I’d never fully considered the word “mundane” in relation to my life until a conversation I had with my professor kept replaying in my head. “I can’t think of anything mundane in my life,” I told her. She smiled, “You’re very lucky.”
Last night while sitting on the couch, I thought, I’m going to Google the definition of mundane. Surely I can find something mundane in my life.
I tapped “mundane” into my phone.
Adjective – Lacking interest or excitement; dull.
And it got worse.
Synonyms – Humdrum. Dull. Boring. Monotonous. Tiresome. Wearisome. Unexciting. Uninteresting. Uninvolving. Uneventful. Unvarying. Unremarkable. Repetitive. Repetitious. Routine. Ordinary. Everyday. Day-to-day. Run-of-the-mill. Commonplace.
I stared at the screen. Google just described my life.
It would be shorter to write about the things in my life that are not dull or boring. But what constitutes exciting or interesting? How does one measure that? What’s exciting to me might not be exciting to someone else.
I tapped “excited” into my phone.
Adjective – Causing great enthusiasm and eagerness.
Verb – Bring out or give rise to a feeling or emotion.
And it got worse.
Synonyms – Breathtaking. Thrilling. Exhilarating. Moving. Inspiring. Compelling. Sensational. Agitated. Annoyed. Delighted. Disturbed. Enthusiastic. Hysterical. Frantic. Wired. Provoked. In a tizzy. Keyed up. On edge. Overwrought.
I began to examine my life from a different angle. If I consider the verb definition of exciting, the last couple of years have certainly been exciting. The person I trusted most in my life broke that trust, sending me on a downward spiral into a heavy blanket of darkness. The warm place I sought solace suddenly turned cold and was reduced to ashes. The blanket got heavier and heavier, and as much as I tried, I couldn’t get out from under it.
That darkness led me to a stranger’s couch, once a week, for 50 minutes. That stranger now knows more about me than anyone else. She even taught me something about myself that I couldn’t see. It has a name, and there is a reason for it. It stems back to my childhood, and it was self-taught, well, almost.
Codependency.
I’m not dependent on anyone; I thought to myself when I first heard the words.
I tapped “codependency” into my phone.
Noun– Excessive emotional or psychological reliance on a partner. Forms or maintains relationships that are one-sided.
How could it get worse?
Synonyms– Addicted. Interconnected. Attached. Interdependent. Mutually dependent.
Growing up was a desperate walk of trying to avoid a minefield of explosives. Explosives that could detonate at any minute. One wrong move and I would be hit, mostly with verbal grenades; the physical ones never left bruises. It’s the damage that no one can see that does the most destruction.
I learned to avoid confrontation.
I learned to do what everyone else wanted to do.
I learned to put others’ needs before mine.
I learned to become a people pleaser.
I learned to feel responsible for the happiness or unhappiness of others.
I learned to keep things inside for fear of displeasing others.
I learned to base my self-worth on the caretaking of others.
I told myself I didn’t matter.
Codependent. I thought that if I made sure everyone around me was happy, I would be happy. I couldn’t have been more wrong. I only set myself up for a lifetime of disappointment as I discovered that all the energy I put into making sure everyone around me was happy would not make me happy. I expected what I gave in return. That rarely happened, causing more disappointment.
Recovery. Recovery is a long, difficult walk. When you own the dysfunction and begin to make little changes, you are met with resistance from the very people you have been putting first for years. Sometimes you want to turn that walk into a run. You want to turn and run from the self you have created, but you know you can’t. So you turn around and face the resistance, all the while telling yourself you are important, and you matter to the most important person in your life, yourself.
I wrote this in 2016 for a creative non-fiction writing class in college. My professor encouraged us to experiment with the layout of text and puncuation, to write in more of an unconventional way. If you take a writing course at SVSU and you get the opportunity to be in a course Dr. Arra Ross teaches, do it.
I have come a long way since then. I have learned that being codependent has not set me up for a lifetime of disappointments. If you are struggling, I want you to know that there is hope for managing codependency. There is a way off the road of disappointment. Don’t give up. Acknowledge the disorder, shake its hand, and tell it you aren’t going to let it control you anymore. You do have control, and you can do this. Read everything you can, find a good therapist who will work with you, and, most of all, trust yourself. You can do this. ~Hope
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