Language of Love with Dr. Laura Berman - Codependency and Narcissism: Breaking the Cycle

Episode Date: July 27, 2022

On this episode of “The Language of Love,” I am doing a “Sessions” episode! These are some of my absolutely favorite episodes because I get to sit down with listeners like you and offer my real-time advice on your love, sex, and relationship questions. For today’s session, I am talking to a caller named Lisa. Lisa is struggling with issues with her partner, who she believes could be a narcissist. Lisa’s partner has kept her trapped in a toxic marriage (over 18 years) in which he has threatened her with financial consequences or alienating their kids if she leaves him. Although Lisa is desperate to leave, she is frightened to exit the relationship. Lisa is a self-described codependent who has always struggled with expressing her needs and standing up for herself. Although she reports that her childhood was relatively happy, as I explain to her, codependency is not a trait we develop in adulthood. It’s a trait we establish in childhood as a way to survive and cope in our family systems. In discussing her childhood with Lisa, we discover that her mother and father had a similar marriage to the one Lisa now finds herself in. Her mother spent her life serving her father and ensuring that his every need was met, and now Lisa finds herself in a similar situation. On this “Sessions” episode, I delve into codependency and the fundamental wound which can lead to codependency. I also reveal how codependency and narcissism can be two sides of the same coin. Although this might sound shocking, people who struggle with codependency can often have shades of narcissism, just as people who struggle with narcissism can also have shades of codependency. Tune into this episode of “The Language of Love” to learn more about what causes codependency and why I feel it is related to narcissism. Check out the advice I have for Lisa about leaving her marriage and healing her fundamental wounds, then shoot me your opinions on social media! I love to hear from you: And, remember, you too can do a “Sessions” episode with me if you email me at [e-mail] or private message me on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hey, I'm sex, love, and relationship therapist, Dr. Laura Berman, and for the last 30 years, I've been helping people learn to love and be loved better. Welcome to the Language of Love Sessions. This is where I get to work with you one-on-one, on air. You, my listeners, my goal in these sessions is to empower you to enjoy better relationships, both with others and with yourself, and to help you embrace how precious and sacred your body, your love life, and your sexuality really is. It's time we all become fluent in the language of love. Lisa, tell me what's going on. How can I help?

First of all, thank you so much for this. I'm really excited and nervous. Oh, don't be nervous. I've been working through something for a very long time, actually. It feels like forever. It feels like for most of my marriage around codependency and narcissism. I don't love to use these labels. However, it seems to be that when I understand it, the patterns of behavior is the feelings associated with the label pops up somehow. Yeah. That's okay. Yeah. Even like gaslighting, it's such a hard word for me and a term to understand, but sometimes I'm experiencing it and it is the crazy making and it just so happens. I'll hop on like a video and I'll be

like, oh my God, those are like the last three sentences he just said to me. It gives me a sense of understanding what I just experienced. Yeah. So I guess my question is exiting this type of relationship. Why is it? It's so hard. So do you want to exit and there's just fear standing in the way or what's standing in the way of you leaving? Okay. So the work that I've done around this will probably say fear. Okay. You know, there's financial abuse every time I talk about it, or there's an indication of me leaving. It's like the abuse around, well, okay, no money for you. Oh, I'm not going to pay for this. I'm not going to pay for that. So, and that's existed in my 18 year marriage. Yeah. Financial control. Control, abuse, taking away of things.

So you're worried about the consequences of leaving him, the financial consequences, any other consequences? I also think family life, what family looks like. I have two sons, they're teenagers, 15 and 16. So I worry about that. Let's just dive in. I'm already got things like coming into my, okay. Okay. All right. You're the codependent, right? Yes. If we're putting labels on things. Yes. And every narcissist needs a codependent. Of course. Yes. And you don't become a codependent in your marriage. You become a codependent in your child. Understood. Yes. Okay. So who is the narcissist growing up? Which parent? So hard to actually identify that because I don't see those

type of things like the way I notice them now as an adult between me and my partner. If I were to guess my mom is the codependent and my dad is a narcissist because I see codependency. I see that in her. Yeah. And so what was your relationship with your dad like? What was it growing up? Nothing too crazy. He was working. We're immigrant family coming here, working to make a lot of money, make sure that I can support my kids, bringing my family over from the other country, everybody living here. I remember that. I remember my mom was a stay-at-home mom. So she was present, available, honest. What was their relationship like? Just her needing to be there for him. And what happened when she wasn't?

