Untangling Codependency When You’re Always the Emotional Fixer
The You're Not Crazy Podcast
43
Untangling Codependency When You’re Always the Emotional Fixer
You're Not Crazy Podcast
Episode #43 - Untangling Codependency When You’re Always the Emotional Fixer
21:03
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In this week's episode:
If you grew up with a parent who had narcissistic or borderline personality disorder, codependency can sneak into your adult relationships without you even realizing it. What started as a necessary survival strategy—keeping the peace, reading the room, making yourself “easy”—turns into a lifelong pattern of people-pleasing, over-explaining, and walking on eggshells.
In this episode, we unpack the everyday signs of codependent behavior: perfectionism to avoid criticism, guilt when setting boundaries, and the urge to fix other people’s emotions so you don’t have to feel the discomfort of their disappointment or anger.
These aren’t character flaws. They’re protective coping skills from childhood—responses youhadto develop in a home where your emotional needs were often dismissed, minimized, or manipulated.
We’ll talk about what it really means to work on codependency, including:
Letting go of the need to manage other people’s emotions
Asking for support without apologizing for your needs
Learning to tolerate discomfort without over-functioning
Reclaiming trust in your own voice, boundaries, and resilience
Welcome to You're Not Crazy, a podcast for the adult children of parents with borderline and narcissistic personality disorders. I'm your host, tori Wixel, a therapist and coach with over a decade of experience in the mental health field. Now let's jump in. Hi and welcome back to this week's episode of You're Not Crazy. If you are one of our new listeners, I want to officially welcome you to our podcast. I am so happy to see some new people trickling in, getting messages from people who are new to the podcast and, as always, I am eternally grateful for our longtime listeners as well, who have been there since the beginning and continue to help spread the word of You're Not Crazy. It's been so cool to see this community grow, and I'm so glad that it is continuing to grow and help other people feel so much less alone in their journeys. It's really been an awesome and very rewarding experience to do the podcast, so welcome.
Torie Wiksell:
A few housekeeping things before we dive into the heart of today's episode One. I believe last week I talked about my new mini course called Before Boundaries. I initially had posted it up on confidentboundariescom for a small price However small price. However, I adjusted that and it's now available at confidentboundariescom for what I call pay what you can. So if what you can pay is $0, then go sign up for $0. If you are able to pay a little bit more then I appreciate that as well. But I just changed that fee structure over there. So if you haven't taken before boundaries, if you are struggling with boundaries, that is a course you definitely want to take. It is also available in the Confident Boundaries online community membership in our on-demand library. So if you are already a part of the Confident Boundaries community, just head on over to the On Demand library and you can find it there. But I highly recommend you take that course because it is a really easily digestible 15-minute video where I break down the differences between BPD and MPD and why these disorders make boundary setting especially challenging.
Torie Wiksell:
Disorders make boundary setting especially challenging. If you even suspect that your parent has either of those disorders, it is a really good place to start to really understand what that means. I know a lot of people are on the fence about does my parent really have BPD or MPD? They've never been officially diagnosed or I don't know if they have. This is your go-to course to get some clarity. I talk about really common signs and symptoms and behaviors that come up with these disorders and it will give you a lot of perspective. And while it absolutely is not me diagnosing your parent because that would be impossible for me to do via a video course and, having never met them, impossible for me to do via a video course and having never met them If you can relate and empathize with what I am saying in the video, then we would be a very good fit for working together as far as addressing your family dysfunction. So that is also a common question that comes up. What if I don't know for sure that my parent is a narcissist? What if I don't know for sure that my parent is a narcissist? What if I don't know for sure that they have BPD? They've really never been diagnosed. That doesn't necessarily matter. What matters is the pattern of behavior that we're seeing and how that impacts you, and if you can relate to the things that I'm talking about in this podcast, if you can relate to the things that I'm talking about in the boundaries workshop and the mini course before boundaries, then we are making progress and we are addressing your family in a way that is resonating and true to what you've experienced. So don't get so caught up in the diagnoses. They're only helpful to a certain extent to give us some common language to talk about, but I know it can also be a little catch-22. It can make things a little tricky too.
Torie Wiksell:
Okay, so let's jump into the heart of today's episode, which is talking about codependency. Codependency is something that is so common when you grow up in a dysfunctional family situation, when one of your parents has BPD or MPD. It also is something that so many people don't understand that they actually are struggling with, and, as someone who I myself have had a very windy road, let's say, with my own codependency, I think it's a really important and helpful topic to dive into on the podcast. What exactly is codependency? What does it mean to be codependent? What does it mean to be in a codependent relationship? We get very enmeshed with people that we care about, and we very much want people we care about to be very invested in us, and so we pour ourselves into them, hoping that we'll be reciprocated.
