47: A Peek into the Roots of Codependency and Labels with Darlene Lancer, JD, LMFT
“It’s all about taking action.”-Darlene Lancer
Just as how a plant withers or thrives by its roots, addiction can blossom or die by its core. However, you could do something about it. A lawyer turned Marriage and Family Therapist shares her experiences and expertise about co-dependency and labelling. Darlene Lancer, digs to the root of two of the ramifications of addiction to help families and individuals attain healing.
Conversely though, when things get messed up, it’s often hard to let go especially if emotions pull you like magnet. Nevertheless, for you and your family to thrive, there is something you must uproot. Join in to their conversation as Jeff and Darlene uncover the mysteries and false facts that surrounds co-dependency and labelling. As the words quoted above suggest, your happiness is yours, but, “it’s all about taking action.”
Highlights:
02:50 Changing Careers
03:56 The Less Talked Terms
05:00 Dreams Awaken
07:13 The Evolution of Codependency
12:00 A Different Approach to Healing
15:19 The Labelling Stigma
20:00 Where To Focus
25:21 Let Go of Codependency-Reconnect to Your Innate Self
Resources:
Books by Darlene Lancer
Conquering Shame and Codependency- 8 Steps to Freeing the New You
Codependency Recovery- Daily Reflections
Spiritual Transformation in the Twelve Steps
Healing Toxic Shame- Understanding and Treating Shame,The Core of Addiction
I Am Not Perfect, I’m Only Human- How to Beat Perfectionism
Don’t lose your loved one by losing yourself! Let’s dig to the root of co-dependency and labelling with @TFRSolution and @DarleneLancer in #codependency #labelling #healing #focus #FeelItLiveIt Share on X
Connect With Darlene
Website: www.whatiscodependency.com/
Email: info@DarleneLancer.com
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Codependency/280366275343864
Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/DarleneLancer
Blog:https://feedburner.google.com/fb/a/mailverify?uri=DarleneLancer&loc=en_US
YouTube:https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCt0aeT_Dd-Ou4HsBSlbbxTw/feed
Clyp:https://clyp.it/user/fim53c31
Quotes:
06:07 “I really loved my dreams… so that was really my inspiration.” -Darlene Lancer
09:34 “I think that codependency is learned…Codependency is based on false facts.” -Darlene Lancer
12:57 “Self-esteem is learned… It’s all about taking action.” -Darlene Lancer
13:50 “Shame is the core of addiction.” -Darlene Lancer
15:45 “You don’t need to use labels to talk about the symptoms and talk about the problems.” -Darlene Lancer
22:04 “Instead of focusing on the label. Focus on your feelings.” -Darlene Lancer
26:04 “(A co-dependent is) a person who cannot function from his/her innate self.” -Darlene Lancer
27:24 “Everything gets twisted and turned upside down. It takes a lot of effort to turn that thinking around. -Darlene Lancer
27:42 “Live and let live. Take your eyes off the other person and focus on your needs….”-Darlene Lancer
Got ideas? Perhaps a future podcast? Schedule time with Jeff here: https://meetme.so/jeffjones
Transcriptions
JEFF: So welcome everyone today. I am very excited to have on this podcast, families navigating addiction and recovery. A woman who I’m just now starting to get to know. Um, her name’s Darlene Lancer. She has quite a resume. She’s written probably a dozen books. She’s a marriage and family therapist and attorney. She has quite an extensive background and I will let her go into that a little bit more. So, Darlene, welcome. Thank you very much for being on this episode of the podcast.
DARLENE: Oh, thank you very much for inviting me.
JEFF: Yeah.
DARLENE: Uh, alcoholism and addiction affects. Yeah. Somebody, millions of people and I say like every addict impacts the lives of five other people, so –
JEFF: –Sure.
DARLENE: More people affected by addiction than there are addicts. –
JEFF: –Yeah.
DARLENE: -Very important.
JEFF: –Yeah. So can you talk a little bit about yourself so that people listening have a sense of who you are?
