Codependency Recovery: Wounded Souls Dancing in the Light
Codependency Recovery: Wounded Souls Dancing in the Light
Book 2: A Dysfunctional Relationship with Life
Chapter 8: Codependents as Emotional Vampires
“If a vampire came up to you and told you that he would die if you didn’t allow him to drink your blood, most likely you wouldn’t have any problem telling him no. In our codependency however, when we do not know how to say no to other people, how to have healthy boundaries, we are set up to react to - and swing between - the extremes of the black and white, 1 or 10 spectrum of codependent behavior. Those extremes are: to build huge walls against connecting with other people - which sets us up to be emotional anorexics; or to offer ourselves up as sacrificial lambs to the type of codependents that are overt emotional vampires. I say overt because all codependents are emotional vampires to one degree or another as long as we are looking outside of ourselves for self definition and self worth. In this chapter and the next two, I am going to use the emotional vampire theme to try to shine some Light upon both the dynamics of codependency and the process of recovery. I am going to be talking about the roles of emotional vampire, emotional anorexic, and sacrificial lamb that we are set up to play out in our disease - and I will discuss the need to end emotional enmeshment and take emotional responsibility as a vital component in a healthy recovery process.” “The selfless martyrs are the sacrificial lambs I refer to in the heading above. They are the people whom the narcissistic emotional vampires - of both the aggressive and passive types - feed upon. They are set up to think it is normal to have someone sucking the life blood out of them - constantly draining them energetically and emotionally.” “When we say, “but she’s my mother / he’s my father” I have to take care of them - we are not owning our choices. The fact that they are our parents does not mean we owe them the right to abuse us. Does not mean we have to sacrifice our lives for them. Their codependency may cause them to believe that they sacrificed their lives for us - but like all unconscious codependents they were acting out of ego selfish reasons. We do not owe them some debt we “have to” pay back to them at the expense of sacrificing our self. Our parents wounded us out of their codependence. Our families were not safe, warm, Loving sanctuaries. The warm fuzzy cultural perspective of families is a myth. It is a fairy tale - just like happily ever after in romantic relationships is a fairy tale. Empowerment is seeing reality clearly and owning our choices to make the best of it. In order to see clearly we need to stop giving power to fairy tales and myths.” “One of the things that was mentioned by several of the sources that brought this topic to the forefront for me in the last several weeks, was people being told that to put their parent in a nursing home would decrease the parents life expectancy. This may be a statistical reality - I don’t know for sure. Rather it is true, or something HMO’s tell people to decrease their expenses, it is still not a reason to allow yourself to buy into being a victim. Consider that maybe an emotional vampire will die sooner because they don’t have anyone to suck the life out of. If a vampire is going to die because you won’t let them suck your blood, is that reason to let them suck your blood?”
On this page is the eigth chapter of an online book by codependency therapist/Spiritual teacher.
Mad Dogs and Skunks
Emotional Vampires and Sacrificial Lambs
Vicim Martyr, Emotional Vampire
self pity
A note to people with an aging parent (s)
Death is a transition
Codependency Recovery: Wounded Souls Dancing in the Light Book 2: A Dysfunctional Relationship with Life Go to Chapter 9: Codependency = emotional anorexia - Published online October 20, 2002
September 2005 - Chapters 3 through 15 of this work are now exclusively available in the Dancing in Light pay to view component of Joy2MeU.com
Discernment in relationship to emotional honesty and responsibility 2Joy2MeU Bookstore
Codependence: The Dance of Wounded Souls by Robert Burney is copyright 1995. Material on Joy2MeU web site (except where otherwise noted) is copyright 1996 thru 2008 by Robert Burney PO Box 235401 Encinitas CA 92023.
Grateful acknowledgment is made for permission to quote from: Illusions “The Adventures of a Reluctant Messiah” by Richard Bach. Copyright 1977 by Creature Enterprises, Inc. Reprinted in Codependence: The Dance of Wounded Souls by Robert Burney by permission of Bantam Doubleday Dell, New York, NY.
Originally published at https://joy2meu.com/codependency_vampires.htm