Torie Wiksell:
And there are really common traits of people who struggle with codependency. That can be things like over explaining or over justifying your decisions. It can be being hyper vigilant to other people's moods or shifts in the way that they're talking like the walking on eggshells thing that is really common to experience or feel. If you're around someone with BPD or MPD, perfectionism is a big one to try to avoid conflict or criticism. Really, people pleasing Codependency and people pleasing go hand in hand. So if you have found yourself to be a pleaser, you also might have some codependent traits. These are all extremely common aspects of codependency and by no means does this describe every codependent trait that could possibly show up in your life, but I think that by talking through some of these, it gives you a good sense of what codependency is. So let's talk about it a bit more and dive into what do we do if we relate to having codependent traits.
Torie Wiksell:
This one is especially tricky because when people have borderline personality disorder, they also have a lot of codependent traits typically Not people with narcissistic personality disorder, but people with BPD tend to have a lot of codependent traits. There is a lot of dependence on other people to regulate their emotions and a lot of external pressure on people around them to do and say the thing that they need in that moment in order for them to be okay. And when you grow up with a parent like that, you are going to have a higher chance of being codependent because your emotional needs are not consistently being met, and that is really what drives a lot of codependency and codependent traits. But if you grow up with a parent with BPD and you see some of those codependent traits in yourself, you might freak out, like I've done in the past, and think, oh my gosh, what if I myself have BPD? What if I'm the problem? What if I am doomed to repeat all of this trauma? And what if this is me too? And I want to tell you what if this is me too? And I want to tell you I know I've said it on the podcast before, but let's say you did have BPD. Okay, you're not your parent. You're listening to me talk on this podcast.
Torie Wiksell:
Bpd is very treatable and very manageable. What I would highly recommend you do is find a DBT program near you if you truly are concerned that you have BPD, and start as soon as you can Work with a therapist who is trained in DBT, who specializes in BPD. Even if you don't have BPD, dbt is awesome for learning skills that we were never taught when we grew up with BPD and MPD parents. So that is okay. It is manageable. The fact that you are afraid means that you're willing to go to therapy and do the work to make sure that you do everything in your power not to harm other people. That is wonderful.
Torie Wiksell:
That in and of itself makes you different from your parent, but I think what's far more likely if you have found yourself here listening to me talk than you having BPD is that you have some codependent traits that are really a result of not having that consistent, stable, secure attachment to your parents. When you're growing up, you can grow up to become an adult who is really fixated on having that secure attachment in your relationships, and yet when you don't grow up with that, the way we go about it is just not productive. We go about it in a way that is reflective of the relationship we had with our own parents, not with what is actually healthy amongst two adults, and so when you're looking at codependency and working on codependent traits, there are some things that are really important for you to understand about that. One is that most adults are capable of taking care of their own emotions. Most adults are capable of handling things like being let down or anxious. Most adults can navigate that, and even the ones who can't are responsible for figuring it out. They're responsible for going and seeking out support and education and knowledge in order to figure out how to manage their difficult emotions. It is never up to other adults around them to manage their emotions for them. That is codependency right there.
Torie Wiksell:
Growing up, you were convinced that it was up to you to regulate your parents' emotions. You were conditioned to believe that if you acted, if you said certain things, if you behaved in the right way, if you followed unspoken rules that were constantly changing, if you could figure them out and get two steps ahead, that you could make everything be okay because you could control and regulate your parents' emotions for them. And in large part that's a fallacy. But even when it is true, it's not healthy and that is codependency right there. Codependency is this belief that I can take care of this conflict or stressor or issue that is happening with this person that I'm in some sort of relationship with, by going around them and regulating their emotions for them.
Torie Wiksell:
The way that I used to do this a lot that I have done a lot of work on and am much better about now is I would get very uncomfortable if my husband was upset, and not just uncomfortable. I would try to fix that, and by fix that I mean make it so he was never upset. And that's not reasonable and that's not necessary, because my husband is, overall, a very lovely human being who is quite capable of regulating his own emotions and while he is definitely not perfect, he is a capable adult who has the ability and the willingness to ask for help when he needs it. And so this was unnecessary and I wasn't even aware I was doing it for a very long time. But once I became aware of this, it was so hard to not step in and try to fix things when he was upset and he didn't have to be upset with me or our relationship, it was just being upset in general because for so long of my life someone my parent being upset with me or upset in general, felt so unsafe. That couldn't be okay for me. And even though I've chosen a much more emotionally healthy partner for myself, even though I have chosen to surround myself with much more emotionally healthy friends and colleagues, that doesn't mean that underlying tendency that I had just goes away.
