Anyone here been told they were either codependent or passive aggressive? Or are you married to someone who is? Have you found any solution to the problems? I found this very good article that I wanted to share on the relationship between the two. In the article it says if a codependents leaves his/her PA partner that they most times end up in the same type of relationship. This is something my counselor told me as well. He told me it was better to work on myself and resolve my issues of codependency than to divorce thinking that there was something better out there. Article below. Would love some feedback on this.
The Passive Aggressive And Co-Dependency
Passive aggressive behavior is usually involved in co-dependency; this involves a relationship where the passive aggressive person has engaged another person who aids their seeking of control over their situation. Codependency with a passive aggressive person usually involves a triangular relationship that has three distinct phases.
1. The first segment of this three-sided nightmare would be the people-pleasing rescuer, this person tries to do it all and will go through endless pains to try and make other people happy mostly at their own expense. These people are often anxious, depressed, self sacrificing, and addicted to hope
2. The second segment is the resentful stage where the codependent person becomes angry, hurt, and resents that their passive aggressive partner will not change or accept their help. They repress feelings because they learn it's no use expressing them because they will be ignored. Their self-esteem is bottomed out and their own emotions overwhelm them. There is a lack of coping skills, which causes difficulty in maintaining a positive sense of self.
3. The third segment would be when you start feeling like a victim and start doubting yourself. Questioning yourself with things like why does this always happen to me, or why can't they appreciate all the sacrifices that I've made for them are typical responses for a codependent person. Co-dependents often become addicted to a relationship and will often choose a dysfunctional mate because it is a familiar relationship pattern. This can flow in either direction but it is a tool in the hands of the passive aggressive person used to control the codependent and to keep them from questioning the behavior of the controller who are masters of distributing guilt to everyone but themselves.
A codependent is in many ways an enabler for the passive aggressive person, they often end up functioning much like the "whipping boy" who takes the punishment for the prince, while the passive aggressive accepts this as the right and proper order of things. In the world of the passive aggressive person they are never the ones responsible for failures or negative outcomes. This responsibility is always passed off to someone else and a co-dependent person makes an ideal target for this kind of blame shifting.
In dealing with a passive aggressive person you will often find that they try to manipulate others to get what they want. This controlling behavior is necessary for them because they feel that their needs won't be met if they let their needs be known. It is almost impossible to penetrate the shield that a passive aggressive has thrown up around their emotions because they are terrified of becoming vulnerable. Passive aggressive people consider intimacy to be the ultimate abomination and will go to extraordinary lengths to make sure that they never become susceptible to being intimate with anyone. They often resort to a strategy where they want to trade something for something, a quid pro quo arrangement where they set the rules.
Strangely these people have a very difficult time with saying no to someone else's requests. Yet they engage in a pattern of procrastination because in reality they are paying you back for daring to make a request of them. This turning of things back on the person that questions their behavior is an extremely harmful strategy to anyone that is attempting to have a relationship with this person. It erodes their confidence and self-esteem and puts them in a very vulnerable position for further manipulation.
Passive aggressive people are great actors, when you examine how they deal with the world everything they do is an act. They refuse to allow their real selves to be glimpsed by anyone. They are afraid that if that real self is ever seen that they will be rejected, so they bury it deep. Being consummate actors though allows them to be great pretenders of emotions that they are really not feeling and this seems to be a way that they lure people into becoming their partners. They seem to prefer people-pleasers that will make huge efforts to keep them fat and happy in the little world that they are creating. This often comes at the emotional expense of their partner. One of the passive aggressive person's primary goals is to be considered as a nice person. They will make huge efforts to build the scenery that makes them look like a wonderful person to others. Often this fantasy comes at a high cost to their partner who is essentially abandoned as soon as the stage is set and everything seems to be in place.
These people can be smooth especially the ones that are highly intelligent, because they are master manipulators. They have learned which buttons to push to get the reactions that they want and they aren't shy about it. It seems as though their victims are hypnotized and somehow they have been convinced that it's all right that they are treated as puppets on the stage of the passive aggressive person's world. When one of their puppets starts to wake up and realizes that they are being mistreated the passive aggressive will often go into overdrive to smooth things over and lull them back into the coma of their regular existence.