DARLENE: Sure. Well, I thank you for asking. I did a marriage and family therapists about 30 years and I used to be a lawyer for a long time and I, part of my growth was changing careers, going back to school and doing actually what I really always wanted to do and uh, had gotten sidetracked. But I have been in relationship with alcoholics. I know what that’s like. I was in Alanon for many decades and it was turned my life around and I was asked by the dummies publishers to write codependency for dummies based on a blog I had written.
JEFF: –Yeah.
DARLENE: I, once I started, you know, writing that book, I realized, my goodness, this is, I’m like, this is my expertise. This is what I’m working with all my clients, I didn’t use to call it that back in the day. People didn’t use the term very much codependency –
JEFF: –Right, Yeah.
DARLENE: The things have evolved. I mean, when I was in Alanon, people didn’t talk about domestic violence or they didn’t even use the word intimacy and a enmeshment and abuse and trauma, all those codependency that, but –
JEFF: –Right.
DARLENE: -It’s like the hundredth monkey story, and so we’re all passing down what we know and I hope to do that and the people can be helped sooner and make changes quicker.
JEFF: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
DARLENE: –Or learning.
JEFF: So I really want ask more about the term codependency and what you referred to as, they didn’t really call it that before. But before we get into that, I wanted to ask a little bit more about what was like in your path to do what you’ve done. Can you say a little bit more about what inspired you, what you saw that drove you?
DARLENE: Well, I couldn’t say, I think it was in my genes cause I was first inspired when I read Freud’s interpretation of dreams when I was a child.
JEFF: –Uh huh.
DARLENE: Well, and then as I became a teenager, I was reading Carl Young and I wanted to be a psychologist or actually I wanted to be a psychiatrist at that time, but I, I decided, you know, nine years of post-graduate work would be like too much. How would I possibly raise a family and do all of that. That was, you know, back in the dark ages. And so I said, okay, so I guess I’ll go to law school because I was also interested in international affairs and politics and wanting to work for the State Department at that time. So, but my earliest interest went back to my childhood and I didn’t have a, an in my family or a drug abuser and my family.
JEFF: –Yeah.
DARLENE: But there was this function, so maybe came out of that that I really love my dreams and I used to try to plan my dreams and think about my dream. So when I read it, Freud’s interpretation of dreams and they have audacity think, I don’t think that Freud as a hundred percent right on the meaning of dreams. I don’t think there were like all wishes. And, and then I read young and uh, that made a little more sense. And so that was really my inspiration.
JEFF: Yeah. Wow. Well Great. Great. Thank you very much, and
DARLENE: –Always interested in the psyche. You know.
JEFF: Yeah. And understanding more about, you know, maybe how and why things happened the way they did. And so I’m curious, you know, with the how and why things happen the way they did or the way they do. Can you say a little bit more, you made the comment about, you know, they didn’t use to call this codependency. So can you say a little bit more about, you know, maybe your understanding of the evolution of that term?
DARLENE: Well, I think originally it was a co alcoholic family Therapists. We’re doing research on alcoholism and they discovered that the spouse of the alcoholic had these dysfunctional behaviors like enabling and obsessing about the addict. And often they were counterproductive to be Addicts recovery. And in doing further research they discover that wait a minute, after the marriage ended or after the alcoholic improved, that partner continued these dysfunctional behaviors.
JEFF: –Yeah.
DARLENE: And in fact they predated the marriage that they went back to childhood. And often it was because there was either an addict in the family, other mental illness like depression can lead of her mother’s depressed, it can lead to codependency or some other illness or abuse. So there are other factors that had nothing to do with the, you know, the attic spouse maybe magnified or brought out those tendencies even more. So and then Melody Beatty wrote a book in
JEFF: –Right.
DARLENE: The mid-seventies that brought it to more popular attention, codependent no more. And I remember reading that.
JEFF: Right, right. So, so Darlene, one of the questions that I have in a kind of stems from, you know, what I’ve seen over years and that is some of these behaviors that happen that are dysfunctional. Like you said, they can happen in families with no active addiction or no alcoholism. And so one of the things that I’ve seen is that some of these behaviors are impersonal patterns that get passed down from generation to generation through no fault of any one person. But it’s more of like coping, you know, defensive coping mechanisms. What’s your sense there?
