Stop The Abuse Of Enabling

You know, when I was contemplating what I should talk about on this podcast, and I came up with something that was inadvertently given to me as a suggestion through a friend who was struggling with the idea of how to disentangle themselves from the enabling kind of behavior that they had gotten into. And it was on both sides, right?

So it's my friend's enabling of the bad behavior of their loved one, but then also from the perspective of somebody who had been causing the enabling, like making the requests for the enabling. And it was interesting because we had talked about previously, and we had a conversation a while ago about the craziness of getting trapped in this enabling kind of experience. And it's a slow erosion of a relationship.

And over time, they had felt like they didn't intend to become an enabler, and the person who was causing the enabling hadn't really intended it to be that, but it just kind of slowly fell into this vortex of enabling. And I'm sitting there listening to it. And during the conversation, it struck me that really kind of what's going on is the history of abuse that the the enabler, the person who was asking for the enabling behavior and then the enabler.

who was the person who was giving to them, there had been this relationship of abuse. And the person, let's just give them names, okay? So the person who was requesting the enabling, let's call that person Bob, and let's call the enabler Steve. So Bob had a history of abuse that had never really been talked about or considered. And Steve had fallen into the trap of enabling abuse. And so Bob's abusive past, which was buried because it was in his childhood. And they had, of course, become...

There was an issue of addiction on Bob's part. So Steve was trying to help Bob out and really didn't consider the fact that what he was doing was he was enabling somebody who had a history of abuse. And the abuse was one of... It included emotional abandonment and neglect, but also there was some other stuff in there. But that was like the primary thing. And so Steve is just kind of helping this person, you know, his friend, seemingly in a positive way.

And on the surface, it really did seem like it was positive. But what ended up happening was Steve was giving to Bob because Bob was seemingly in need and Steve was not considering... or even knew about the abusive past of Bob. Once it was discovered, Steve's reaction was to immediately start to step into a repair mode for Bob and try to help him out of this situation because now he felt even worse for Bob.

And I pointed out to Steve that actually what you're doing is you're kind of furthering the abuse that Bob has experienced in his life because what you've done is you've created... this dependency situation for him because he's depending on you now to fulfill needs that he should be filling himself, for himself. So Bob is now dependent on Steve.

And Steve, having a good heart and being a kind person, was trying to do charitable work and help this person in need and really felt like that was the right thing to do, which I guess it is, but I've got to go back to the scriptural idea of feed a man for a day because you gave him a fish versus teach him how to fish, which is the one that's actually the most helpful, which is, of course, to teach him to fish.

But teaching somebody to fish can be painful and hard and take a long time, especially if they're not very good at it. Or they, on the other hand, are trying not to have to go through the process of the labor of fishing. They're just being sloth-like and lazy and they don't want to do it. So it's easier. So that's what causes this cycle of dependency. And Steve had never really considered the fact that perhaps what he's doing is abusing Bob.

Because Bob's emotional abandonment issues would continue to stay in his life if he was always... needing to have somebody provide for him or help him and he felt helpless and that's the key with this is he felt helpless and Bob really actually was a very capable person or could be when he would put his mind to things, he would actually be able to do them. And most of us are like that, right?

I mean, even if we are being destructive, if we want to be destructive, we sure do figure out ways to be destructive. We can figure out the means to be destructive while we're claiming helplessness. And that was certainly Bob's story, was that he was saying that he was helpless, when in fact he actually wasn't. And Steve was saying, you know, he needs help when actually he needed a different kind of help.

So this is the idea I wanted to get across today is a lesson on abuse, being an abused person or being an abuser.

And sometimes what we do when we're you know handing people things without any expectation of self-reliance or self-direction or healing we're just handing them things over and over again creating a dependent that in fact what you're doing is you're abusing somebody and if you are the person who is receiving the helping hand and then you keep going back over and over and over again and you become dependent. I'll bet it feels a little bit like I'm not sure what to do. This doesn't feel good.

I am glad I got something. Certainly there are those people who are just full on sociopaths and they don't really care for other people's feelings and it doesn't matter to them so they'll just take whatever they can get. Absolutely. But on the other hand, you know, it doesn't probably feel good that you can't do things. I certainly treat clients all the time who have this dependency cycling going on in their lives as they recover from their addiction or they're sliding into addiction.

And it's really interesting because I talk to them about it and when it comes right down to it, they actually don't like it. They are upset about the fact that they are dependent. It's hurting their self-esteem, their self-worth, and it feels bad. They have a hard time saying that, and they certainly don't say that out loud easily. It takes me a while to get it out of them, but they eventually get to where they just, yeah, it doesn't feel right.

