Ep 209: From Codependence to Interdependence: Finding Your Worth After Divorce

Most women going through divorce don't realize they've been living in codependent relationships, desperately seeking external validation rather than trusting their inherent worth. In this transformative episode, I introduce you to a powerful reframing of codependence as "emotional outsourcing" as coined by Beatriz Victoria Albina - the habit of chronically seeking our sense of value from everyone and everything outside ourselves.

This pattern didn't emerge from nowhere. From girlhood, we're conditioned to believe our purpose is making others comfortable, prioritizing everyone else's needs, and feeling guilty when we put ourselves first. The devastating message? You're not complete until you fulfill your "duties" as a woman. This harmful programming creates the belief that you're somehow broken or unworthy - especially when your marriage ends.

Here's the liberating truth: We can replace emotional outsourcing with a deep, unshakable knowledge of our inherent worth. But contrary to what you might think, the goal isn't complete independence. True healing comes through interdependence - knowing your worth from within while maintaining meaningful connections where you give from abundance rather than obligation.

Ready to stop believing you're broken? Your journey to wholeness begins with recognizing your worth isn't determined by anyone else. 

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Grief and trauma are the two biggest struggles women deal with as they go through their divorce. It's highly likely that you are experiencing both and don't even realize what you're feeling. I'm here to tell you that it's okay for you to grieve your marriage (even if it was shitty) and it's normal to be experiencing some kind of trauma (which is essentially a disconnection from yourself - your mind, body and soul). I can help guide you through the grief in all of the forms it shows up so you can heal. I can also teach you how to ground yourself in healing so you can ease through the trauma. Schedule your free consult by clicking here.

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Full Episode Transcript:

If you're a woman going through a divorce and you are just tired you're tired of believing that it was your fault, you're tired of being made the bad one, you're tired of believing that you've ruined your life and your kids' lives Then Becoming you Again, this podcast, is the one for you. This is the podcast where you learn to step into your power as a woman in this world, where you learn to trust yourself and reconnect to your brain, your body and your intuition, and you learn to break down beliefs that are no longer serving you and replace them with new ones instead. This is Becoming you Again, episode number 209, and I am your host, karin Nelson. Welcome to Becoming you Again, the podcast where you learn to step into your power as a woman in this world, where you learn to reconnect to your wholeness, your integrity and bring into alignment your brain, your body and your intuition after divorce. This is the podcast where you learn to trust yourself again and move forward toward a life that you truly want. You are listening to Becoming you Again, and I am your host, karin Nelson. Welcome back to the podcast. My lovely ladies, I am so glad that you're here. I'm always so glad that you're here. Thank you for coming back week after week.

This week I'm going to be talking a little bit about codependence, interdependence and independence, and especially how these three things relate to you and your divorce and your relationships with everyone else moving forward. Most of us going through a divorce have been living in a codependent relationship, most of the time without even realizing it, or maybe you did realize it, but you just weren't sure why or how you got there. Most people typically think of a codependent relationship where there's a lot of emotional reliance on the other person in the relationship and then there's a lot of like enabling of bad behavior because you're so tied up in that emotional dependence, and that is a definition of codependence. But I want to offer you another idea, another definition of codependence, and this is a theoretical idea that was introduced to me by Beatriz Victoria Albina. She is a nurse practitioner, she is a somatic healer, she's just an all around amazing woman and one of my mentors. And I'm going to be using her definition of codependence because I think for the majority of women living in this world, but especially those coming out of a marriage, I think this definition really fits and it's why I like it so much.

So Beatrice has recoined the term codependency as emotional outsourcing. And so what is emotional outsourcing? She says that emotional outsourcing is, and I quote, when we chronically source or look to find our sense of worth, value, significance and emotional wellness from everyone and everything outside of ourselves, instead of believing in our own being, that we are inherently worthy of love and care exactly as we are. End quote. She believes that codependency doesn't have to depend on enabling bad behavior or enabling addiction, and instead she defines it as that emotional outsourcing. And this is what we are doing when we are living in a codependent relationship. We are looking to everyone else to tell us that we're valuable, to tell us that we're worthy, to tell us that we have significance, instead of knowing and believing it from within us, believing that we are inherently worthy, that we are inherently valuable exactly as we are. This is what we're doing when we are socialized to believe that we aren't complete, that we aren't whole, that we aren't worthy as we are. I want to make something very clear we are taught to believe this about ourselves. We are taught to live and act this way in the world. This is not how we were born. It is not a truth about our personality or something that just can't be changed because we think like, oh well, that's just who I am, I'm just not good enough, I'm just not worthy enough, I just am ruined. I just have done too many things to possibly be loved, I just have let down too many people, I just have made bad choices and that's just who I am. Like no, no, this is emotional outsourcing when we believe those things about ourselves. This is codependency, it is a learned behavior and if you learn to do that, then you can learn something different. I'm not going to say you can unlearn it, because if we know things and we learn things, we can't just like, pretend like we don't know them anymore, but we can learn other things instead and replace the learned behavior with a new learned behavior other things instead, and replace the learned behavior with a new learned behavior.

