Yesterday, my best friend Lucy and I took a trip to San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park to visit the Japanese Tea Gardens. I can’t even begin to tell you about the wonderful adventures we had. We laughed so much and so hard, others probably thought we were drunk or on drugs…especially on the paddle boat! During our drive there, we were discussing some issues around codependency and she brought up a really good question that made me think.
“If your always in recovery and you think your doing great, how do you measure your healing if you haven’t had any situations to measure it against?”
For me, the answer is pretty simple. Ok, maybe not simple but here’s how I can tell if I am doing well when there really is no drama/trauma going on in my life:
- Situations (most often other people’s drama) do not stress me out.
- I do not feel the urge to want to “fix” something or rescue someone when they come to me with a problem.
- If someone judges me for something I say or do, says a harsh word or is rude, I can let it go and tell myself, “That’s their opinion/problem”.
- I often reflect on my day to make sure I did not offend, hurt, disregard anyone and if I did, immediately try to make things right by owning my part and making amends…(had to do this exact thing this morning).
- I feel peace and serenity in my life overall.
I can measure the healthiness of my recovery when life gets a bit chaotic by the following:
- Am I minding my own business?
- Am I trying to fix or rescue?
- Am I setting boundaries and sticking to consequences?
- Am I processing feelings before reacting/responding?
- Am I being honest and truthful?
- Am I standing up for myself?
- Am I doing what is necessary to make sure I am emotionally strong and healthy?
- Am I being respectful when I speak? (Not snapping, sarcastic, or rude)
- Am I “owning” my part?
- Am I making amends when necessary?
If I can answer “yes” to these questions, then I know that I am in a healthy place and I am actively working my recovery. If I answer “no” to ANY of these questions, it’s time to really sit back and figure out what it going on within me that is causing me to be in an unhealthy place. Yep, sometimes, it takes some serious soul searching because “denial” can be my best friend, if I let it.
For me, codependency affects me every single day, in every part of my life. I battle it every day. I have a tendency to get up in my head about things and they just spin and spin. It’s what I do from there, how I handle whatever is spinning in my head, that let’s me know if I am in a healthy place or not and if I am actively working my recovery or if I’m letting my codependency work me.
I think my next post will be about the steps I take when I do find my codependency working me. Those times are a lot less frequently but they do happen!
We would love to hear your response to the question!
Bless you all!
Journey On Strong 
Great post! I periodically have situations that offer the opportunity to test/measure my recovery. If I had these situations often, I’d know I need to step up my recovery work. Codependent thinking and behaviors, like wanting to fix another person’s problem, still pop up now and then, but I catch myself a lot sooner than I did in the past and turn it over to a power greater than myself more easily.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Thank you for commenting JoAnna! Codependency can be sneaky but when we are vigilant we can catch ourselves much sooner than we use to and avoid a lot of heartache and drama. Thank God we have tools today!
LikeLiked by 1 person