DARLENE: Oh yes, absolutely. I think that codependency is learned and I even wrote a blog, my websites, what is codependency.com and I have a lot of free information on there. One of my blogs has to do with the codependency is based on fake facts or based on a lie, something like that.
JEFF: Uh Huh.
DARLENE: –So yeah.
DARLENE: It’s, it’s either things that we were told or things that we inferred because of our parents who are parenting. So it could be overt abuse or it could be just there’s too many children or there’s economic thrice. And so parents don’t have time or attention to give to a child. So they feel ignored and important.
JEFF: –Yeah. Things that,
DARLENE: –Valued,
JEFF: –things that shouldn’t happened in a child’s life but didn’t like neglect for instance.
DARLENE: Yeah. And then if the parent doesn’t know how to nurture because maybe their parent was an addict or mentally ill or,
JEFF: –Yeah.
DARLENE: There was, you know, there were other things just survival, you know, in earlier generations. And so that you don’t learn what nurturing looks like. And so children learn that I guess I have to be self-sufficient or I can’t share my feelings. And pretty soon you start to denying your feelings and that’s a symptom of codependency.
JEFF: Yeah. So I mean, so one of the things that I’ve seen is that oftentimes when there’s addiction in the family, everyone in the family, their nervous system gets activated and they’re in like a hyper arouse state and trying to make good decisions from that state while they’re compromised from the get go. And then family interactions or are taken personally of course. But there’s this impersonal pattern that oftentimes they don’t see. And so I’ve really tried to, you know, come up with ways where family members can see the larger structure to where they can start to make good decisions earlier and earlier. And, and I’m curious like how have you done that?
DARLENE: Well that’s a different approach than I take. I feel like in recovery from codependency that there’s several factors and one is a big part of it is learning new skills.
JEFF: Sure.
DARLENE: So two of the symptoms are like this functional communication, dysfunctional boundaries and those are learned in families.
DARLENE: And we can
JEFF: –Right.
DARLENE: Learn to have more service communication, which is typically absence in a dysfunctional family and to have healthy boundaries, which are usually they’re too rigid or their enmeshed in dysfunctional families or they’re like separate changing…
JEFF: –Right.
DARLENE: And those are the things that we can learn,
JEFF: –Absolutely.
DARLENE: So those are like skills.
JEFF: –Yeah.
DARLENE: And things you can do self-esteem as learned.
JEFF: –Sure.
DARLENE: So, –
JEFF: –Yeah.
DARLENE: -Concrete steps you can take to raise yourself esteem is not just about thinking. It’s also about taking action.
JEFF: –Absolutely. Yeah.
DARLENE: –And, um, my own therapy for years and people that come to me, they often will talk to a therapist over and over about their feelings and their problems and they don’t make any progress.
DARLENE: It’s because they’re not actually,
JEFF: –Taking. –
DARLENE: –Learning. You’re taking action and learning, you know, a different, different way to behave. Cognitive
JEFF: –Right. –
DARLENE: -Behavioral therapy I think is very effective.
JEFF: –Yeah.
DARLENE: So then a deeper layer, are the belief is it motivate those behaviors. So then you have to challenge all these false, these beliefs that are based on false facts as I said.
JEFF: –Right.
DARLENE: A lot of that is shame that we’ve, uh, I have another book conquering shame.
JEFF: –Yeah.
DARLENE: And a blog that, that shame is the core of addiction. Most of for the addict and the codependent and addicts are codependent too, and in my world.
JEFF: –Yeah.
DARLENE: And so, so teasing apart that and changing your beliefs and doing healing and then deeper than that, there may be trauma
JEFF: –Yeah.
DARLENE: That led to the shame.
JEFF: –Right.
DARLENE: And then finally, learning skills of self-nurturing that I mentioned before.
JEFF: –Yeah. Yeah.
DARLENE: So I, I look at it that way.
