Jen's Personal Bill of Rights

1) I have the right to say what is on my mind

2) I have the right to be happy or sad

3) I have the right to express my own opinions and beliefs

4) I have the right to change my mind

5) I have the right not to make a decision until I am ready to do so

6) I have the right to say ‘ I don’t understand’

7) I have the right to say ‘ yes’ or ‘ no’ without explaining myself

8) I have the right to feel ALL my emotions

9) I have the right to accept or decline help without undue shame, anxiety or guilt

10) I have the right to decline responsibility for other peoples problems

11) I have the right to change my mind if I feel like it

12) I have the right to be illogical in making decisions

13) I have the right to my own time

14) I have the right to say ‘ I don’t care’

15) I have the right to set my own rules and priorities

16) I have the right to be listened to, and taken seriously

17) I have the right to make mistakes

18) I have the right to my own friends and acquaintances and how and when to spend time with them. I may, but don’t have to, justify these choices to others

19) I have the right to choose if, when and how to respectfully tell others how their actions are affecting me and to take responsibility for doing so

20) I have the right to take all the time I need to evaluate and make important life decisions. If this stresses other people, they are responsible for asserting their needs and I am responsible for balancing them with mine

21) I have the right to distinguish between who other people SAY I AM, and WHO I REALLY AM

22) I have the right to choose how and when to fill my needs, even if my choices conflict with other people’s values or wishes.

23) I have the right to decide if and when, I choose to forgive my mistakes or anyone else’s mistakes.

Are you struggling too?

I have had several people asking me about what I have discovered about myself.  Wanting to know where to look, and what to research, so I am going to post a few different things here:


Codependency involves a habitual system of thinking, feeling, and behaving toward ourselves and others that can cause pain.
Codependent behaviors or habits are self-destructive.
We frequently react to people who are destroying themselves; we react by learning to destroy ourselves. These habits can lead us into, or keep us in, destructive relationships that don't work. These behaviors can sabotage relationships that may otherwise have worked. These behaviors can prevent us from finding peace and happiness with the most important person in our lives.... ourselves. These behaviors belong to the only person we can change.. ourselves. These are our problems.
The following are characteristics of codependent persons: (We started to do these things out of necessity to protect ourselves and meet our needs.)

Care Taking

Codependents may,
1. Think and feel responsible for other people---for other people's feelings, thoughts, actions, choices, wants, needs, well-being, lack of well-being, and ultimate destiny.
2. Feel anxiety, pity, and guilt when other people have a problem.
3. Feel compelled --almost forced -- to help that person solve the problem, such as offering unwanted advice, giving a rapid-fire series of suggestions, or fixing feelings.
4. Feel angry when their help isn't effective.
5. Anticipate other people's needs
6. Wonder why others don't do the same for them.
7. Don't really want to be doing, doing more than their fair share of the work, and doing things other people are capable of doing for themselves.
8. Not knowing what they want and need, or if they do, tell themselves what they want and need is not important.
9. Try to please others instead of themselves.
10. Find it easier to feel and express anger about injustices done to others rather than injustices done to themselves.
11. Feel safest when giving.
12. Feel insecure and guilty when somebody gives to them.
13. Feel sad because they spend their whole lives giving to other people and nobody gives to them.
14. Find themselves attracted to needy people.
15. Find needy people attracted to them.
16. Feel bored, empty, and worthless if they don't have a crisis in their lives, a problem to solve, or someone to help.
17. Abandon their routine to respond to or do something for somebody else.
18. Over commit themselves.
19. Feel harried and pressured.
20. Believe deep inside other people are somehow responsible for them.
21. Blame others for the spot the codependents are in.
22. Say other people make the codependents feel the way they do.
23. Believe other people are making them crazy.
24. Feel angry, victimized, unappreciated, and used.
25. Find other people become impatient or angry with them for all of the preceding characteristics.