So as I'm working with somebody in recovery, trying to make that part of their step four recovery, character defect issue you know issues they have in their lives a lot of issues around in their life are are centered on that idea of dependency if they weren't a dependent a willing participating dependent on someone else or a group of people and they start feeling isolated and lonely and they're not doing what other people are doing so their their social life starts to fall off they don't have a

lot of of healthy relationships with peers of the peers that they have those are the people who were also playing that game and so how do you help somebody and not abuse them and continue the abuse that they had in their life well it's very hard for both of those people in that cycle, the dependent and the dependee, or the enabler and the enablee. So Steve, being the enabler, has to stop enabling, and that feels bad because Steve thought he was doing things to help Bob. He really did.

He thought he was helping him. But when I pointed out, hey, you know, you've told me that Bob now, you understand he has this history of abuse in his past. You know, you're kind of continuing the same abuse, right? And so if you don't provide for him, you are abandoning him. And so now you're afraid that he's going to be re-traumatized with abandonment issues. When in reality, if you teach him to be independent... you can now have a peer relationship.

There can be a more level playing ground that you're walking in. It's like you've become not just situational peers, but age cohort peers, but you're actually relational peers because you probably keep trying to get him to improve his life, right? And at that point, Steve was like, yeah, I just, I hope one day he can get it together. So getting it together, you know, Not getting high or drunk all the time and having a job and having a home and being able to, you know, it'd be nice.

Steve basically said it would be nice if I could do things with him socially where I wasn't in this awkward position of paying for it all the time. And I know that Bob doesn't like that. I see his expression on his face. But I could have him over to my house without feeling like I was always trying to help him. It'd be nice to have just a friend instead of somebody that always needed something. And I think at that point, that was the lesson perhaps for Steve.

On Bob's part, the idea of like ending the dependency abuse cycle is one where he would have to make a change in his belief set or his attitude towards other people. And that might be a little bit hard, especially if he's used to a lifestyle where he's not doing anything. And I certainly have clients that are like that. They're wanting something. They want to live independently. But they've lost the ability to understand that they can.

And so that takes a different kind of recovery from a problem than Steve's. So Steve and Bob are coming at the same thing from two different angles. So if you are a person who is... enabling or causing enabling, right? You're the person who's the dependent. I'll bet if you really did some soul searching, you'd think about how life has not been fair or other people have mistreated me.

And now this is how I'm extracting my my pound of flesh or I'm making somebody else pay for this because other people have abused me. And I can understand how you would think that because if you come from a history of trauma in your background, certainly life was not fair, especially if it was childhood trauma. And so life not being fair is never going to be made up by you constantly going to people and saying, I need help. Please help me.

Because every time you receive something like that in that kind of a circumstance, it takes away a bit of your self-esteem. And like I said, unless you're a full-on sociopath and you don't care about other people's feelings, it does bother you. And being the child in a relationship where there's two adults, because the dependency is... Kind of what children are like, right? I have children, I've had children, and you're responsible for their welfare and their care.

And so I don't expect my seven-year-old daughter to go out and get a job to pay for part of the house that she lives in. That's ridiculous. I expect her to just be a child. And if you were robbed of that opportunity as a child, you were robbed of the opportunity to be a child, certainly that's not fair. But I really do think that if you go out and you try to make people pay the price for that unfairness in your life, you're just continuing to hurt yourself. It wasn't fair.

So how is becoming dependent on other people, how's that fair to you? You're not really living a full life, are you? You're not living life on your terms in a free, full way. And so I guess my words to the Bob people out there who have become dependent on others, think about your self-esteem, think about your self-worth, think about your feel-good part of your pride, not the arrogance part, but the feel-good part.

When you rely on other people and you cannot provide for yourself, that's actually not a healthy state to be in. I guess you could argue that if that is my job, if I'm dependent on other people, my job is to go and ask people for help as a living. And we've all seen those scammers, you know, the lady that's standing on the side of the street in the middle of the day who's got a sign that says, I'm homeless, please help me. And she's got her child with her. Those kind of things.

It's always enraging. I remember walking through Costco one time and a woman was walking around with a small 3x5 card that she had written on it that she didn't speak English and that she was in dire need of help. And she's walking around in Costco with a shopping cart and it's got things in it. And she's asking for money at Costco and she's got her child in the cart. And she's handing me the card and it's a laminated card. And I'm looking at it and she just says, no English.

And I'm like, wow, panhandling in Costco. Now that's a first. I haven't experienced that one. And I just looked and then I looked in her cart and I was like, wow, so you're What are you doing? I'm not sure that that person has the capacity to feel bad. I'll bet that person feels like that is their job. This is their employment is panhandling in the Costco with their kid.

