Dalancer

Thanks for your contributions on the Codependency article. I edited out some of the changes made. We ask editors to improve content but not for the purpose of self promotion. The initial paragraph of the article has a good straight forward definition. I added your expanded definition to the Behaviors section. We are already running into criticism that they definition is too broad. I also fixed the formating errors.

This article really needs help in the "Behavior" and "Patterns" sections. 192.136.235.164 (talk)

Thank you for your message.

My intent was to correct the wrong definition used, which as currently displayed relies on a professor who is not a recognized expert in the field of codependency and cites a blog on a website on borderline personality disorder, so it's skewed to describe people involved with borderlines. It also doesn't address the tens of thousands of people who are codependent, though not in a relationship. The narrow definition was over-ridden decades ago based on research showing that the symptoms of the spouses of addicts pre and post-dated their marriages.

Multiple definitions of codependency exist, although none has been empirically derived. (Dear, et al., 2004). Lack of agreement has hampered both testing and its inclusion in the DSM diagnostic manual. One consensual definition was in reached 1989: “A pattern of painful dependency on compulsive behaviors and on approval from others in an attempt to find safety, self-worth and identity.” This would apply to all addictions.

There is rich literature supporting the definition I quoted in my edit, which is similar to that of Pia Melody, John Bradshaw, and Charles Whitfield, as noted below. (You dropped citation to Whitfield's book). (As early as 1988, researchers Friel and Friel wrote that codependency was arrested identity development, stating as I do, that a codependent overreacts to external events, while ignoring internal cues and feelings. Wegscheider-Cruse (1990) sees codependency as a brain disorder that leads codependents to seek the relief of soothing brain chemicals released through substance abuse and compulsive behaviors, including addiction to work, gambling, food, sex, and/or relationships. For relief, “we get into self-defeating behaviors that keep the rush coming. . . The living problems are “results of having the disease of co-dependency not the cause.”

Placing the wounded self at the center of the definition is in line with codependency experts Charles Whitfield (“Codependence is a disease of a lost selfhood,” 1987), Pia Mellody, and John Bradshaw (“a loss of one’s inner reality and an addiction to outer reality”), who states:

The founders of the AA movement, Bill W. and Dr. Bob, were clear about the ultimate problem of alcoholism. For them it was ‘spiritual bankruptcy.’ This is what I have described as the problem of codependency. This ism of alcoholism or any addiction is the inner self-rupture called, variously internalized shame, self-will run riot or co-dependence. (Bradshaw On: The Family, 1997)

BTW in editing, you removed the full citation of publisher John Wiley & Sons, etc. Also, the seminal work by Karen Horney on the self-effacing personality (see Wikipedia) was the first to describe a codependent personality, and has been cited as such. Her analysis is based on intrapsychic conditions and not based on caretaking others.

Dalancer (talk) 07:06, 9 December 2014 (UTC)

Thanks for your suggestions 192.136.235.164 (talk) — Preceding ::undated comment added 16:52, 9 December 2014 (UTC)

Thanks for the edits and advising me of the Wikipedia policy. Now I can understand why my website would be considered objectionable. I thought it would provide a lot of information as there are over 70 articles on the subject.

Here are the full references for the quotes I mentioned.

John Bradshaw states:

The founders of the AA movement, Bill W. and Dr. Bob, were clear about the ultimate problem of alcoholism. For them it was ‘spiritual bankruptcy.’ This is what I have described as the problem of codependency. This ism of alcoholism or any addiction is the inner self-rupture called, variously internalized shame, self-will run riot or co-dependence.” John Bradshaw, (1997) Bradshaw On: The Family: A New Way of Creating Solid Self-Esteem Deerfield Beach, Fl:Health Communications Inc., p. 246.

Codependency is “a loss of one’s inner reality and an addiction to outer reality”), John Bradshaw, (1988) The Family: A Revolutionary Way of Self-Discovery (Deerfield Beach, Fl: Health Communications, Inc., p. 166.

FYI I had added links I thought would be helpful to AL-Anon and CoDA.org.

— Preceding unsigned comment added by Dalancer (talk • contribs) 02:47, 10 December 2014 (UTC)

Thanks!

192.136.235.164 (talk) 07:18, 7 January 2015 (UTC)