"One day your self-esteem disappears completely," says E. We won't know her name, but we will understand her life, which for decades was the life of others: taking care of them, controlling them, pleasing them, and a long list of verbs that turned this 50-year-old teacher, married and mother of several children, into a codependent person. And you will say, "Ah, the excessive attachment, depending on your partner (or your mother or your child) extremely." That, let's call it a 'need,' which shows that one cannot handle their own life.
But it's not that. Being codependent goes far beyond needing constant affection from our important (and not so important) people: it's about not being a person in reality and, above all, structuring life around another or others who, in turn, are addicts in any of their forms: alcohol, drugs, pills, gambling, food, sports, shopping, technology, social media... Behind the drug addict is the codependent, who is addicted to the addict, believing that they can save them from their hell, and this is what they dedicate their existence to.
"Codependency makes you lose your identity. I stopped being who I was. And I became what I thought I had to be. Until I asked myself what I wanted," E. says in a café in the center of Madrid, after months of conversations with this newspaper through calls and WhatsApp messages. It has been raining continuously in this city for days, and she has just been photographed by the photographer, whom she requested not to be recognized. "Telling my life involves telling the lives of others," she argues to explain why she prefers not to make her face public.
She recounts the previous night, how she and her husband - who is part of Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) and has been in recovery for almost 30 years - were working together, looking for the best definition of codependency that could be given in this report. E. carefully unfolds a computer-written sheet with handwritten additions in blue pen. She smiles and begins: "Codependency is an emotional problem (added: addiction, disease) characterized by an obsessive emotional dependence (in capital letters) on another person and their relationship with this person. These dysfunctional codependent relationships are common in family members who care for chronic patients, people with disabilities, alcoholics, or drug addicts. One feels an uncontrollable urge to meet all the needs of the person in their care, assuming their problems as their own. This implies forgetting about ourselves and our needs. To make matters worse, often this obsessive and unconscious help is ineffective."
E.'s husband may be (he is, but now in a different way) key in her life, but above all because one day, 25 years ago, he handed his wife a book by the American author Melody Beattie, Codependent No More, which he had heard about in his AA meetings. And its reading not only changed E.'s life, but directly saved it. This is what she affirms in the café where she is being interviewed, after taking out the notes she had prepared, she starts pulling out one, two, three, and even four books by Beattie, as if her bag were Mary Poppins's.
Until she reaches a last, smaller one, which is not by Beattie but is also essential to her: the blue book (of the 12 steps) of what is known as CoDA (Codependents Anonymous). This internationally extended organization was born within AA in the 80s because they were the ones who began to realize that there was a pattern of a family of addicts that repeats itself over and over. Beattie's figure is key in the foundation of the new organization, as she not only was part of its internal gestation but her literature is crucial to understanding it.
This is how the author herself describes codependents in the recent and expanded reissue of one of her best-selling books, Codependent No More (Diana editorial), first published in 1990, of which eight million copies have been sold and also has its place in E.'s bag. "Codependents are not more disturbed or sicker than alcoholics, but they suffer as much or more than them. They are not the living image of suffering, but they face their pain without the anesthetic effects of alcohol or other drugs, and without the euphoria experienced by some people with compulsive disorders. And the pain of loving someone with serious problems can be very deep."
Melody's life, who is now 72 years old and lives in California, is simply too much, and no more adjectives are needed. Also, what Time magazine said about her serves well: "Beattie knows what it's like to truly be up to your neck in water, that's why she can give valuable advice to those who are."
She suffered sexual abuse at four, started drinking at nine, was an alcoholic at 12, and a drug addict at 18. After going through a rehabilitation center, she became a therapist for relatives of addicts. And she married another recovering addict. In the mutual aid groups that she helped found from 1986 in the city of Minneapolis (Minnesota, USA), Beattie not only found a generalized profile of family members who had developed an addiction to controlling their loved ones' dependency but also discovered her own codependency.
She was the girl who hid bottles at four so her father wouldn't drink and ended up drinking them. And she was later the woman who turned the house upside down to check that her husband wasn't hiding alcohol. Like in the most cliché scene in the world about alcoholism: checking for bottles behind the sink pipe. Extreme experiences: people throwing away the alcohol others are drinking while shouting and crying. Or insulting. "As in the classic scene of a TV movie, I found a bottle of vodka wedged in the tank. It was too cliché, too Days of Wine and Roses," Beattie writes in this bestseller, which is an ode to sincerity.
After a failed video call, the author gives her mobile number so that this newspaper can interview her for the book's reissue. On the other end is a very calm voice, so much so that it is sometimes inaudible. E. had asked for a favor, that we ask a question on her behalf, so we start there.
Mrs. Beattie, a codependent person who has been attending CoDa meetings weekly for 25 years and has started her own weekly meeting in her city, has a question for you: Are you aware that you have saved thousands of people with your books?
I'm not really aware of that. If I were, it would possibly scare me a lot. But I am very grateful that my experience and work have touched so many people because that was my main challenge when I started writing: to share the information.
Regarding the creation and definition of the term, Beattie speaks humbly but firmly: "Yes, I believe I started it. And I have seen very little evolution on the matter since then because the information remains static. No one was talking about this during the years when I was writing 'Codependent No More.' No one knew the term, even though it was really groundbreaking information. And when that book was reissued two years ago, all I wanted was to add a chapter on trauma. Because that is the only thing that has truly changed since then: now we are all much more traumatized than before. In the United States, at least, most of us have been since September 11th."