Low Self Worth

Codependents tend to:
1. Come from troubled, repressed, or dysfunctional families.
2. Deny their family was troubled, repressed or dysfunctional.
3. Blame themselves for everything.
4. Pick on themselves for everything, including the way they think, feel, look, act, and behave.
5. Get angry, defensive, self-righteous, and indigent when others blame and criticize the codependents -- something codependents regularly do to themselves.
6. Reject compliments or praise
7. Get depressed from a lack of compliments and praise (stroke deprivation)
8. Feel different from the rest of the world.
9. Think they're not quite good enough.
10. Feel guilty about spending money on themselves or doing unnecessary or fun things for themselves.
11. Fear rejection.
12. Take things personally.
13. Have been victims of sexual, physical, or emotional abuse, neglect, abandonment, or alcoholism.
14. Feel like victims.
15. Tell themselves they can't do anything right.
16. Be afraid of making mistakes.
17. Wonder why they have a tough time making decisions.
18. Have a lot of "shoulds".
19. Feel a lot of guilt.
20. Feel ashamed of who they are.
21. Think their lives are not worth living.
22. Try to help other people live their lives instead.
23. Get artificial feelings of self-worth from helping others.
24. Get strong feelings of low self-worth ---embarrassment, failure, etc...from other people's failures and problems.
25. Wish good things would happen to them.
26. Believe good things never will happen.
27. Believe they don't deserve good things and happiness.
28. Wish others would like and love them.
29. Believe other people couldn't possibly like and love them.
30. Try to prove they're good enough for other people.
31. Settle for being needed.

Repression

Many Codependents:
1. Push their thoughts and feelings out of their awareness because of fear and guilt.
2. Become afraid to let themselves be who they are.
3. Appear rigid and controlled.

Obsession

Codependents tend to:
1. Feel terribly anxious about problems and people.
2. Worry about the silliest things.
3. Think and talk a lot about other people.
4. Lose sleep over problems or other people's behavior.
5. Worry
6. Never Find answers.
7. Check on people.
8. Try to catch people in acts of misbehavior.
9. Feel unable to quit talking, thinking, and worrying about other people or problems.
10. Abandon their routine because they are so upset about somebody or something.
11. Focus all their energy on other people and problems.
12. Wonder why they never have any energy.
13. Wonder why they can't get things done.

 Controlling

Many codependents:
1. Have lived through events and with people that were out of control, causing the codependents sorrow and disappointment.
2. Become afraid to let other people be who they are and allow events to happen naturally.
3. Don't see or deal with their fear of loss of control.
4. Think they know best how things should turn out and how people should behave.
5. Try to control events and people through helplessness, guilt, coercion, threats, advice-giving, manipulation, or domination.
6. Eventually fail in their efforts or provoke people's anger.
7. Get frustrated and angry.
8. Feel controlled by events and people.

Denial

Codependents tend to:
1. Ignore problems or pretend they aren't happening.
2. Pretend circumstances aren't as bad as they are.
3. Tell themselves things will be better tomorrow.
4. Stay busy so they don't have to think about things.
5. Get confused.
6. Get depressed or sick.
7. Go to doctors and get tranquilizers.
8. Become workaholics.
9. Spend money compulsively.
10. Overeat.
11. Pretend those things aren't happening either.
12. Watch problems get worse.
13. Believe lies.
14. Lie to themselves.
15. Wonder why they feel like they're going crazy.