JEFF: Right, I’m, you know, I’m on the same page a lot with what you’re saying, Darlene, with you know, people learning new skills and then being in an environment to practice them and, and that it’s not just about one person, it’s about a system and how that system kind of orients and functions. But one of the things that I’ve, I’ve noticed, and I’m curious kind of what you’ve noticed here, but that is a lot of times we’ll, my language when I use language that labels are, makes assumptions or you know, kind of assumes that they are part of the problem. And I think some of the negative labels and you know, there’s plenty of negative labels and the addiction recovery space and, but just labeling people that what I’ve seen is that when I start using those labels, like enabler or codependent or something like that, their body language starts to contract and it’s harder for them to hear whatever comes next. Do you know what I mean?
DARLENE: Yeah. I don’t like labels either. And you don’t have to talk to use labels to talk about the symptoms and talk about the problems. I mean people don’t, some people come to me and saying, I realized I’m a codependent, I need help. But a lot of people just say, you know, I’m, I can’t get over, stop obsessing about my ex or
JEFF: –Right.
DARLENE: Unhappy in my relationship and they don’t really understand what the problem is.
JEFF: Right, right, right. And there’s a lot of information under the umbrella of each one of those labels. So you know, your blog article, and I was looking at it a number of days ago, but it was one on codependency and in the beginning of it you were kind of quoting different definitions of codependency. And so I’m curious, could you talk a little bit about the impact of those different definitions, impact specifically on family members?
DARLENE: Well, some definitions focus on the individual and some focus on the relationship. I tend to focus on the individual because I think that whether or not you’re in a relationship, you would still have the symptoms because I see it as a disorder of the self or problem with this, your relationship with yourself.
JEFF: –Yeah.
DARLENE: But some of the early people are melody babies I mentioned and her definition had to do with the relationship and it was allowing another person’s behavior to affect us, uh, and obsessing about and controlling another person in here. But she saw it through that lenses, how we think about someone else.
JEFF: –Right.
DARLENE: And then Robert Savvy, who was a family therapist, said, well, he looked at the family of origin, said it’s a result of a exposure to oppressive rule in a family. Well, I would disagree because I see codependents that they said, well, there were no rules. You know, this let us do what I want.
JEFF: –Right.
DARLENE: They never judged us and then I have no concept of like, who I am.
JEFF: –Right.
DARLENE: So actually, or their parents always praise them. And so they also don’t have a concept of, you know, what’s right or not right. Because a child knows even when they’re not doing the right thing or they’re not doing well and apparent praises them anyway. So then, yeah,
JEFF: –Right.
DARLENE: There’s a dissonance there. There’s a conflict between what their parents saying and what they know inside.
JEFF: Yeah. Yeah.
DARLENE: So then that creates shame too. Well, I’m not measuring up to my parents idealized image of myself.
JEFF: Right. I can. So relate to what you’re saying Darlene. You know, just the kind of one image that’s put out in the family, like say one thing that then as a child seeing something totally different and it’s like crazy making and I’m, I’m, I mean that’s kind of the essence of my own growing up. And I grew up without, you know, active substance use addiction in my family of origin. I mean, it was, it with, with my grandfather, but it’s like what I noticed is the same structure was there and my family of origin. And it was really kind of, um, shocking to me. And you know, I realize, I mean, it took many years for me just to realize that I had this impact and it took many more years to actually be motivated to do something about it. So I could, you know, go from living with defensive coping to thriving. And I mean, I’m sure you see that a lot in your practice and the work that you’ve done with people all around the world.
DARLENE: Well, yeah, and that’s getting back to something about labels and I say in the introduction to my book on Codependency is that I don’t like labels, but you know, if you’re going, let’s say you’re going into a department store, if you know what you need, then you go right to that department and it’s much,
JEFF: –Yeah.
DARLENE: More efficient than wandering around if you have a diagnosis. The same for a medical issue. If you have a diagnosis then there may be specific treatments. –
JEFF: –Yeah.
DARLENE: -That would be effective or ineffective.
JEFF: –Yeah.
