[forgottenmom]

What's the difference between being loving and supportive and being an enabler? If I nitpick I can see enabling in every loving relationship, yet in my relationship people feel that they can call my loving support enabling. I worry myself about being an enabler, don't get me wrong, but if it's a thing that is only an issue to others and not to me is it wrong? I'm not going to get too specific, but as an analagy, if I buy cards and presents for my bf's family because he doesn't care to do it himself and I want his family to not feel neglected, then technically I am enabling his indifference to his family, but if it's not important to them how the cards and such are bought, and I don't mind picking stuff up while I'm at the store anyway, then is it really enabling? I have not picked a great example, really, but it's all I can think of and it's really my bf's analagy (he's good at them)

[misty]

I believe I am enabeling when my helping, doing (fixing things) is not really helping someone other than to stay in unhealthy, selfish, irresponsible and/or distructive behavior pattern. I could not say if you are enabeling or not because I do not know the sittuation.
Usally when I enabel someone, it may take a while but I will always end up angry, resentful at the person I'm enabeling (helping), hoping they'll change and burned out with what I'm doing for them. Being an enabeler I have found looks like being nice, caring, loving and self sacrificing (lol!! more like martyrr) but is pretty selfishly motivated to cover my fears, insecurities, want for control. This is just my experiance and what I have learned.
Larks

[Kathyanita]

I feel (after 25 years of marraige to same man) that there will be certain duties I will charge myself with performing because it would not and does not accure to him that they are important- he is not in my head and I'm not in his. If we take up certain duties and then over time they are given the wieght of responsibilities we might want to remind ourselves who assigned the job in the first place. But- doing things that we resent for one another because we've made voluntary efforts into responsibilities then becomes sort of passive-aggressive. This year in my house we discussed and decided not to put up Christmas decorations and a tree and go without all the formalities (our lease is up in spring so it was practicle not to unpack all that stuff and we were able to save money we'll need to move) so we had a relaxed day and even decided not to exchange gifts but to get food and movies and a few board games that would belong to everybody. My point is I could have felt obligated to do all the holiday stuff and resented it all being on me to pull off the holidays- if I'd not brought it up to family and gotten thier input. I had assigned myself these duties years ago and it was up to me to find out that it wasn't something the family would hold against me if I didn't do it. We all ended up on the same page instead of anguishing over who required what from whom and feeling put-upon by each other. My husband was very happy not to have to shop as well.

[hamy]

I believe that it becomes enabling when you are doing something to help the person hide or perpetuate unhealthy behaviors. the analogy of the card giving would be an example of enabling in my opinion. Now, if you did buy them cards and signed them from you, that is a different story. Men have long been notorious for not doing such things as sending cards and gift buying...women should not perpuate this behavior by doing it for them. The issues get much larger, I know...not just card buying. Just some thoughts....

[colors]

Well my experience has been that men just don't like to shop, and if they do, they choose wrong colors or sizes.

I know this is not on the topic of choice, but in this example it seems normal. It is for me in any case.

Now if we are talking about his chore list around the house, that is something entirely different.


Colors

[forgottenmom]

Ok so lets talk about chores. I have usually been on the wrong end of this convo as I am just about the perfect definition of a slob, was my ex enabling me because he did 90% of the housework, and I did very little, or was it a case of it mattered more to him if it was done than it did to me? He did end up resenting it, and we fought about it often, but the end result was always the same, I would resolve to do better, but in the end I just don't "see" the mess piling up until it was way beyond his breaking point. About the only things I sucessfully changed was closing drawers and not throwing my winter coat down just inside the door.

[Kathyanita]

I think if the husband asks specifically for cooperation around housework and it is specifically refused and verbally- then he's not enabling- he's resigned to doing what must be done. If cooperation is agreed to but not carried out then it's charitable enabling if he goes the extra mile to cover the rest of the chores. That's been my place a lot of my married life- my husband has done work that I have every intention of doing but have in the past mentally left and not done it. I have more control now that I understand dissociation but I felt guilty and he felt resentment but he didn't want to enable me and I didn't want to be enabled- just forgiven and understood as I tried like hell to understand myself.

