabling.


Above is why I think enablers are picked by their mates they solve the problems for the other person.


How to solve the problem.

BR if you enable out of fear you should really look at that.

What some may consider fear others do not.

My FWW is an alcoholic. I am absolutely an enabler.

Hopefully as time goes by it is weaning. I did not enable out of fear.

I enabled out of a misguided attmept to be RESPONSIBLE. Now looking back I wasn't being the responsible one I was being an enabler.

I decided to take the first step almost two years ago now.

I woke up on New Years morning and told my FWW I would be taking the kids and leaving, that no court in the world would allow her custody because of her alcoholism.

She finally hit rock bottom and went to an AA meeting. I told her it is now my choice to never live with an Alcholic again. I have done it for far to long.

She can drink any time she wants but I will leave.

Not for me but for my children.

Hi Frog,


So are you saying that after you took the kids and left, then she hit rock bottom and such consequences helped her choose to change?

What did she do to prove she had changed so that your recovery (according to your sig line) could start 11/06?

When did you come back home? (Sorry if you mentioned all this on an earlier post I didn't see.)


Are you saying that if you had no children, you would have left her for good?

Ace