I don't think that she wasn't. I think that she always was. Was there ever anxiety like, oh, I have to get this done before your dad comes home? Or was there this sort of inherent urgency in her efforts to? I remember my sister and I both remember this leaving the house one day and seeing my dad drive the other way, like he was driving home. and my mom's like, oh, I have to turn around and go see if he needs something. We were teenagers. So it's both of us have the same memory. And it was like weird. We're like, why? Right. So he was her focus. Yes. Did you get approval, love, affection from him? No, I would say disappointment, try harder, do more. I remember that. I remember a lot of,

okay good but you need to do more the bar kept getting higher yeah you did that okay but i think we need to do this too and what about criticism criticism that felt like criticism like what i was doing wasn't good enough no i agree but what about like you're talking about when you accomplish something saying okay good but the bar is higher you didn't do enough right that is a kind of criticism, but what about overt criticism of criticizing your behavior or your looks or your personality? I don't remember that from him. I remember that from my mom. Really? I remember that from my mom. Yeah. Very focused on looks, very focused on behavior, very focused on this is how girls should be very focused on being presentable. And would she be critical? Like

would she say, you look horrible, go do such and such? Or would she just push you to go do such and such? This is interesting. She was very critical of my sister. And I think I watched that. Your sister was older. I know my sister was younger. She was critical of the way she's friendlier than you. You should be more friendly. Oh, comparing you to her. I would say, okay. So comparison, she was critical of her weight. She was always like, you know, nobody is going to like you if you're overweight. And it's funny. I became the one that was like, then became obsessed with how I look and my weight. And I never had like a weight problem. Maybe now. Why wouldn't you? You're watching your mother say that to your sister. You're thinking, holy crap, don't do that.

You better not let that happen to you because the fundamental wound of the codependent. Here's what's tricky about, and you already brought this up with your labels, Mm-hmm. Your caveat about labels, right? The thing about codependence, and this took me a long time to figure out personally as a recovering codependent, is that codependent and narcissism are kind of on the same spectrum. And lots of codependents have narcissistic traits. They just come out more passive-aggressively. Yeah. And lots of narcissists by nature are codependent because they need that other submissive to be in their narcissistic power. So it sounds to me like your mother was the codependent, your dad was the narcissist in their relationship, and then she

became the narcissist and you became the codependent with her. And the parent-child. Yes. Oh. Yes. So let me just ask you this. Okay. Take a few deep breaths and just get into your body a little bit. Maybe like as you breathe in, breathe light through the top of your head and let it flow through your body and then breathe out deep into the earth, like out your tailbone as you breathe out, the light goes. Just sort of grounding yourself there. And when I say to you, your attractiveness, your lovability, your worthiness of love, your worthiness of praise is all conditional on you behaving, looking, acting the way your mom or your dad or your husband says you need to act, right? Trying that on, where do you feel it in your body?

The upper stomach area. Seat of worthiness, the solar plexus. That's the solar plexus chakra. So just put all of your attention there for a minute and describe to me what the sensation is. Nervous, butterfly, anxious. I actually feel like I want to throw up. Nauseous. Nauseous feelings. Yeah. Stomach dropping.

Stomach dropping. Oh, yeah. Yes. I can feel that too. Okay. So as you tune into that feeling, I'm going to ask you a question and there's no wrong answer. I want you to go with whatever comes first. What is the earliest, earliest, earliest memory you have of feeling this feeling in your belly,

that stomach dropping, butterfly, tight, constriction, nauseous? I want to say like just before I was a teenager. I want to say 11 or 12. Okay. I want you to go see if you can go a little earlier. I am feeling five or six. I don't remember five or six. Do you have any memories of that time in your life?