If you believe that you're broken and you're constantly needing others to validate and remind you of your self-worth and your value, then I'm sorry to say that there's no hope for ever truly believing that you are not broken, because no amount of outside validation will be able to convince you that you are whole and that you are worthy. That is an inside job, always. It is always an inside job for you to believe your sense of worth, your sense of value. So that is what I want to instill in you today with this episode. First of all, you are not broken.

You didn't just come out of the womb believing that everything was your fault and that you're to blame for everything that has gone wrong in your marriage and in your kids' lives and in your relationship. You've been taught to believe those things. You've been taught from a very young age that your purpose as a woman is to give to others. Your purpose is to make others feel comfortable. Your purpose is to take care of others and to put everyone's needs above your own. You've also been taught that that means take care of others, not yourself.

You're the last one on the list and if you do something for yourself, you should feel guilty. You should believe that you are selfish, selfish. You have been handed this platter of thoughts and ideas that tell you that you are not as important as everyone else. Once you fulfilled all of your duties as a woman purity, marriage, children, wife, supporter of all people and all things then then you've achieved your status as worthy. Then you can know you did a good job and you're a valuable asset to this existence here on earth. But, my friend, please, please, listen to me when I tell you none of that is true. That is what has you believing that you are broken. That is what has you believing you are not worthy. That is what has you feeling guilty.

I want to help you create new neural pathways that support the knowledge of your worth, that support the knowledge of your value from inside, rather than needing it to come from someone else outside of you. Once you learn to lean on your inherent truth of who you are, of your inherent worth being 100%, no matter what you do or don't do, that's when your world can evolve from one of codependence to one of interdependence. And so these are the the distinctions that I think are important, that I want to highlight here. Remember at the beginning when I said this this podcast is going to be about codependence, interdependence and independence. I want to make an important distinction about why our goal is not going from codependence to independence, because, yes, I do think it is very important to be independent in many things, especially when it comes to like believing that you have worth right.

We want that to come from within. We want you to be independent in your thinking and believing about that truth about you, and so, especially when you're going through a divorce, you should learn to be independent. In many ways, I think your thinking is number one. We don't want to just take what everybody tells us and automatically believe it. We want to decide for ourselves, right? We want to be independent in that way. We want to be independent thinkers, make decisions that are intentional and for our best interest. We don't want to just go with the flow. We don't want to just be agreeable to not make waves, right. So, yes, you should learn to be independent in your thinking. I believe that every woman should be independent in their finances, and I learned that as I got out of my divorce. Right, that was something that I had to relearn and decide for myself. And there's probably other ways that I think being independent is an important thing for you. But I don't think it's the only thing.

I'm going to explain with some examples in just a minute of why going from codependent to fully independent in all aspects of your life, it's not a great goal, because what that means is you have no relationships with people. We don't want to live a life where there's no relationships. That is a sad, lonely experience. And I'm not saying you can't be alone. Being alone is fine, but having no relationships is a terrible prospect. We, as human beings, we need relationships, we thrive on them. They're beautiful aspects of this human experience.

And when you set so rigid of boundaries that you keep everyone out and only you in, that is independence that is hurting you, is independence that is hurting you. When you are inflexible and uncaring about anyone but yourself, that is independence that is hurting you. When you don't ask for help when you actually need it, that is independence that is hurting you. It's not healthy. So the answer it's not codependence. We know that we can't have everyone else out there validating us constantly. It has to come from within. But it's also not true independence where we're shutting everyone out either. Right, it's going from codependence to interdependence.

So let me reiterate codependence it's where you're sourcing or seeking your sense of worth and your sense of value from everyone and everything outside of you, as opposed to interdependence. Interdependence is where we mutually love ourselves and we take care of our individual needs and our wants and our desires, but we also consider others and we love others. While we're doing that, we don't discount them. We don't say things like well, I'm not in charge of your emotions, and so who cares? You just go over there and feel sad and I don't give a crap about how you feel, like no, we care about the people in our relationships, in our families, in our lives. Right, we care about them. And so when we accept and embrace interdependence, it is finding that balance of knowing our worth and our value from within while loving and sharing and caring for those outside of us.

This is possible to do, and when my clients step into interdependence in their relationships with their children or with their new partners, or with their friends, or with their family and themselves, it is the most beautiful thing to watch. There is more calm in their lives, there is more peace, there is a sense of wholeness, there is more acceptance of themselves and of their relationships, knowing that people aren't perfect, knowing that we can love people for who they are and accept people for who they are, rather than needing them to change to make us feel a certain way. There's typically less judgment, there's less animosity, there's less resentment, there's less annoyance, there's less obligation, there's less perfection seeking. It's such an amazing thing to watch my clients step into, and it's such an amazing thing to watch my clients step into and it's such an amazing way to live your life. And when you get there and you're not going to be there all the time, it's not going to be perfect, but when you get there, in moments it is a beautiful feeling, when you're able to understand your wants and your needs and then you're able to provide those for yourself. That actually creates a path for giving to others while taking care of yourself, and you give and you help because of reasons that you like, reasons that fill you up, reasons that don't have you feeling resentful or exhausted or let down. So let me give you an example.

