Codependency is a pathological condition, characterized by deep preoccupation and strong emotional, social and even physical dependence on another person. This term is used mostly in relation to relatives and close ones of alcoholics, drug addicts and other people suffering from some dependence.
Codependency differs from the other types of dependences. It is characterized by certain unhealthy peculiarities and features. Unhealthy, because we depend on unhealthy person, and some way we get infected with his disease. Although, we become ill not at once, but gradually, and the disease manifests itself and progresses in a way, specific for this or that human, taking into account his character, personality traits, way of life, his personal experience and events of the past.
A codependent – is a person, who is totally absorbed by desire to control the behavior of another person, and he doesn’t care at all of his own essential needs.
The codependents are:
Among codependents are first of all those people, who experienced severe hardships in childhood; people from dysfunctional families, where one parent was absent or both parents suffered from alcoholism; where children were abused; people with traumas received in childhood not only in a family, but also at school, outdoors, from peers, teachers or other adults. Here belong victims of sexual, physical, emotional and sectarian abuse, who themselves suffer from alcoholism, drug and medication dependence and so on.
Main characteristics of codependence:
It has been observed that codependent relatives have, as a rule, the symptoms, typical for alcoholics and drug users: frequent headaches, depressions, gastroduodenal ulcer, cardiovascular disease. The only exclusion is that codependency doesn’t lead to cirrhosis.
Alcohol addiction, drug dependence and gambling as well as codependency are equally responsible for the troubles in the lives of addicts and their close ones. Such conditions take away power, energy, health and rest of the people and overmaster their thoughts and emotions. While the addict thinks of alcohol, drugs or gambling machines, the thoughts of his wife, mother, girlfriend, sister or brother are obsessively fixed on possible ways to control the addict’s behavior in all spheres of his life.