What am I? Is that kindergarten? I might've been like six or seven. This is something interesting that keeps coming up in my memories. I got sick and I remember thinking to myself when I got sick, like, oh good. Like now she'll take care of me and it'll just be about me. I was under seven or eight. Yeah.

I was young. I don't know my age. And I remember that. And that's about it. Like, I feel like this is so maybe I was younger than that. Yeah. Well, tune back in. Don't get it. Get out of your head because you're going into your intellect. I just did what we do. I know. So go back to your belly. Okay. And don't try to figure it out. Okay. Let's just try this on. Are you tuned back into that tightness and butterflies in your belly? Yeah. It's in my throat too. Yeah. Okay. Those are usually connected. to the solar plexus. Yeah. Okay. But let's let that get a little bigger in your throat.

And is it constricted? Yeah. It feels like there's something in it, in my throat. Okay. So let's ask the same question while you put your attention there. Just whatever scene comes to mind, just don't think. Okay. Don't search. Be completely present with the sensations in your throat. As I ask you, when's the first memory early, early, early that you remember feeling this feeling? Whatever scene pops into your mind. Do you ever remember feeling this feeling? I definitely remember from my teenage years. Okay. So talk about that. Nervous, unknown, not feeling like being chosen, being wanted, unless I performed or did something, and even then it was not enough. I remember that. Is there a scene that comes to mind?

So many. I just, there was always kind of something that went, that kind of, I carried all the time was be different. Then you are. Be different. You're too much. You're too outgoing. You're too loud. You're too, you know, and then that's what I remember. It just was like, well, I'm just being myself. That's how I remember feeling. And so the message for the child and my guess is, because what I was seeing as I was tuning into your throat, and it's interesting, by the time you're a teenager, these stories don't develop. These stories we attach to about what we're worthy of and being too much to not enough, they develop much earlier than teenage years, but that's probably just a period of time where

you were feeling it super strongly. And also you probably don't have a lot of earlier concrete memories because probably it was really painful. And a lot of people who don't have a lot of memories of early childhood, it's because they'd rather not remember, right? Not that there had to have been horrific abuse that you're blocking out or anything like that. I just mean, you don't like to spend a lot of time there. And so you didn't hold on to those memories. They weren't pleasant, right? But what I immediately saw as I was asking you the question was this little girl. She had curly, dark hair and sort of tendrils around her face. It was like in a ponytail and she had on like a white shirt and a blue skirt. Don't ask me why. And she was

like squatting in a yard, digging around happily with like a stick kind of playing outside. And the mother came out and started freaking out and yelling. And there was this moment and I'm not saying this is the memory that you should have, but I think this is the encompassing feeling of I'm in flow. I'm being in flow. I'm being myself. I'm exploring the world. I'm playing and enjoying. And all of a sudden, my mother comes out and yells at me for just being in my essence. I mean, the child isn't articulating it in their mind this way, but that's what the child thinks is like, oh, I'm supposed to be exactly what you said, what you remember from your teenage years.

I'm too much. I'm not enough. I'm not, me being me is going to get me yelled at, punished, or criticized. Calculating route to avoid seeing poverty. Turn left to bypass the unhoused youth sleeping on the street. Then keep right to skip by the lines of people

waiting for food. Steer clear of the crowded shelter turning people away. Then take the next exit. let's stop looking away and get in the way of rising poverty your donations help the united way fight poverty in thousands of ways like providing food shelter and crisis prevention donate today at unitedwaygt.org and so if the very essence of you is criticized and you're told not to be who you are it's really hard to feel worthy of love and then you meet a man and my guess is your husband says many of the same things to you. Yes. He's reenacting for you, your childhood.

Yes. Both your mother and your father, because he's telling you constantly, okay, that's fine, but you should be doing more. Right. And he's telling you constantly, you're too much of something. You're not enough of something like your mother. So you had it from both sides from your parents. And by the way, I'm not saying they're bad people or bad parents. We all just do the best we can with the resources and emotional maturity that we have. So it's not intended to say you grew up with horrific parents. It just means it's really important to get clarity on where those wounds started and why they were there.