When my dad passed away last year, he passed away in the middle of the night, peacefully at home. He was at home with my mom on hospice and he had been there for a few days, the last few days of his life, and he passed away. And then my mom because it was in the middle of the night she let me and my siblings know early the next morning that he had passed, like we had been expecting it. We knew it was coming, we just weren't sure exactly when and of course, I was devastated. I love my dad and I miss him and I'm actually getting kind of teary, you know, right now talking about him. But I called her that morning after she let me know that he had passed and we cried and we talked briefly and I had asked her if it would be helpful for me to come down to her house and be with her and help her and just support her in whatever way she needed help her, plan some things for the funeral, just be whatever kind of support she needed and she said yes and so, because I am not in a place of codependence, because I am in a place, a space of interdependence in my life, I was able to give that to her but also support myself in the ways that I needed.

If I had been in a place of codependence which I was when I was married I was absolutely codependent in my emotional outsourcing. If I had been in that same space emotional outsourcing, if I had been in that same space I would have needed my mom to validate me and the loss of my dad. I would have been inconsolable. I would have been seeking her reassurance that he was okay and that, now that he had passed on, that we would get through this as a family and that she was going to be okay, and I would have needed her to tell me that I was fine and that we're strong and we can do it. It would have been a completely different scenario.

But the reality is that I have done a lot of work on myself to let go of my emotional outsourcing and to let go of seeking external validation myself. But I am also available to help, care for those in my sphere and those who need help, even outside of my, even outside of my sphere. When things come up and I recognize when those moments are creating tension or when they are overstepping my own bounds for myself, where they're crossing a line and I need to step back and create that support and love and awareness around my worth and my value for myself. I can now much more easily recognize when I'm forgetting myself, when I'm saying yes to things that I really should be saying no to. I can now have an easier time no, when I'm stretching myself too thin and doing things for others and putting myself on the back burner. It's easier for me to recognize these moments far more often now and to turn them around, take a beat, be more intentional, create space for myself than I ever did when I was married.

I'm not perfect at this. I'm not like this person who shows up every day perfectly believing that my worth is 100%, believing that I can handle things and that I've got me and I've got people out there and I can do it all. I'm not perfect. I don't want you to ever think that about me. I'm not perfect and that's okay. I'm not expecting perfection from myself. Perfection isn't the goal. Bringing things back to the present, bringing things back to awareness and to caring and loving myself and caring for others and loving them and creating that interdependence as much as I can, that's the goal. So here are a couple of questions that you can ask yourself to become more aware of.

If you're stuck in codependence, if you're opening yourself up to interdependence because once you can become aware of it, that's when you can start to decide from there, depending on your answers, what is best for you. Am I giving to others or continuously doing for them and forgetting myself? Be honest, cause I used to do this all the time when I was married and you might be doing it too. So just be honest. No judgment. Just be honest and curious. Okay, am I looking outside of myself and not balancing that with looking inside? Am I seeking care, validation, support from others because I don't think I can provide it for myself? Am I present with me and giving of myself from interdependence? These are some questions that are going to help you identify kind of where you stand in terms of. Do I believe fully that I am worthy exactly as I am and can I give that to myself when I need it? Or am I continuing to look outside of me for that emotional support? Or am I creating an Island where I'm by myself and I don't look outside of me at all for relationships that are connective and supportive and loving and caring? These are good questions.

This is work that is worth doing because you are worth it. You deserve to have a loving, solid relationship with yourself and you deserve to know your worth inherently. And you also deserve to have beautiful, fulfilled relationships that are solid, loving and caring, not because you feel obligated to them, not because you feel beholden to them, but because you know your worth and value and you know there's two. All right, my friends, that's what I have for you today. Thank you so much for being here. As always, I love you. You're amazing. Do this work. You are worth it. Okay, you are worth it. I will be back next week.

Hi friend, I'm so glad you're here and thanks for listening. I wanted to let you know that if you're wanting more, a way to make deeper, more lasting change, then working one-on-one with me as your coach may be exactly what you need. Together, we'll take everything you're learning in the podcast and implement it in your life, with weekly coaching, real life practice and practical guidance. To learn more about how to work with me one-on-one, go to KarinNelsonCoaching dot com. That's W-W-W dot K-A-R-I-N-N-E-L-S-O-N. Coaching dot com. Thanks for listening. If this podcast agreed with you in any way, please take a minute to follow and give me a rating wherever you listen to podcasts and for more details about how I can help you live an even better life than when you were married. Make sure and check out the full show notes by clicking the link in the description.