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occasionally has sad feelings, or one of the people mentioned earlier.

But, the heart of the definition and recovery lies not in the other personno matter how much we believe it does. It lies in
ourselves, in the ways we have let other people's behavior affect us and in the ways we try to affect them: the obsessing,
the controlling, the obsessive ''helping," caretaking, low self-worth bordering on self-hatred, self-repression, abundance
of anger and guilt, peculiar dependency on peculiar people, attraction to and tolerance for the bizarre, other-centeredness
that results in abandonment of self, communication problems, intimacy problems, and an ongoing whirlwind trip through
the five-stage grief process.

Is codependency an illness? Some professionals say codependency isn't a disease; they say it's a normal reaction to
abnormal people. 9

Other professionals say codependency is a disease; it's a chronic, progressive illness. They suggest codependents want
and need sick people around them to be happy in an unhealthy way. They say, for instance, the wife of an alcoholic
needed to marry an alcoholic and chose him because she unconsciously thought he was an alcoholic. Furthermore, she
needed him drinking and socking it to her to feel fulfilled.

This latter judgment may be overly harsh. I'm convinced codependents need less harshness in their lives. Other people
have been hard enough on us. We have been hard enough on ourselves. Friends, we have

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suffered enough. We have been victimized by diseases and people. Each of us must decide what part we played in our
victimization.

I don't know if codependency is or isn't an illness. I'm not an expert. But, to tell you what I believe, let me complete the
brief history of codependency which I started earlier in this chapter.

Although the first Al-Anon groups were formed in the 1940s, I am certain we could go back to the beginning of time and
human relationships and find glimmers of codependent behavior. People have always had problems, and others have
always cared for their troubled friends and relatives. People have likely been caught up with the problems of others since
relationships began.

Codependency probably trailed man as he struggled through the remaining B.C. years, right up to ''these generally
wretched times of the twentieth century," as Morley Safer of 60 Minutes says. Ever since people first existed, they have
been doing all the things we label "codependent." They have worried themselves sick about other people. They have tried
to help in ways that didn't help. They have said yes when they meant no. They have tried to make other people see things
their way. They have bent over backward to avoid hurting people's feelings and, in so doing, have hurt themselves. They
have been afraid to trust their feelings. They have believed lies and then felt betrayed. They have wanted to get even and
punish others. They have felt so angry they wanted to kill. They have struggled for their rights while other people said
they didn't have any. They have worn sackcloth because they didn't believe they deserved silk.

Codependents have undoubtedly done good deeds too. By their nature, codependents are benevolentconcerned about and
responsive to the needs of the world. As Thomas Wright writes in an article from the book Co-Dependency, An
Emerging Issue, "I suspect codependents have historically attacked social injustice and fought for the rights of the
underdog. Codependents want to help. I suspect they have helped. But they probably died thinking they didn't do enough
and were feeling guilty.

"It is natural to want to protect and help the people we care about. It is also natural to be affected by and react to the
problems of people

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around us. As a problem becomes more serious and remains unresolved, we become more affected and react more
intensely to it."