#co dependency

[firsttarotreader]

Pedro saying he is a huge co-dependent. 😅

[generic-whumperz]

[awkwardandeccentric]

Co-dependence is such a stigmatized survivor response (especially in a hyper-individualistic culture) and I’m so glad we have a story where the co-dependent partner lets his iron grip let up and is not only not being villainized by the narrative but also is an unapologetic romantic who is strong enough to continue his self-improvement journey, despite how terrifying and uncertain everything is. He refuses to continue to keep being dysfunctional because it’s not good for the people around him, even though it’s easier.

Stolas knows what he wants, he’s not settling for anything less, and he’s learning to stand on his own two feet. He’s never been a priority to anyone, before. So, he’ll have to be his own priority.

[solianapaeris]

I think it’s important for women to realize the subtleties of manipulation and how some men will try to break your spirit or knock you down a notch. There are men who will try to appeal to your ego and compliment you and put you on a pedestal; they try to soften you with false flattery, only to knock you down and try to sow seeds of confusion, insecurity, and co-dependency later on down the line.

If you are a woman who keeps up with her looks and fitness, they will compliment you on that consistently, only to try to throw in digs at how you “look bigger” in some photos, or how you look like you’ve been eating good. They’ll tell you that you “look tired” when you’re feeling and looking just fine to start to sow seeds of insecurity and have you micromanaging and being hyper vigilant about your looks around them.

If you are a woman who is deemed free-spirited or easy going they will mention other women who tried to proposition them (only to reassure you that no, they didn’t accept). They’ll bring up female friends who may or may not be interested in them, or say how so many people think they are handsome in an attempt to bring out insecurity or jealousy in you, to try to get you to cling to them and become co-dependent while triangulating you with imaginary people and scenarios.

If you are a woman who is comfortable in solitude, they will initially try to smother you with affection and compliments and then withhold or withdraw them, to get you to cling to them or to ask, beg, or relay how much you miss them. They will withhold compliments, will not give you affection, or will purposefully leave you or walk ahead of you in public so that you will metaphorically (and literally) have to chase and keep up with them.

It’s important as a woman to know that it’s not a bad thing for you to think “I’m too good for this/them/this situation/him.” That is your intuition telling you something is off. Everyone does not deserve a chance to experience your time or presence, and that does not make you arrogant. It doesn’t matter how many times a man asks you out, wants your time. If something in you says “no” don’t let anyone wear your down or convince you otherwise. That’s not being rude or mean. It makes you wise, and strategic. Men know this.

Men who know that you are indeed too good for them in some way, shape, or form will try to manipulate you in various ways so you will feel like you need them, because deep down they know they don’t deserve the spot they falsely secured to begin with. So they try to pick and dig at your self-esteem, your pride, your looks, so you will feel that you don’t deserve them or that you need them —not the other way around.

And yes, if you are well put together, good looking, well-spoken, and intelligent, the harder they will go to get you in the beginning, and the worse the manipulation will be afterwards, because some men feel that the only way to obtain a woman of that caliber is to break her emotionally or mentally, so she can become a shell of herself and be “built up” again by his external validation.

Be safe out here, ladies, and protect yourself 💕

[awbwi]

So I made a comic about co-dependency and how I've been feeling for Mental Health Awareness Month.

[thefandomlifechoseme]

There's not nearly enough content about Vox Machina being found family/violently co-dependent and I need it

They've been through end of the world level stuff, and your trying to suggest that they aren't all Utterly Traumatised and Also Family

[dead-orange-club]

this user is codependent box pls?

[tipsyboat]

Snip.

Co-dependency is weird. Only recently I found out what it even was, and I realized how much I struggled from it. I thought I was fine without them. That person. Why is it only now, after everything I've realized?

And to the ones whose unwillingly had that happen, the string squeezes your heart painfully. Taking your hope, your feeling. Taking your strength, making you sick.