Dependency

Many codependents:
1. Don't feel happy, content, or peaceful with themselves.
2. Look for happiness outside themselves.
3. Latch onto whoever or whatever they think can provide happiness.
4. Feel terribly threatened by the loss of any thing or person they think proves their happiness.
5. Didn't feel love and approval from their parents.
6. Don't love themselves.
7. Believe other people can't or don't love them.
8. Desperately seek love and approval.
9. Often seek love from people incapable of loving.
10. Believe other people are never there for them.
11. Equate love with pain.
12. Feel they need people more than they want them.
13. Try to prove they're good enough to be loved.
14. Don't take time to see if other people are good for them.
15. Worry whether other people love or like them.
16. Don't take time to figure out if they love or like other people.
17. Center their lives around other people.
18. Look for relationships to provide all their good feelings.
19. Lost interest in their own lives when they love.
20. Worry other people will leave them.
21. Don't believe they can take care of themselves.
22. Stay in relationships that don't work.
23. Tolerate abuse to keep people loving them.
24. Feel trapped in relationships.
25. Leave bad relationships and form new ones that don't work either.
26. Wonder if they will ever find love.

Poor Communication

Codependents frequently:
1. Blame
2. Threaten
3. Coerce
4. Beg
5. Bribe
6. Advise
7. Don't say what they mean.
8. Don't mean what they say.
9. Don't know what they mean.
10. Don't take themselves seriously.
11. Think other people don't take the codependents seriously.
12. Take themselves too seriously.
13. Ask for what they want and need indirectly --- sighing, for example.
14. Find it difficult to get to the point.
15. Aren't sure what the point is.
16. Gauge their words carefully to achieve a desired effect.
17. Try to say what they think will please people.
18. Try to say what they think will provoke people.
19. Try to say what they hop will make people do what they want them to do.
20. Eliminate the word NO from their vocabulary.
21. Talk too much.
22. Talk about other people.
23. Avoid talking about themselves, their problems, feelings, and thoughts.
24. Say everything is their fault.
25. Say nothing is their fault.
26. Believe their opinions don't matter.
27. Want to express their opinions until they know other people's opinions.
28. Lie to protect and cover up for people they love.
29. Have a difficult time asserting their rights.
30. Have a difficult time expressing their emotions honestly, openly, and appropriately.
31. Think most of what they have to say is unimportant.
32. Begin to talk in Cynical, self-degrading, or hostile ways.
33. Apologize for bothering people.

Weak Boundaries

Codependents frequently:
1. Say they won't tolerate certain behaviors from other people.
2. Gradually increase their tolerance until they can tolerate and do things they said they would never do.
3. Let others hurt them.
4. Keep letting others hurt them.
5. Wonder why they hurt so badly.
6. Complain, blame, and try to control while they continue to stand there.
7. Finally get angry.
8. Become totally intolerant.

Lack of Trust

Codependents
1. Don't trust themselves.
2. Don't trust their feelings.
3. Don't trust their decisions.
4. Don't trust other people.
5. Try to trust untrustworthy people.
6. Think God has abandoned them.
7. Lose faith and trust in God.

Anger

Many Codependents:
1. Feel very scared, hurt, and angry
2. Live with people who are very scared, hurt, and angry.
3. Are afraid of their own anger.
4. Are frightened of other people's anger.
5. Think people will go away if anger enters the picture.
6. Feel controlled by other people's anger.
7. Repress their angry feelings.
8. Think other people make them feel angry.
9. Are afraid to make other people feel anger.
10. Cry a lot, get depressed, overact, get sick, do mean and nasty things to get even, act hostile, or have violent temper outbursts.
11. Punish other people for making the codependents angry.
12. Have been shamed for feeling angry.
13. Place guilt and shame on themselves for feeling angry.
14. Feel increasing amounts of anger, resentment, and bitterness.
15. Feel safer with their anger than hurt feelings.
16. Wonder if they'll ever not be angry.

Sex Problems.

Some codependents:
1. Are caretakers in the bedroom.
2. Have sex when they don't want to.
3. Have sex when they'd rather be held, nurtured, and loved.
4. Try to have sex when they're angry or hurt.
5. Refuse to enjoy sex because they're so angry at their partner
6. Are afraid of losing control.
7. Have a difficult time asking for what they need in bed.
8. Withdraw emotionally from their partner.
9. Feel sexual revulsion toward their partner.
10. Don't talk about it.
11. Force themselves to have sex, anyway.
12. Reduce sex to a technical act.
13. Wonder why they don't enjoy sex.
14. Lose interest in sex.
15. Make up reasons to abstain.
16. Wish their sex partner would die, go away, or sense the codependent's feelings.
17. Have strong sexual fantasies about other people.
18. Consider or have an extramarital affair.