In 'The New Codependency,' the new chapter is number 20, starting on page 263, and describes some possible roots of the codependent personality:
"There is a situation that overwhelms us and drags us down. For example, we discover that the person of our dreams is an alcoholic. Or we were born into a family where there is alcoholism, addiction, or abuse. We may not be aware that our life is traumatic or psychologically devastating when we live with the same behaviors and traumas every day. To cope with it, to maintain balance, we often internalize it, normalize it, deny it, ignore it. We begin to develop our own repertoires of psychological tics, self-harming behaviors, and other addictive or self-hating patterns, including beliefs that we are not worthy of love, that we are inferior to the rest of the world, and that for some reason we deserve disaster. Meanwhile, our fear, anxiety, and traumas bubble beneath the surface, eroding our foundations and possibly causing illnesses: headaches, stomach aches, or worse. Even when the conscious mind forgets (or denies) what happened, the body keeps score."
With this last sentence, Beattie is quoting a best-selling book by psychologist Bessel van der Kolk dedicated to trauma. Meanwhile, in Spain, it is E. who quotes her when teaching her books, which have covers from other eras and are full of marks, folded pages, underlines, and annotations. Codependents constantly read and write about their sensations, feelings, ups, and downs. "I keep making mistakes," confesses this woman, who does not falter: "When it happens, I open my book, read, write, and start over."
The last time it happened was recently when she discovered that under the Christmas tree, on Three Kings' Day morning, no one had left anything in her shoe. She suffered, but she could handle it. A paragraph from 'The New Codependency' explains this inner struggle, which actually stems from respect: "Codependents have the mission of practicing self-love from a conscious stance. Daily, throughout life. It is not about approaching existence and relationships from a narcissistic or aggressively selfish attitude. Loving oneself implies a more humble and discreet stance."
When asked what is the first and most important thing a codependent person should do when they realize they are codependent, Beattie is firm: "Take care of your own affairs. And this can break our hearts when there are people with illnesses by our side, but we cannot save them. We simply can't. We can be by their side, as long as they don't harm us, but we can't fix them or fix their problem. Because we end up trapped doing the same thing over and over again and run the risk of ending up destroying ourselves."
Regarding the current era, Beattie sees signs of extreme dependence often between parents and children, at least, she says, in the United States: "The young people in our country believe they are entitled to everything, they believe they deserve everything. Now the relationships between parents and children are very different from what they were, the former want to please the latter. When I was growing up, my mother didn't care if I liked it or not. She just wanted me to be quiet."
E. also refers to situations of dependence with her adult children, not just towards her husband. And she quickly explains that it actually all started with her father, who was an addict and whom she constantly sought to please, with every action, every decision, and every gesture. But when she wants to explain codependency, she usually resorts to a "very basic example." "My husband gets upset when I tell this story. He likes me to have short hair and look at me..."
E. shows what is often called a "mane": very long hair. And she used to please her husband. "He didn't force me, he didn't say 'you have to cut it,' it's not about that, but about what it triggered in me, how it made me feel: that he wouldn't like it, that he would leave me, that he would find another girl with short hair, if I don't have it short, he will leave me, I won't be enough... All that over a hairstyle. That's codependency, that's the problem."
From a psychological perspective, the term, in the words of specialist Fernando Mansilla Izquierdo, refers to "an obsessive and compulsive attitude towards controlling other people and relationships." He explains that "it has been and continues to be a reason for consultation for family members of patients in rehabilitation and recovery processes in addictions or chronic illnesses." "It is a phenomenon resulting from having lived in a family where one would have learned to relate in a dysfunctional way," he adds. "It is characterized by emotional dependence, extreme focus on the other, self-neglect, compulsive need to help the other, need to control the other's behavior, low self-esteem, little personal autonomy, emotional repression, compliant attitude, hyper-responsibility, perfectionism, constant worry, difficulty setting boundaries, trusting others..."
Can you imagine it? Let's take a little break to breathe while E. explains it in her own words: "In my worst moments, I didn't even know what food or clothes I liked. I would stand behind a person in the store and buy what they bought. I have cooked for the family and forgotten to make food for myself, I have distributed what was on others' plates and finished it without serving myself."
How one reaches such a limit of self-destruction is well explained, as always, by Melody Beattie: "Codependents have experienced terrible situations while sober. It's no wonder they ended up so disturbed. Who wouldn't be after living with people like that? Codependents have found it very difficult to get the information and practical help they need and deserve. It is already quite challenging to convince people with compulsive disorders to seek help. It is even more complicated to convince someone dealing with codependency (and who seems normal in comparison, although their feeling is different) that they have a problem."
This is precisely what E. dedicates herself to, warning someone, with utmost tact, with infinite delicacy, of what may be happening, as she directs a weekly meeting of Codependents Anonymous in her city on the outskirts of Madrid. A place where this newspaper cannot enter, but can learn about through a recent member we will call B., a lawyer around 50 years old. "I know CoDa thanks to E. It is a recovery program for people who, basically, have human relationships that are, let's say, harmful. That are not entirely functional and are harmful to myself. I had realized some time ago that something was happening to me in my human relationships, especially in romantic relationships, but not only in romantic relationships," she says in a video call where E., B.'s sponsor in CoDa, is also present.
The role of a sponsor is common in Alcoholics Anonymous. It is a person in recovery for a long time who helps others start their recovery. Let's turn to the classic image of an AA meeting from an American movie where someone says, "Hi, my name is so and so, and I am an alcoholic." Similarly, CoDa, as a child of AA, follows the same structure of meetings and talks where anonymity and discretion are paramount. But E. points out the stigma still present in Spanish society when it comes to integrating recovering addicts: "In the United States, you say you've been in Alcoholics Anonymous for 20 years and you get hired in a job interview right away: they value what such an achievement means. Not here, no one hires you here."