It feels like your life is ruined. It feels as if these people know that you're so dependent on them even though you didn't even mean to. How could they have seen it when you couldn't? People are cruel and will leave for selfish reasons than talk to you and communicate why they feel a certain way. Not all, but most don't know how to communicate, so they coward away and leave you. Some will say why they leave, others won't even say goodbye before leaving. making you wonder "What did I do?" You may have done wrong, but it isn't your fault. We all need guidance to see our wrongs, its not easy to see them when it becomes natural reaction. It's the ones who run away and snip that connection that you so strongly cared for who do wrong. They know they're hurting you most of the time. And that's the dangerous part. Personally, when this happened to me. I almost died. You might wonder "why? you were overreacting." I was struggling harshly mentally already before they had left. They knew I was struggling, and they knew December was a hard month for me due to past experiences. They were the only person that made me get up everyday in that moment, and I didn't even realize how bad I was struggling until they left completely. no warning, no goodbye. I had lost all hope, and well, you could probably tell what happened. But now I am better with medication, but I will never forgive what they did. Instead I will be better than them, I will never become such a selfish person.

Its okay to hate those who hurt you, but not trying to better yourself from that experience and accepting what happened will get you nowhere. And hey, if you cant tell what you need to work on despite trying, I can help you understand, You aren't alone. We will figure this out together.

[firsttarotreader]

https://x.com/pascalarchive/status/1897340674875515247?s=46&t=cGL6Aea-Q3qTIFOcpLnCOA

Did we talk about him being co-dependent before? I feel like we have, he says it here as well!

He talked about it before, during SDCC. I posted this video back then 😁😁:

[deepwebgirl]

I looked for you in myself and never found. From then on lost what little was left of me. I never met again. And I won't.

[ghost-go-roasty-mctoasty]

Remember when Dean, this completely unhinged man, literally SAWED off his cast off his still very much broken and unhealed leg for the sole reason to go looking for his fully grown brother who left a note saying he was fine. HE PUT A REAL SAW THAT CLOSE TO HIS SKIN

[kuiperoid]

I wonder if we'll be together looking back on the past But I don't care if I don't live to see another day

[pinkcherryobseslove]

I'm not ready to be alone tomorrow. I'm scared. I'll have nothing. 9am till 3pm (11am till 5pm for me however). All alone. This isn't fair. Why can't I keep her with me?

[mentalpilled]

I miss being in a co dependent relationship. I miss being dependent on someone

[afineprivateplace]

Nightmare People

Looking back over my last post, I can see that the portrait I've painted of Anagram is not very attractive. The few compliments I paid them were kind of backhanded (sharp-to-the-point-of-cutting sense of humour) and the rest of my description was negative. And it's not that I feel like I owe them anything, but that makes it an incomplete picture. If nothing else, it's worth describing that there was a person there who someone could fall in love with. More than that, though, it might show that, aside from the abuse (which obviously no one should have to endure), they and I were never as good a match as I once thought. We were each other's nightmare people.

(If you want a song to serve as a soundtrack for this post, listen to "They'll Need a Crane" by the band They Might Be Giants.)

So, who is Anagram? Anagram is artistic, and very talented: they would draw, write poetry, create textile art, improvise funny silly songs while they did things around the house, played a couple of instruments a little. The art they created suggested a sensitive, inquisitive mind, and a desire for connection and tranquility. They liked to cook and try new places to eat and drink. They have a wide-ranging interest in art, film, culture and music, and manage to be unpretentious about it; they could enjoy a 'Fast and Furious' movie just as much as an experimental dance piece. Anagram has a fierce zeal for social justice issues - feminism, queer rights, mental health and disability advocacy, and more. They are a devoted animal lover, with a particular soft spot for cats.

Anagram could be unbelievably generous, empathetic, and encouraging. They love to buy presents for friends and share simple pleasures like games nights or picnics. They enjoy being goofy, cuddly, demonstratively friendly. There's a sweetness to Anagram that can be honestly overwhelming, especially when contrasted with their bluntness at other times. If Anagram likes you, they will let you know effusively. They can be a lot of fun to spend time with, comfortable being out at a party or doing karaoke just as much as they are having a quiet night in front of a TV bingeing a show.