DARLENE: -That’s why I can be useful
JEFF: –Absolutely. –
DARLENE: -A lot of years in therapy that was not helpful.
JEFF: Yeah, yeah, yeah, absolutely. I, I mean I totally agree with what you’re saying. When people know what’s going on that can be so helpful and allow them to focus on what they can do about it. You know, the other side of that that I’ve seen is being in, you know, being a part of a family program in a treatment center are something like that. And kind of putting out labels and making assumptions about people that I don’t really know and I don’t really see that as being –
DARLENE: –Okay.
JEFF: -All that inviting. So it isn’t just a black or white, you know, it’s good or it’s bad.
DARLENE: –Yeah.
JEFF: It’s contextual and situation by situation.
JEFF: So,
DARLENE: –Yeah, you know, a lot of people they see, they, they’re trying to figure out if they’re partners with narcissist. A lot of credit tenants are in relationships with narcissists.
JEFF: –Uh, Huh.
DARLENE: And I wrote a book on dealing with a narcissist,
JEFF: –I saw that,
DARLENE: -because there was such a demand for it. And I say to, and I even have a blog on like how do you tell if a narcissist loves you? And I used to like just go, uh, have a lot of angst about that question because my mother was a narcissist and I wondered about it. But in the end I should say that’s the wrong question.
JEFF: –Uh, Huh.
DARLENE: Instead of focusing on the label, it’s like focus on your feelings.
JEFF: –Uh, Huh.
DARLENE: How are you feeling in this relationship? Are you getting your needs met? Are you feeling love? And I just want to add, I used to years ago feel ashamed of the identifying as a codependent.
JEFF: –So,
DARLENE: You mentioned that earlier, but the truth is, is like the majority of everyone are codependent in effect. It’s only considered dysfunctional in western culture. And I go into that in my book too, because in collectivist cultures in
JEFF: –Right.
DARLENE: Latin America and Asia, a lot of other places, it’s the norm. And being more autonomous is considered, you know, you’re alienated from your family. It’s not, it’s not supported. There are an institutional elements to support you. And there’s a huge pole. I see a lot of clients that their families immigrated here
JEFF: –Right.
DARLENE: And they have really difficulty in separating from them because the values are very different.
JEFF: The values, the beliefs. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Darlene, I wanna go back to one thing you said and just underline and emphasize how I see what you’re saying and doing so important. And that is when you were talking about dealing with narcissists and having this question about you know, do they love me or, or, but it was a focus on them and then what I heard you did to kind of come up with more of a solution for self is turn it around to how do I feel in this relationship, which is switching the focus from other to self, which is brilliant. I mean it’s a little thing but it’s incredibly powerful and I just want to underline that.
DARLENE: Thank you. Why I remember in my own a relationship with an alcoholic at one point, uh, he was prescribed, this is so many decades ago, you know I 40 years ago or something, he was prescribed antidepressants and I was at that time I was like, really against by getting medication and that kind of scared me about, okay, well I don’t know if this he, who is he really is he really himself now and like I was all obsessed about that and then I realized, no, I just have to pay attention to how I feel,
JEFF: –Bingo.
DARLENE: What behavior.
JEFF: –Yeah.
DARLENE: Focus on, doesn’t matter if he’s drinking or if he’s not drinking, if he’s on drugs, he’s on antidepressants is like, how is this relationship working for me or not?
JEFF: Yeah. Yeah. Beautiful. Beautiful. Just the you know, the switch in focus there. Wow. I really appreciate that. And so at this point, is there some takeaways that you would like people to have that you haven’t said yet before we bring this to a close?
DARLENE: Well, a couple of things I like to close with my definition of codependency.
JEFF: –Okay.
DARLENE: Which embraces some of the others. Melody Beatty’s uh, another series and the field was Ernie Larson who said diminished capacity to initiate and participate in loving relationships. Well, I think that’s a symptom of
JEFF: –Uh, Huh.
DARLENE: -codependency, John Bradshaw and see a melody talk about a symptom of abandonment.
JEFF: –Right.
DARLENE: And Charles Whitfield said the reasonable lost self.