Passive aggressive people are often condescending to others and often make sarcastic comments designed to lessen the worth of other people. A common strategy is to make derogatory remarks about those close to them or family members. They often have a distorted self-concept that combined with low self-esteem, drives them to seek approval but when they get it then it has no value. These people have an underlying goal, which is to avoid all conflict or emotional intimacy and they will avoid confrontation at all costs. A favorite tactic when confronted with something that they will not deal with is to derail the conversation by changing the subject, or ignoring what's been said, or to make a disparaging remark about it, which effectively ends the discussion.
The passive aggressive persons greatest weapon is time. The discomfort of being in a relationship with them usually takes quite a lot of time to reach a point where you know that something is wrong. By the time you begin to see the problem you have invested so much of yourself that you simply can't admit that you can't fix this problem. All of that time, energy, devotion and commitment that you have put into the relationship anchors you because like most people pleasers you just can't give up and recognize that you have made a seriously bad investment. Being a pleaser (co-dependent) is a lot like an addiction to gambling; an addicted gambler will bet the last dollar they have because they fervently believe that the next hand will be a winner. A co-dependent will keep fighting a hopeless battle because they don't have the courage to give up and start again. If they do finally break free they often end up with another version of what they had because they unconsciously choose a partner that is familiarly dysfunctional.
So if you are in a relationship and you keep seeing these behaviors then perhaps you need to evaluate how this is affecting you. This behavior mode is horribly difficult to change and this can only be done with the full cooperation of the passive aggressive person and they will likely never admit that there is anything wrong or will blame it on you. Sometimes you have to know when to fold your hand in this game because in this case there are no winners. But just knowing what you are up against can help you decide what to do for your own survival. As co-dependent people pleasers it's terribly difficult for us to tear ourselves away from these projects that we somehow believe that we can fix. The reality is that it's not our problem to fix and most passive aggressive people don't feel that there is anything wrong.
Absolutely the only chance you have of changing this scenario is to get the passive aggressive person to know that they are passive aggressive and to get them to voluntarily seek help for this problem. It has to come from them, unless you can get them to recognize that they have a problem they will never do anything about it because they don't believe a problem exists. Remember you are dealing with a master blame shifter and the passive aggressive behavior is the root of the problem but unless they have a real desire to change things then your relationship will never change.
The Passive Aggressive And Co-Dependency
Passive aggressive behavior is usually involved in co-dependency; this involves a relationship where the passive aggressive person has engaged another person who aids their seeking of control over their situation. Codependency with a passive aggressive person usually involves a triangular relationship that has three distinct phases.
1. The first segment of this three-sided nightmare would be the people-pleasing rescuer, this person tries to do it all and will go through endless pains to try and make other people happy mostly at their own expense. These people are often anxious, depressed, self sacrificing, and addicted to hope
2. The second segment is the resentful stage where the codependent person becomes angry, hurt, and resents that their passive aggressive partner will not change or accept their help. They repress feelings because they learn it's no use expressing them because they will be ignored. Their self-esteem is bottomed out and their own emotions overwhelm them. There is a lack of coping skills, which causes difficulty in maintaining a positive sense of self.
3. The third segment would be when you start feeling like a victim and start doubting yourself. Questioning yourself with things like why does this always happen to me, or why can't they appreciate all the sacrifices that I've made for them are typical responses for a codependent person. Co-dependents often become addicted to a relationship and will often choose a dysfunctional mate because it is a familiar relationship pattern. This can flow in either direction but it is a tool in the hands of the passive aggressive person used to control the codependent and to keep them from questioning the behavior of the controller who are masters of distributing guilt to everyone but themselves.
A codependent is in many ways an enabler for the passive aggressive person, they often end up functioning much like the "whipping boy" who takes the punishment for the prince, while the passive aggressive accepts this as the right and proper order of things. In the world of the passive aggressive person they are never the ones responsible for failures or negative outcomes. This responsibility is always passed off to someone else and a co-dependent person makes an ideal target for this kind of blame shifting.