Because if you don't, then they drive you in life, right? And you make choices from your wounds. And that's what you did with your husband. So the same fear you are facing now in standing for yourself. setting the boundaries that you want to set, whether that's leaving or just saying, no, don't talk to me this way, whatever boundaries they are. You've never had practice doing that ever. Never. And you are still operating according to that little girl's world view. The person you are now that I'm talking to, the woman you are now knows intellectually

that she is worthy, you know, but she's not the one keeping you in the relationship. And that's, I think, where the tug of war is happening, right? Because there's you who is saying this isn't okay. And if my girlfriend or my daughter or somebody was in a relationship with this, I'd be saying, get the hell out of there. Hell no. But for some reason, I'm too scared to leave. And the one who's too scared to leave is the one that still is dying for her parents' approval and love. And by the way, children experience love and approval as the same thing. Yes. So if approval is always withheld from you one way or another, no matter what you do, the approval bar is always going to be higher. And by the way, your parents were doing

this with love, right? They were thinking, okay, if we're hard on her, it's not like they were trying to make you feel like crap about yourself. This was their misguided way of pushing you to thrive. And a lot of parents were raised this way and raised their own kids this way, right? Who didn't know any better. But what happens is when with approval is always withheld either through hypercriticism, your mother, or the bar is always going to be higher, your father, you never get approval ever. And same in your marriage. You never get approval. That's right. There's no approval.

There's no acceptance. There's no validation. Yeah. So eventually, a couple of things about leaving your relationship. First of all, as in all things, the pain of being in this relationship has to get greater than your fear of leaving it. And there will be that tipping point. There will be, especially if you keep doing your own healing work.

It's kind of where I am right now. Yeah. And it's going to be scary as hell to do that, to leave, because you have never had an opportunity to practice standing for yourself. And this is a big stance. But I will tell you this, your teenage boys have been raised with this model of what love looks like. And you still have an opportunity to show them something different. If you were to leave this relationship and stand for yourself, the bravery and the courageousness that that requires, I understand. And a narcissist will make it hard for you to leave. They are very vindictive. So they will

be vindictive. Will he be successful? Probably not. I mean, unless he's someone who's really mercurial and good at hiding money and has shell companies and everything else, he's going to have to pay. That's just him manipulating and controlling you through threats, but you have to come to a point where a couple of things, one, your peace and value of yourself is more important than the potential consequences of what punishments he tries to create as you leave and the model that you are going to be setting for your boys when you show them that you are standing for yourself. And this is what a strong woman does. And it's not okay. You don't even have to have an explicit conversation with them about all of this.

It's just through your actions, you're going to model that it's not okay to behave this way in love. And they are old enough now. They're going to go to college soon. They're old enough to make their own decisions about relationships. It's not like they're two and three, right? And this is going to really deeply affect their lives to have their homes disrupted. What people don't understand about divorce and children is everyone says, oh, it's so bad for children. It's not. Actually, it's worse for them to be in a home with such unhappiness. All they want is for each of you to be whole and happy. The thing that predicts for their pain is not whether or not you get divorced. It's to what degree you put the kids in the middle and you won't do that. I can't promise

your husband won't, but you won't do that. And to what degree you make them feel like they have to choose and to what degree you disrupt their lives logistically. And even that, even if all of that is hard because it's on your husband's side, right? You can't control what he's going to do and say and manipulate and whatever. Even if that happens, they're still going to be okay because they're pretty much baked. I love it. Raising of them, trust my presence with them, trust my connection with them. I was just kind of sitting with that earlier today, actually, before I got on the call with you, I was just sitting with that and modeling for them. That's a fear because I fear that they will blame me, that I will be the one breaking up the family.