Torie Wiksell:
Another way codependency has shown up in my life and that I've had to work on is with asking for help. It can be really hard to ask for help, and something I used to do a lot is, on the rare times that I did ask for help, I would preface it by saying it's completely fine if you don't want to do this or you don't have the capacity to do this, or if you just make sure you can definitely tell me. If you're not interested in doing this and I'm not going to lie sometimes I still find myself prefacing things with that whole unnecessary intro where I am assuming responsibility for someone else, knowing what their capacity is and being able to tell me yes or no. I'm assuming that because it's hard for me to say no to people if I don't have the capacity that. It's hard for other people, and that's not my job.
Torie Wiksell:
My job is to recognize what I have the capacity for emotionally, what I'm experiencing and what I need to help myself with those feelings, and so I actively work on trying not to get two steps ahead of myself and answer on behalf of someone else and instead be much more present and mindful and know that it's okay to ask for help and it's okay for people to say no, and as adults, these are very normal things that we have to go through in order to be a healthy person. We have to ask for help. We have to be understanding that not everyone that we ask for help is going to be able to accommodate us or accommodate us in the way that we hope or want or need. And when that's the case, that we're okay figuring it out by ourselves, going to ask someone else for help who is more capable or available to us at the time that we are not depending on another person to feel emotionally stable and safe and secure, because that is what we did with our parent for so long. We really gave our parent this power to decide whether or not we felt safe and okay or not. If they were happy with us, if they were pleasant, if they were not upset with us, then we felt okay, and if they were upset with us, if they were not happy with us, our world was not okay, and so our well-being did very much revolve around our parents' emotions, which is why we develop codependency, where we try to regulate other adults' emotions, because that has been our survival skill, that has been our survival tool, our mechanism for keeping ourselves feeling safe and being safe.
Torie Wiksell:
And the reality is when you start choosing safer people, when you start choosing healthier people to be a part of your life. You don't have to protect yourself in that way and you really need to relearn how to approach relationships in a way that isn't trying to regulate someone else's emotions for them, because that, inadvertently, is trying to control the other person, and I know if you're listening to my podcast, that's like the last thing that you want to do. I'm sure of it. I know for a fact you do not want to be out there controlling other people and that is not your intention. But that is, in fact, what we do when we are exhibiting codependent tendencies. We're assuming that we know better than that other person how to make sure they're okay, how to regulate and manage their emotions, how to anticipate and respond to their capacity levels, and we just don't know better. They know them best.
Torie Wiksell:
We need to focus on ourselves and what we need and we want, and that is also a really good redirection to getting more familiar with yourself and learning about yourself and developing that trust in yourself of saying this is my capacity, this is what I need, this is what I want and I'm capable of handling the consequences of that right. I'm capable of feeling a little uncomfortable if my husband is upset. And because I love him and I don't want him to feel upset, I don't want him to be sad or disappointed or afraid or angry or all those things because it's painful to see someone that I care about experience distressing emotions and, at the same time, it's okay for him to, because he's human and it's a good thing, it's a healthy thing, and I can just be with him, I can just be there around him. I don't have to step in and do anything, I don't have to make it my emotional experience, and he doesn't want that, frankly, because he is a grown adult who is a healthy adult, who tries his best to be the healthiest version of himself. I hope that diving into the basics of codependency today added some clarity to what it means. This is something that comes up so frequently with the people that I work with and, like I said, this is a journey that I am on as well, and I'm sure this will not be our last episode on codependency at all.
Torie Wiksell:
So thank you so much for tuning in for another week of You're Not Crazy, don't forget Before. Boundaries and the Boundaries Workshop are both available over at confidentboundariescom and in the Confident Boundaries online community on-demand library Until next week. I'll see you guys then Bye. Thanks so much for joining me for another episode of you're not crazy. If you like the podcast, please leave a review and rate us five stars. It helps so much, and make sure to check the show notes for links to bonus podcast episodes and other ways I can help. See you soon.
About the Show
Welcome to You're Not Crazy, the podcast for adult children of parents with borderline and narcissistic personality disorders. I’m Torie Wiksell, therapist, coach, and cycle breaker- here to guide you through the complexities of growing up in a dysfunctional family each week.
If you’re tired of wondering, “Am I the problem?”, or struggling through gaslighting, emotional manipulation, and setting boundaries with toxic parents, you’re in the right place. This show is here to help you heal, break free from codependency, and reclaim your emotional health — whether that means setting boundaries, going no-contact, or finding peace in your relationships.
You’re not crazy and you're not alone. I'm so glad you're here.
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