In dealing with a passive aggressive person you will often find that they try to manipulate others to get what they want. This controlling behavior is necessary for them because they feel that their needs won't be met if they let their needs be known. It is almost impossible to penetrate the shield that a passive aggressive has thrown up around their emotions because they are terrified of becoming vulnerable. Passive aggressive people consider intimacy to be the ultimate abomination and will go to extraordinary lengths to make sure that they never become susceptible to being intimate with anyone. They often resort to a strategy where they want to trade something for something, a quid pro quo arrangement where they set the rules.
Strangely these people have a very difficult time with saying no to someone else's requests. Yet they engage in a pattern of procrastination because in reality they are paying you back for daring to make a request of them. This turning of things back on the person that questions their behavior is an extremely harmful strategy to anyone that is attempting to have a relationship with this person. It erodes their confidence and self-esteem and puts them in a very vulnerable position for further manipulation.
Passive aggressive people are great actors, when you examine how they deal with the world everything they do is an act. They refuse to allow their real selves to be glimpsed by anyone. They are afraid that if that real self is ever seen that they will be rejected, so they bury it deep. Being consummate actors though allows them to be great pretenders of emotions that they are really not feeling and this seems to be a way that they lure people into becoming their partners. They seem to prefer people-pleasers that will make huge efforts to keep them fat and happy in the little world that they are creating. This often comes at the emotional expense of their partner. One of the passive aggressive person's primary goals is to be considered as a nice person. They will make huge efforts to build the scenery that makes them look like a wonderful person to others. Often this fantasy comes at a high cost to their partner who is essentially abandoned as soon as the stage is set and everything seems to be in place.
These people can be smooth especially the ones that are highly intelligent, because they are master manipulators. They have learned which buttons to push to get the reactions that they want and they aren't shy about it. It seems as though their victims are hypnotized and somehow they have been convinced that it's all right that they are treated as puppets on the stage of the passive aggressive person's world. When one of their puppets starts to wake up and realizes that they are being mistreated the passive aggressive will often go into overdrive to smooth things over and lull them back into the coma of their regular existence.
Passive aggressive people are often condescending to others and often make sarcastic comments designed to lessen the worth of other people. A common strategy is to make derogatory remarks about those close to them or family members. They often have a distorted self-concept that combined with low self-esteem, drives them to seek approval but when they get it then it has no value. These people have an underlying goal, which is to avoid all conflict or emotional intimacy and they will avoid confrontation at all costs. A favorite tactic when confronted with something that they will not deal with is to derail the conversation by changing the subject, or ignoring what's been said, or to make a disparaging remark about it, which effectively ends the discussion.
The passive aggressive persons greatest weapon is time. The discomfort of being in a relationship with them usually takes quite a lot of time to reach a point where you know that something is wrong. By the time you begin to see the problem you have invested so much of yourself that you simply can't admit that you can't fix this problem. All of that time, energy, devotion and commitment that you have put into the relationship anchors you because like most people pleasers you just can't give up and recognize that you have made a seriously bad investment. Being a pleaser (co-dependent) is a lot like an addiction to gambling; an addicted gambler will bet the last dollar they have because they fervently believe that the next hand will be a winner. A co-dependent will keep fighting a hopeless battle because they don't have the courage to give up and start again. If they do finally break free they often end up with another version of what they had because they unconsciously choose a partner that is familiarly dysfunctional.
So if you are in a relationship and you keep seeing these behaviors then perhaps you need to evaluate how this is affecting you. This behavior mode is horribly difficult to change and this can only be done with the full cooperation of the passive aggressive person and they will likely never admit that there is anything wrong or will blame it on you. Sometimes you have to know when to fold your hand in this game because in this case there are no winners. But just knowing what you are up against can help you decide what to do for your own survival. As co-dependent people pleasers it's terribly difficult for us to tear ourselves away from these projects that we somehow believe that we can fix. The reality is that it's not our problem to fix and most passive aggressive people don't feel that there is anything wrong.
Absolutely the only chance you have of changing this scenario is to get the passive aggressive person to know that they are passive aggressive and to get them to voluntarily seek help for this problem. It has to come from them, unless you can get them to recognize that they have a problem they will never do anything about it because they don't believe a problem exists. Remember you are dealing with a master blame shifter and the passive aggressive behavior is the root of the problem but unless they have a real desire to change things then your relationship will never change.
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