Therapy for Codependency

Is it easy for you to put the needs of others before your own?

Do you sometimes struggle to figure out how you even feel?

Do you find it hard to hold standards for how others treat you? 

Do you worry that holding your boundaries will make others go away?

The fawning impulse is real. We often hear about fight or flight as stress responses, but we don’t often hear about fawning.  Fawning is where when under stress and threat, we disconnect from what we want and need, zero in on what others want and need and give it to them at the expense of our needs.  

It’s a strategy that makes sense in difficult circumstances, and yet when it becomes an ongoing strategy for life, it can come with the side effect of abandoning yourself and tolerating situations that aren’t serving you, and focusing on changing others instead of growing yourself.

If I just do better

If I just give a little more perfectly

If I just wait a little longer for my needs to be met

I need them to be more this, or less that for me to feel okay

These are common thoughts of those who struggle with codependency.

And it’s tricky, because interdependence is healthy, altruism is goof good for us, and striving to be better is a good thing!  

But when this gets out of balance, or relationships aren’t mutual, it can cause problems. 

We can find ourselves lowering our standards, falling in love with people’s potential instead of focusing on what is here right now, or get overly fixated on changing others, neglecting ourselves and failing to set healthy boundaries and care for ourselves.   

Fortunately Brainspotting and EMDR can help heal codependency and establish healthy boundaries and self care.  

It can feel easier to set boundaries

It can feel easier to feel deserving of care and love 

It can feel easier to move towards what you want and away from what you don’t want

And this can make space for calling in a whole lot more of what you really  DO want and deserve in your life! 

I’d love to chat with you about how to heal codependency and get you some relief!