And, you know, you see the, the way you go on family vacations and all those things that the pretty pictures, the pretty pictures, which are just pictures. Yeah. Right. It's so much more valuable for them to have a model of what healthy love looks like than to be in pretty family vacations that look good on instagram watching their mother be humiliated by their father right calculating route to avoid seeing poverty turn left to bypass the unhoused youth sleeping on the street then keep right to skip by the lines of people waiting for food steer clear of the crowded shelter turning people away then take the next exit let's stop looking away and get in the And if they blame you, which I doubt they will, but if they do, that's another opportunity for you to stand for yourself in love and say, I understand this is upsetting and I understand this is scary and I understand that I'm the one that took the initiative.

So in a sense, it is my fault because I'm taking the initiative, but I need you to know that if I felt like I had any other choice to be happy and whole in my relationship, I would take it. And I've tried everything under the sun. And I too am sad that this relationship is ending. And all I can tell you, because you're not going to malign their father and you're not going to talk shit about their father to them. But the only thing I can tell you is that I have tried and done everything I can.

And this has nothing to do with the two of you. It's nothing to do with how much you're loved. This has to do with the fact that I can't stay in this relationship. And if you have judgments about that, that's okay. I'm still going to love you through it. And if you don't want to talk to me for a little while, that's okay too. I'm going to be texting you every day and calling you every day and hear as soon as you want to talk and let you know that there's no punishment for that.

That feels so good to my body, what you're saying. good. How does that feel in your throat? It's like almost I'll be okay if they do blame me because part of the situation is, and maybe it's the codependency over explaining, right? Always making a choice, doing something, being criticized. You're like, no, no, no, but wait, let me tell you why I did that. Right. That's the codependent in me. Proving and convincing. Proving. And in a way, I just like this kind of just came to me like if they do blame me it's almost like an opportunity to be codependent and be like I want to tell you something yeah like I tried everything yeah and I said to myself it was probably like 10 years ago I said I will not leave until I know I have tried

every single thing I was not on this journey of codependency I like recovering codependency I just knew something wasn't right I we were just having problems and I was like no way I can leave been telling no for sure. And you're saying things like, you know, those are the two things I'm struggling with actually right now, as of yesterday, modeling for my boys. And I was at the beach yesterday envisioning what it would feel like if I was at the beach, like just feeling free and not constricted. And I was like, and if my boys saw that in me, like, would that just be everything. And then the other one you just said, which was the blame, like even if they did blame me actually. And as a person who's in the relationship I'm in, I realized about six

months ago, Dr. Laura, that somebody asked me like, who do you blame in your relationship? And actually what I said was I take a thousand percent of the blame to change myself, to be different, right? All of these words that came in through me in December, actually, those were the words that were coming to me. I took a thousand percent. There's no such thing as a thousand percent. And your husband may try to manipulate the boys and they may in fact be manipulated for a little bit, but that's not going to last because every child needs their mother. I don't care how angry they are at you. Oh, wow. If you stay consistent in your love of them and your open heartedness of them, and it's okay for them to be angry because you understand how much of an

upheaval and you're not defending yourself by making their father wrong or bad. And you're not even really trying to defend yourself except to say, I've tried absolutely everything. And if I could stay in this relationship, I would have. And I just want you to trust me and know that I love you and your father loves you. And this has nothing to do with you. And I'm here when and if you want to talk and I'm going to call you tomorrow and the next day and the next day, even if you don't want to talk to me. And they will come around, I promise. And the only reason they'll be angry at you is because either they feel like they're going to lose their father if they're not, which is his problem and his karma, or because they're scared and they don't

know what the new you and their new life will look like. And all you can control is your end of it and creating the most grounded, free, peaceful version of yourself. So then you are a magnet. They're going to want to be around you. They're going to enjoy being, not that they don't enjoy it now, but it's going to be even more wonderful to be around you. And you're giving them a tremendous gift, modeling for them what it looks like to stand for yourself