[Malady156]

This is just my limited perspective, experience and observation, but ...

it seems to me that people are generally more in danger of erring on the side of hardness than on the side of compassion.

it seems to me that much damage is wrought by disparaging genuine loving supportiveness by the taint of the suggestion of "enabling", and what is erected in its place smacks of hard-heartedness. much abusiveness is passed off and self-justified as so-called "tough love". there is a such thing as genuine "tough love", yes, and there is the need for balance and boundaries -- none of us can be everything to someone else, none of us can take on responsibility for "fixing" someone else -- but we are rarely in danger of erring on the side of being too soft and showing too much compassion, understanding or respect for another. what generally results is we are too quick to excuse ourselves from making the effort when it becomes difficult for us, too quick to dump blame on their heads for things they cannot control because WE cannot MAKE them control those things either, and too quick to justify ourselves and brush off our hands in smug, self-righteous satisfaction that it's not our problem and they needed that kick in the arse or whatever.

making someone feel like crap about something they have no control over is never productive for them. it doesn't give them that control. you can't shame someone into having control over an irrational product of biochemistry (mental illness). taking responsibility is another matter -- but again, you cannot shame someone into responsibility. people tend to take responsibility when they are treated with respect and made to feel valued JUST AS THEY ARE. shaming them is counterproductive to this and only drives them underground or into defiance or into lipservice fake compliance with resentment underneath; it doesn't help them grow as people. and taking responsibility does not mean they now have control. it only means they are doing what they CAN be doing to get better and to grow, and that's all they can do. you can't rip the skin from the snake; you can't demand someone heal or grow or improve themselves on your timetable. if you aren't there to water and nurture, get out.

telling someone they really have control when they don't is never productive for them. it does not magickally give them that control. it is a cruel, sick, abusive self-justification mechanism. if you (not you personally hon, just talking in general!) want to bail on someone, for gods' sakes, bail on them, make it clean, complete and fast. don't hang around dumping your garbage / baggage / sewage on their heads and making things worse for them, making them out to blame because you can't be there.

(all those "YOU"s above are NOT directed at YOU PERSONALLY, just speaking in general as in "any person" -- PLEASE don't take anything as a personal direct aim at you because I said "you"!!! These are my general thoughts and they'd apply to anyone, self included.)

[forgottenmom]

thanks Malady. Actually I feel like I'm taking hits from my bf's family and possibly his therapists, although I'm not there to defend. This is an issue that I knew before my bf and I were bf and gf, and I never had a problem with it, and now that he's getting help all of these "experts" have a bit of a problem with my not having a problem, and I still don't have one, but it makes me worry that I am not helping him, if that makes any sense. I knew going in that this was there, I did some soul searching then to determine if I thought it was ever going to become a problem, decided it wasn't, and so far I have been right, and I don't think that will change. BUT what if it's really not good for him that I don't have a problem with it? How would I know? The only two people this affects is me and him. No one else has to live with the results.

[forgottenmom]

You guys have all been helpful and thank you for posting

[jtarbox]

I agree with Malady I tend to be to soft and enable people or let people step on me because I don't want to be a "hard @ss" like some people I have grown up with. I have had the boundary lecture already but that is the price you pay by being a people please I suppose?

[sqrlb8]

When some one we love has the flu, or is recovering from a broken leg, we take care of them. No one accuses us of enabling someone to have the flu. Similarly, if someone is in a state of shock or grief, we allow space to heal and recover. Again, no accusations of enabling. On the other hand, as soon as any form of mental illness, or as i like to say, "otherness," is involved, and we give care and space, the accusations just fly. Such crap. It only reflects a deep ignorance on the part of the accusors.

As for the example you gave, buying cards and so on on the behalf of your partner, well, stop it. So what if no one gets a card? His family might get a better picture of how and who he is and isn't if expressions aren't made for him. You can just let those things be however they are and thereby demonstrate that there is no shame in it. So many of those perfunctory expectations are what drive us crazies nuts anyway. Let it fall, no harm no foul. Notice that to say that, I never had to even use the word, "enable?"

Tough love is just a euphamism for intolerance. Trust your heart, and don't expect any reinforcement for that from the psych world.

That would be my two cents worth.

[forgottenmom]

LoL the cards thing is actually HIS folks, I don't buy cards for anyone, my family or his. I was just using that as an example. Thanks for the input everyone I feel much better now

[(JD)]

Glad you're feeling better. Still thinking about that analogy...
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When we agree to link up with someone, part and parcel of that relationship is to use our strengths where the other has weakness. No one person can do everything, especially everything a relative might impose! Being able to fill in for one another is part of the team work!

(Think of short term projects for work and the team, how you accomplish so much more once you realize Joe doesn't do on=time well, Mike is great at visualization, Mary has to have everything in writing, but she's great with expressive writing! The team compensates for the lack of another, and uses the strength of those who have what is needed.)

Skylrks said it well, right off the bat: if what I'm helping with contributes to an unhealthy symptom in a partner, then it's enabling and not healthy for anyone. But if something isn't hurting anyone, what's the big deal? The machinery is running smoothly.

Now back to your analogy For: Case in point actually! My oldest brother and his wife sent mother cards each and every holiday, occasion, along with flowers special delivery (they lived all over the world.) It thrilled my mother for years and years. After my brother's wife died: no cards. no flowers. Of course she realizes just WHO was sending the thoughts... and it saddens her that her son didn't do it. But did that taint the joy all those years? Nah.