JEFF: –Yeah.
DARLENE: So in my thinking deeply about this, when I was asked to write the book, my definition is a person who can’t function from his or her innate self. So that’s the lost self.
JEFF: –Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
DARLENE: It’s there
DARLENE: You have to uncover, we connect to it and instead organizes thinking and behavior around another person?
JEFF: –Right.
DARLENE: Process or a substance. So that includes addicts, whether it’s a gambler or a substance abuser, because their focus is, um, you know, their life and their thinking revolved around that substance. So codependence could be addicted to a person and someone else might be addicted to food or work or a drug. And it’s coming back to what do I feel? What do I need? And that’s not projecting that revolving your life around something outside of yourself.
JEFF: –Right.
DARLENE: And that becomes, there’s a lot of emptiness inside coming from childhood. So we try to fill that for something outside. And also we get trained to do that because we have to remain vigilant to get our parents love and a dysfunctional family and we’re tuning into them rather than them our parents tuning into us and emphasizing and mirroring us.
DARLENE: So everything is twisted around, upside down.
JEFF: –Right.
DARLENE: So it takes a lot of effort to turn that around that thinking around, which is, what you are pointing out in what I said. And my favorite slogan, which I’ll close with. So trust that program is live and let live. I take your eyes off the other person and focus on your knees, your feelings, your wants, your desires. Live it.
JEFF: –Yeah.
DARLENE: Feel it. Live it, and express it.
JEFF: –Beautiful, beautiful –
DARLENE: –Live on that relationship. And this often happens. And then people, I say, they lost their Mojo. Codependents have a hard time with self-efficacy.
JEFF: –Right.
DARLENE: If they’re alone, if they’re not, don’t have a teacher, a boss, a partner, a mentor, a friend or something to another person to do it with the support them as hard for them to get their own, you know, Mojo going on their own.
JEFF: –Yeah.
JEFF: Yeah. Beautifully said. Yeah. And so can you say a little bit about how people could get in contact with you or learn more about you or one of the dozen different books that you’ve written?
DARLENE: Well, thank you. Um, my books are on Amazon and on my website also Barnes and noble and other booksellers. The two paperbacks are conquering shame and codependency published by Hazelden Foundation and then a codependency for dummies. Those are paperback and digital. And then I’ve written about seven e-books. A lot of them are focused on, they’re all e workbooks where tools and exercises for recovery and building self-esteem, learning to be assertive, uh, overcoming guilt. There’s a handbook on spiritual growth in the 12th step that, or explanation and exercises, how to work the step, whether you’re religious or atheist is applies. And then dealing with a narcissist and perfectionism is often a symptom. So I wrote a book on overcoming perfectionism.
JEFF: –Yeah.
DARLENE: And it’s all available. What is codependency.com…,
JEFF: –Okay.
DARLENE: There, there’s links to my youtube channel and talk or you can, you know, search for my name on there and sound cloud and clip it. C, l y T. Dot. I t. I have a lot of talks there. They’re also on the media page in my website. There’s links to my Facebook and linked in pages. So,
JEFF: –Yeah.
DARLENE: As you put my name on, is this in Google, but probably a massive amount of information,
JEFF: A massive amount of stuff. So Darlene and it’s Darlene Lancer. Thank you very much. I really appreciate your time today.
DARLENE: Oh, thank you for asking me. Oh, one last thought, and that is on my website. I have a free PDF for people called 14 tips for letting go.
JEFF: –Alright.
DARLENE: So detachment is really important when you’re have a loved one that is, you know, doing self-destructive behavior or is hurting you.
JEFF: –Yeah.
DARLENE: In either case, you have to learn detachment. So.
JEFF: Yeah. Well, thank you very much.
DARLENE: Thank you again. I appreciate this opportunity.
JEFF: Thanks for listening. If you’ve enjoyed the show, please rate it on iTunes or wherever you get your podcasts and pass it on to someone else who will find it useful. You will find resources and options for your family’s best. Next Steps and the show notes for this episode@wwwdotoffamilyrecoverysolution.com.