CODEPENDENCE - DEAN AMORY

More documents

Recommendations

Info

Helping a Person Who Is Codependent If someone in your life is codependent -a spouse, parent, child or friend- your support may be an important part of recovery. Here are some ways you can help. Spouse Friend Child Parent Begin a dialogue about childhood and messages your spouses might have received from his parents that could have caused shame. You might want to share your own experiences of shame and how they affected you. If you are recovering from an addiction, it might be useful to discuss how most spouses are affected by their partner’s addiction and what might be helpful to him (Al-Anon Meetings, Codependence Anonymous Meetings). Attending therapy with a spouse or buying a book on codependence and reading it together are other ways to begin to help. You might want to get a friend to open up to you by sharing your own insights with him. You can offer to go to a Codependents Anonymous Meeting with him or buy him a book to read about codependence. You also could offer him a place to stay (if he is living with an addict and could benefit from time apart) or a referral to a mental health professional. Sometimes making the first phone call for help can be the first step toward empowering the person to get well. Helping a child, unless it’s an adult child, might not be appropriate since codependency as dysfunctional behavior is hard to distinguish from normal dependency when a child is still young. If you are the parent of an adult son or daughter who is now in a codependent relationship, you could help by telling your child how much you love her and that getting well is possible. Remind your child of the strengths and positive qualities that sustained her through other difficult times. Offer a place to stay or to go to a 12-Step meeting with her. Helping a parent often is like helping adult children. Parents may resist taking advice from their children. But if, together, you can go to a 12-step meeting, go to therapy or read a book on codependence, you may begin to stir up a desire for recovery.
Co-worker Helping a coworker might include sharing information over lunch or inviting her over for coffee after work. If you are aware of a codependence problem with a coworker, chances are she already has entrusted you with some intimate information. However, work might not be the best place to discuss a topic as personal as codependence. Often, you can help just by offering to listen outside work or to be an escort to a 12-step meeting. Treatment Options for Codependence If you think you have a problem with codependence, treatment is available and can help you feel better. Healing takes time and hard work, but talking with other codependents and seeing a therapist are two of the best ways to start your recovery. Twelve-step groups Therapy Treatment may consist of individual therapy, group therapy and, eventually, couples and family therapy. A clinical social worker, psychologist or psychiatrist with experience treating codependents and families of addicts can help you identify and discuss the feelings, thoughts and behaviors that you and others find troubling. Many advocates of the codependency theory view codependency as a type of addiction. Therefore, they maintain that codependents can overcome their symptoms with a 12step process similar to that used by Alcoholics Anonymous. Twelve-step recovery programs bring codependents together as a group to talk about their struggles and share hope and experiences. The 12-step recovery process involves spirituality and is nondenominational. Codependents Anonymous meetings can provide participants with a great source of emotional and practical support. Program recovery involves admitting your life has become unmanageable because of your codependence. It requires expressing your feelings, doing what you can to get better and letting go of things you can’t control. Familiar 12-step affirmations include “One Day at a Time,” “Easy Does It,” “Let Go and Let God (a higher power).” If you are interested in going to a meeting, contact your local mental health center and ask where you can find a Codependents Anonymous meeting in your area. Medication If you are confronting codependence issues as well as mental illness such as a depression or anxiety disorder [Link to articles on Depression and Anxiety Disorder], you might want to see your primary care doctor or a psychiatrist. He can determine whether medication such as an antidepressant might help you. Often those who take medication and attend
Page 1: CODEPENDENCE A compilation of Publi
Page 4 and 5: Codependent people misplace their a
Page 6 and 7: Since codependent people are expert
Page 8 and 9: may tiptoe around him wondering if
Page 10 and 11: y Daniel Ploskin, MD - August 21, 2
Page 12 and 13: health disorder that they are not i
Page 14 and 15: Are You Codependent? By { HYPERLINK
Page 16 and 17: If you suspect that your helping be
Page 18 and 19: What addictive behaviour were you s
Page 20 and 21: I would ask her what she was doing
Page 24 and 25: therapy and 12-step sessions find t
Page 26 and 27: Twelve Step process Twelve Step pro
Page 28 and 29: not that of a legal adviser, a bank
Page 30 and 31: These are some versions of the Twel
Page 32 and 33: esponsibly for ourselves, for our o
Page 34 and 35: 12 Step Process THE BIBLE & THE TWE
Page 36 and 37: Twelve-step program From Wikipedia,
Page 38 and 39: - "Lois's Story" in the Al-Anon "Bi
Page 40 and 41: Hope - People who experience mental
Page 42 and 43: You have the right to recover accor
Page 44 and 45: Treatments for Depression and Bipol
Page 46 and 47: There are ways you can help friends
Page 48 and 49: 3. Realizing and Believing Change i
Page 50 and 51: Continue to support them as they se
Page 52 and 53: meetings where people can learn mor
Page 54 and 55: An advance directive and a medical
Page 56 and 57: Self Help Affirmations That Work Me
Page 58: 5. Exercise your mind to strengthen

CODEPENDENCE - DEAN AMORY

Create successful ePaper yourself

Delete template?

Save as template?