How to Handle Codependency Issues in Friends and Family

Handling codependency issues with friends and family requires you to look at why and where the codependency is coming from. In lay terms, codependency is: I feel better when they feel better, I feel worse when they feel worse. When you’re attached to somebody at that level, you’re not helping them, and you’re certainly not helping yourself. Feeling a certain way based on how another person feels is a very unhealthy way to live, and what ends up happening is that you start to forget who you are as a person. You start allowing yourself to let other situations—people, places, things, and relationships—suffer. The more time you spend trying to make somebody else feel better, the less you care for yourself.

Our model of intervention, which is very similar to the model of the CRAFT theory, is that you don’t reward negative behavior—you reward positive behavior. And when you are codependent on somebody, it’s just like enabling. You send the message that their negative behaviors have something called positive consequences. Behavior is not defined by the pros and cons in and of itself; it’s defined by the outcome of what you get from the behavior. So, in other words, the more you get a positive result, the more of a behavior you will engage in. And until there’s a negative consequence versus a positive, you won’t change that behavior.

So when you’re codependent or enabling, whether you’re a friend or a family member, you create a scenario where they learn that committing negative behaviors, or acting out negative behaviors, is something that brings a positive outcome. So in other words, if you’re a loved one, if you’re codependent on them and you’re enabling them, and they lie every day. They excel in their addiction, their mental health, or their dysfunctional behaviors; they receive a positive reward for that. And it goes against everything the CRAFT model of intervention and addiction treatment says. So when you’re codependent, you’re sending the message of rewarding negative behavior. And it doesn’t move people through the stages of change when you do that. Because remember, when you’re codependent, you think it’s all about your loved one—but it’s not. It’s all about you.

Until you do something called detach, which most of you have heard of, you will continue to send the message of validation for what they’re doing. And you should never be in a position where you need to feel better because somebody else does, or somebody else’s demise makes you feel worse. And I mean, listen—that happens to everybody. If somebody we love is sick, we get depressed. If somebody’s happy, we are so glad for them. I don’t mean that. I mean in addiction and mental health.

Codependency is technically not a disorder according to the DSM (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual—published by the American Psychiatric Association. But dependent personality disorder is. The most significant difference between these two things is the nature of the relationship. Whereas a person with dependent personality disorder is codependent in all relationships, somebody who is codependent has the same behaviors, but it’s specific. In other words, in addiction and mental health.

Either way, both codependency and dependent personality disorder take away your ability to be who you are. It takes away your values and your morals. And it doesn’t help the other person, and it isn’t helping you. So when I look at friends and family members in a family system, and I look at a substance use or somebody with a mental disorder, it’s challenging for them to learn that their negative behaviors actually should have adverse outcomes. People think you’ve got to want help and hit bottom. Codependency prevents that. So the best advice I have for you is to look at where your codependency and enabling are coming from—not so much what it’s doing for your loved one, but what it’s doing for you.