Miscellaneous

Codependents tend to:
1. Be extremely responsible.
2. Be extremely irresponsible.
3. Become martyrs, sacrificing their happiness and that of others for causes that don't require sacrifice.
4. Find it difficult to feel close to people.
5. Find it difficult to have fun and be spontaneous.
6. Have an overall passive response to codependency -- crying, hurt, helplessness.
7. Have an overall aggressive response to codependency -- violence, anger, dominance.
8. Combine passive and aggressive responses.
9. Vacillate in decisions and emotions.
10. Laugh when they feel like crying.
11. Stay loyal to their compulsions and people even when it hurts.
12. Be ashamed about family, personal, or relationship problems.
13. Be confused about the nature of the problem.
14. Cover up, lie, and protect the problem.
15. Not seek help because they tell themselves the problem isn't bad enough, or they aren't important enough.
16. Wonder why the problem doesn't go away.

Progressive

In the later stages of codependency, codependents may:
1. Feel lethargic.
2. Feel depressed.
3. Become withdrawn and isolated.
4. Experience a complete loss of daily routine and structure.
5. Abuse or neglect their children and other responsibilities.
6. Feel hopeless.
7. Begin to plan their escape from a relationship they feel trapped in.
8. Think about suicide.
9. Become violent.
10. Become seriously emotionally, mentally, or physically ill.
11. Experience an eating disorder (over- or under eating)
12. Become addicted to alcohol or other drugs.


Dr. Irene's Page

Quality Time

I will start this post out by saying that I have had a TREMENDOUS amount of amazingly positive things happen in the past few weeks, but like most people you are less like the write or "vent" when things are going well.  So I absolute plan on writing some positive posts soon, I just need to get this out.  This is the reason, after all, that I started this blog.

There have been a few things that have been continuously coming up in my life.  And I am not exactly sure why. The first being the fact that I get extremely upset at my children when they start picking at each other.  For instance, if my daughter starts picking at my son, I get very angry at her.  And vice versa, if my son keeps annoying my daughter, I get very angry at him.  Secondly, I have been overwhelmingly angry at my daughter during homework time.  I can't seem to handle it when she doesn't "get it".  And lastly, I basically have a weekly melt down because I want to see my boyfriend, we only get to see each other on Sundays and Mondays (granted it is the entire 2 days).  By Thursday usually, I am beside myself.  And I end up fighting with him for whatever reason, essentially pushing him away.  So these are the 3 things I would like to deal with in this blog.

Lets start with the boyfriend.  Him and I started dating long before I ever found out I was codependent.  And I have to be honest, trying to maintain a relationship with him during my recover has proven to be extremely difficult.  As I try and find my voice, and stand up for my own thoughts and emotions, I run into road blocks with him telling me that I am overreacting and being irrational.  Which I don't necessarily disagree with him, but I still want to be acknowledged.  If I say that for some reason the sky appears purple to me, I know it's not purple, but still, I see purple.  I want someone to help me understand why I am seeing purple.

My therapist and I have been talking about this very thing, and she often tells me, when did you feel like this as a child?  And I don't even have to think about that one.  Of course, my relationship with my dad.  I could have screamed my wants and needs to my dad until I was blue in the face, but he still did whatever he wanted to do.  Which is probably the reason, that I began hiding away my deepest, passions, dreams, and emotions.  No one cared, so why bother.  And I literally, had not one soul to talk to.  All I really needed was for my dad to want me.  To want to talk to me, to want to love me, to want to hold me and call me his favorite.