and what it looks like another possibility, right? You still have the opportunity to find healthy love eventually. And then you get a chance to model for them, they're still young enough, what a healthy relationship looks like and what a respectful, mutually respectful relationship looks like. I mean, you kind of just nailed my two greatest fears that I've been sitting with probably for the last five or six days. I mean, longer, but these were really showing up. Every time I thought about what's holding me, those were the two things, what I'm modeling for my kids and the blame from them. I'm kind of over him now, what he will do. I've kind of accepted that that's

whatever he's going to do, he's going to do. And I cannot control that. But it was then, then it moved into my kids, you know, as you just, that's, that's a different relationship. Yeah. So I appreciate what you just said. And I, what I wrote down was, thank you was, it's another opportunity to express myself, which actually felt like my throat didn't feel so stuck. It felt like, wow, wait a second. That's another opportunity for you in this, in this place. Cause blame has always been project like the, I'm not good enough. And I absorbed that the blame part was really hard for me because I'm the person who always absorbed. Oh, it must be me. Yeah. You've been marinated in that your whole life. It must be you. Right.

It's a very, very knee jerk place for you to be. Anytime you find yourself blaming, I want you to yourself. I want you to go the other direction. I don't mean blaming someone else, but like, no, I am not to blame. Even if you do have your own 50% or a hundred percent, you err so far on the other side. And the constriction in your throat is about the self-expression of being your fully expressed self, which you have never been allowed to be ever, ever, ever. And that's not freaking fair. Even now I hold back. Yeah, right. Because you're not in a situation where you can be fully expressed, right?

There's going to be consequences. There are going to be conflicts. There's going to be anger. There's going to be aggression. There's going to be repression, right? So right now, a lot of what you're doing in this relationship is just trying to stay safe emotionally and to try to avoid conflict at all costs because it's so right with conflict. So you have made yourself small and compressed and constricted in your self-expression.

but imagine who you're going to become and what you're going to be capable of creating for yourself when you can be your fully expressed, authentic self. That's an amazing gift to give your sons. That just feels so good. Wow. That feels really amazing. And I kind of see what that feels like in my body. Yeah. When I was at the beach yesterday, just kind of looking across, it's a little cold. I'm in New York. It's a little cold to go to the beach right now to go in the water, but it was a beautiful day. And I just kind of watched and I said, wow, you might, you'll be here one day, just walking free and not encumbered with all these, everything else. And I just, I felt that I felt that yesterday. Do that as much as humanly possible, because the

more you can be in the energy of that freedom and that possibility, the stronger you're going to feel in your power to change your situation. And you want to be practical. Obviously, go talk to a lawyer. In fact, find the best three lawyers and your divorce lawyers in your town and go consult with all of them because then he can't hire any of them. That's my little trick I always advise people about. Thank you. I like that. So, go consult with the top three divorce lawyers in town. Know what you're getting in for and set yourself up. Don't be impulsive about it because you're dealing with someone who's smart. You need to be practical, but also cultivate, marinate that sense of freedom. Freedom is the word that really resonates with me that you're

talking about because it's the freedom of pure, authentic self-expression. My guess is when you are able and allow yourself, and it won't be in this marriage, but once you're separated or beyond it and you can fully express yourself that way, you're going to discover so many new things about yourself, so many new interests, so many new friends, so many new possibilities. And you're going to really probably get to know yourself fully for the first time since you were that little girl playing in the sand. That's really resonating with me. Yeah. Good. Good. And I want you to keep in touch and let us know what happened and how you're doing, because it's going to be scary. That's why it's so important to cultivate what you're creating in yourself, because that's going to be your touchstone to hold on to when you feel scared. Thank you.

You're welcome. I will keep in touch. I'm crazy for your love I wrote me a prescription But there's no cure for a crush All I wanna do, I wanna do is take you home with me I wanna make a move, I wanna make a move But I'm too

Calculating route to avoid seeing poverty Turn left to bypass the unhoused youth sleeping on the street Then keep right to skip by the lines of people waiting for food Steer clear of the crowded shelter turning people away Then take the next exit Let's stop looking away and get in the way of rising poverty Your donations help the United Way fight poverty in thousands of ways Like providing food, shelter, and crisis prevention

Donate today at unitedwaygt.org