So I'm not suggesting that that person is reachable with an understanding that You know, they're working on their self-esteem by not doing that and going out and actually seeking real employment and living a fulfilling life of independence. So just forget that person, that kind of person, the one on the street or with a sign or whatever. You know, that's a different situation.

But you who are dependent on drugs or alcohol and you're dependent on other people to pay your rent, your phone, your insurance. perhaps even your therapy sessions, your food. I'm trying to think of other expenses. Electricity, cable, you know, all that stuff adds up. Where we live here in Northern Virginia, that's probably about $3,000 a month at a minimum. And you have to generate that revenue to live here.

Other parts of the country, perhaps in New York City or Los Angeles, it might be more, but... If you're not in a situation in a very expensive part of the country, it may not be that high. But if you're going to become independent, you must make a couple of changes. So the changes that you make will help build your self-esteem.

And if you are a person who is a family member who is caught in that cycle of... creating dependency by the enabling behaviors if you cut them off you are part of the solution trust me if you cut them off you're part of the solution you are not now making the problem worse your abuse of contributing to the person's dependency is actually what's making it worse And I know that that seems perhaps counterintuitive, but you're abusing that person.

And you're probably reenacting the kinds of abuse that they had in their past. And I'm sure that that is not your intended consequence. That's the unintended consequence. And it certainly is not the one that you're thinking you're doing. But in fact, that is what you're doing. So let's stop the abusive cycle. You know, life is short enough as it is.

And if you're caught and you lose in this dependency cycling and you spend 10 or 15 or 20 years enabling someone's bad behavior or their dependency, or you are a person who demands that there be that support that's inappropriate and create the dependency yourself as an addict, hey, it's time to get off that cycle because it's really not worth it and it's damaging and it's abusing you. You're participating in self-abuse when that happens.

So if you can provide help to somebody, you're helping them up, you're not helping them out. You've got to help them up. It's a hand up, not a hand out. So teach that person to fish. Teach them independence. And it's painful to watch them suffer. I get it. But the suffering is short-lived, especially if they want to end the suffering themselves because they want to learn how to fish. And they'd rather I fish for myself than have you provide fish for me because this feels horrible.

So end that cycle of abuse. If you're the Steves in the world and you're providing help to somebody, help them up. Don't help them out. And if you are a person who has been stuck in the cycling of dependence and you created that for yourself, you need help. So get the help. But the help is not give me $50 so I can eat right now and then a week later give me $50 more and $50 more a week after that and so on and so on. It's let's learn how to fish. You know what? You can fish. And it feels good.

It feels good to become independent instead of dependent. It feels much better. It gets rid of the helplessness. And it ends that cycling of abuse that perhaps you grew up with, whatever it was, the physical or sexual abuse or the verbal emotional abuse or the abandonment. It ends that cycle. And so if you're not being abused and you're not putting yourself in abusive situations any longer, guess what happens to your self-esteem? It starts going up. Guess what happens to your mental health?

It starts improving. Depression goes, anxiety goes. Guess what happens to your physical health? You get healthier. The problems that you had, the ulcers, the anxiety-induced problems with colds and flus and illnesses and all the stress hormones, they're all gone. So your body reacts in a very positive way. So it's It's very much a win-win situation for the person who is causing the dependence, the contributing, the one who's giving, giving, giving.

And it's a win-win-win for the person who is constantly dependent because not only do you get your mental health back, you get your physical health back, then you get your social relationships back. And that's got to feel much better. So let's stop the abuse. That's the message I wanted to give is let's stop the abuse. Stop being abusers by contributing to dependency and stop the abuse yourself by asking for things without learning how to fish. Learn to fish. It's fun.

Get out in the fresh air, on the water and the trees and the nature. Kind of a metaphor. Metaphorically. Not, you know, it feels better. It's very freeing. So go out there and learn how to do that. And if you need help with that, you can always seek professional help because people are out there, like myself, who want to help you get better and not be dependent. Be free and happy and contributing to society and to yourself and enjoying the relationships you have. Do it now. Don't wait. Go do it.

Well, that's it for this edition of Doc Shock, Your Addiction Lifeguard. I am Dr. Shock DeBruker. Doc Shock, Your Addiction Lifeguard. Hanging out at the beach of misery to pull you out of the water to keep you from drowning in sadness and sorrow. If you're in need of help, please go get it. Go to a rehab. It's an awesome experience, and it helps you on your launching to the destination of sobriety, sane, stable, and sober.

So if you need help, you can reach out That's me, Doc Shock, at my website, wellspringmindbody.com, and ask for help. I'll help you out. It's been a blast visiting with you today, and tune in again for the next episode of Doc Shock, Your Addiction Lifeguard. So let's all get sober out there, shall we? See ya.