 But instead, I got lectures about how I was the oldest, and I needed to step up and be a spiritual example to my sister and brother.  If I wanted to do something such as get my ears pierced, I had to go into the Bible and write a short essay on where it said it was acceptable to get my ears pierced.  My dad had read the Bible from cover to cover MANY times.  He knew that was an impossible feat.  I was probably 10 or 11 at this point.  I started babysitting my sister and brother when I was 8 years old.  I remember my mom telling me that my dad was pretty hands off with me and my sister.  He didn't really get involved with the kids until my brother was born.  My brother changed my dad, I guess.

Once I became a teenager, I started acting out.  My dad didn't notice me when I was following all of the rules, so maybe he would notice me if I wasn't following the rules.  That somewhat backfired on me.  He started a new job with FedEx, and was gone some times for 2 weeks at a time.  It became a game for me.  How much can I get away with before he notices.  Because my mom already knew, she just turned a blind eye.  And anyway, I didn't want her attention.  I wanted my daddy's attention.  My knight in shining armor.  The man I had put on a pedestal.  And he just simply did not want me.  It wasn't until I had become addicted to my "recreational use of drugs" that he noticed me.  This is when he had me sent to jail, and then rehab.  More time away from him.  Still to this day, I can't get my dad to notice me.  I will call him to talk to him, and he interrupts me MID-SENTENCE to tell me he has to go.  Thankfully, my God has proven to me this past month that he has paid very close attention to me all of these years in reminding me of the passions that make me, Jen.  So I have faith that I will overcome this extraordinary pain that I am carrying.

Knowing that, you can see why I fight so hard to be heard, and to be noticed.  But I am fighting to the detriment of my relationship. Sometimes I just want to give in, and stop trying to get him to not only hear me, but listen to the cries deepest in my heart.  To give up trying to get him to see my side of the story and where I am coming from.  But to do that would just throw me back into the viscous cycle of always looking for something to fill me up or someone to tell me that I am worth it.  I need to know that I am worth it and embrace that fact on my own.  Because I am beautifully and wonderfully made.  I am loved by many, and most importantly loved by my Creator.

So how then, do I get my wants and needs across to others without sounding needy, bitchy, and annoying?  Well the answer just floated into my mind.  When I stop trying so hard to be noticed and heard, that is when the cries of my heart will scream the loudest.  Meaning, I need to start focusing on loving myself, and taking care of my own needs.  Which means I am going to need an action plan, in order to remember these things.  My therapist wants me to write my own "Bill of Rights".  That will be a good starting point.  I also need to have some activities ready to go for when I start getting really lonely, and begin desperately reaching out for the love and acceptance of others.

Action Plan

• Make a list of projects around the house I want to complete.  When I am lonely, pick one and get to work.
• Have a favorite book handy to pick up and read when I want to pick up the phone and start dialing or texting.
• If I am kid free, look for a last minute yoga class to get myself grounded again.
• Write a letter to my dad crying my heart out to him and burn it, allowing myself to release those hurts so I stop taking them out on other people.
• Put the laptop down and go hiking or for a walk

I am thinking that is enough for now.  It is a good start, and it gives me some healthy activities to focus on rather than focusing on the fact that I am not with my boyfriend, driving me to drive him insane.  Who knows, maybe it will give him a chance to miss me.

After a good five minutes of crying during my paragraph about my dad, I am exhausted.  I must get to sleep, but I will elaborate on the other two "moles" later.

***UPDATE:  I had an epiphany today... I hate being with myself, so why would anyone else like being with me?  SO my new goal, is to learn to enjoy being with myself.  And to start spending some quality time with myself.  So I am going to create a box (beautifully decorated).  In that box I am going to put several things that I LOVE doing, including some yarn and crochet needle, a book that I have been wanting to read, some magazine projects I have wanted to complete, a journal for my thoughts, and other things I might find along the way.  So when I feel especially needy or lonely and I am craving attention, I will make a date with myself for some quality time, and grab something out of my box.  I am looking forward to truly getting to know myself better.