Particularly for me, I was attracted to Anagram's ambition and seeming ability to not care what other people think, both things I lack. They were - they are - smarter than me, and I found that appealing because we could talk about interesting things and I might learn something I didn't know. They encouraged me to not take myself so seriously. They laughed at my jokes, and riffed with me to create new ones. For the first time in my life, they made me feel attractive, and told me how much they liked features like my eyelashes, my smile, my hands.

It's hard for me to talk about my own good qualities. I've always struggled to have any positive self-image. So it's not easy to say what Anagram saw in me, but here goes. As I've mentioned before, people tell me I'm funny, and it's one of the only nice things people tell me that I'm able to accept. I'm a good conversationalist, once you can get past my initial shyness. I think I am fairly empathetic; even though I don't always understand people's emotions, I try to hear people out and validate their side of things. I'm not always adventurous off my own bat, but I am accommodating, so I will try new things with someone so we can share an experience. I love the arts, and we had enough similarity in taste regarding movies, TV and music that we could share these things and talk about them. We introduced each other to new bands and books that we each loved. I always tried to take an interest in the things Anagram liked, and became quite fond of some of them. I liked to do things for them; it made me feel good to be useful.

On the surface, we seemed to have so much in common. Even after the abuse began and I started to feel scared of being around them, there'd be days where we'd have such fun together. We were on the same wavelength, able to sense each other's needs, saying the right things to comfort each other. There were times when no one seemed to get me like Anagram. I was able to tell them things about myself that I hadn't told anyone else before, and I would listen when they spoke about the things that scared or hurt them. There were times when it felt like me and Anagram against the world.

But I can see now that those similarities hid the ways we were uniquely bad for each other. Both Anagram and I have some serious mental health issues, with a tendency to anxiety and depression. We're also both neurodivergent; I have ADHD and autism (both diagnosed), and Anagram had autism (I don't know if they ever got an official diagnosis). This is not necessarily a problem - lots of couples have very healthy relationships with mutual mental health issues and/or neurodivergence. In our case though, I believe we aggravated each other's issues, lowering each other's mood, heightening each others nerves, and setting off each other's triggers. When we met, sparks flew; they just weren't always the good kind.

I have some further ideas about Anagram's mental health struggles, but that's just speculation and I'm not going to get into that right now. But I do know what my issues are, and I can see how they caused problems. My low self-esteem makes me needy and fragile, and it's frankly not an attractive quality. I tend to be self-defeating, which I think Anagram always found frustrating; combined with my indecisiveness, it meant I so often would just not do things that could make my life better, which would obviously annoy Anagram if I then complained about being unhappy. I have a pessimistic streak, which can make me very hard to be around sometimes. And Anagram certainly wasn't the only one with a temper. It's something I try to combat, but boy can I get het up over tiny things sometimes.

Again, none of this is intended to excuse the abuse. Fundamentally, I think we were two very broken people, and I want to be compassionate to both of us. Maybe two healthier versions of Anagram and I would have given it a few months and then realised we couldn't make each other happy, and broken up amicably. After everything, I still loved our time together enough that I'd prefer that than us never meeting at all. But I'm not sure that was ever a possibility. Instead, we locked into the strong emotions we brought out in each other, riding the euphoric highs past the horror of the lows. I think we were both scared of where we'd find ourselves if we gave up on the relationship, how much we'd feel we had lost. Until, finally, there wasn't anything good left to rescue. Until the last time Anagram kicked me out, and told me not to come back, and I agreed with them. We'd gone from two human people to each other's nightmare.

[firsttarotreader]

Pedro saying he's a "huge co-dependent" person and then clearly thinking "why the fuck did I revealed that? 😬" LOL P, relax, we already knew but we also know how you are capable of break bonds with people and act like they never existed in your life, you complex beautiful man 😉

(I have the link for the interview in case someone haven't see it. It's from a interview he did yesterday)

Send the link, please! 😅 I haven’t had the time to watch the interviews today, but that makes total sense! He obsesses over people for a while and then just drops them. This co-dependency is temporary. He’s intense, but he loses interest for good and drops the person. 😅