The Silence That Takes You Away From Yourself.
Many African homes teach us that silence signifies respect, love, and peace. You hear things like, “Just keep quiet,” or “Don’t cause trouble.” It sounds wise. It sounds mature.
But what if that silence is not protecting love, but destroying you?
What if the actual action you learned to maintain peace causes you to lose yourself in your relationships? Remaining silent, suppressing emotions, and avoiding disagreements in a relationship do not lead to peace, a fact many cannot comprehend.
But over time, it builds fear, hatred, resentment, rejection, and passive anger.
- Sometimes, it causes you to shrink.
- Your voice fades.
- You become unaware of your own needs.
- A sense of insignificance might lead you to dislike and abandon yourself.
Parents and wives alike can become so absorbed in caring for their families that they neglect their own personal and professional growth.
Regardless of the origins of people-pleasing and codependency, the fact remains that you cannot pour from an empty cup.
As a child, you learned to suppress your feelings and equated love with silence and constant effort to gain others’ affection, a path that veers away from self-love.
When seeking love, individuals may become ensnared in codependency and people-pleasing, characterized by giving, adapting, and sacrificing to the detriment of their identity.
In this collection, we will investigate why you become lost in connections, the damaging habits acquired in your upbringing that mold your capacity for affection, and how reliance on others and the compulsion to appease them keep you in loops that seem standard but are harming you.
Suppositions and Myths that leads to codependency.
During my process of recovery from childhood distress, I recognized an aspect that is seldom discussed:
People often remain in toxic relationships, sacrificing their sense of self, due to dreading societal reactions, like
“What will people say?”How will they see me?
What will they think about me?
To the outside world, individuals may seem cheerful, but this silent fear is causing them to crumble from the inside out.
Losing oneself in a relationship happens gradually; it does not happen overnight.
It creeps in from your self-perception, your beliefs about love, and your upbringing.
The language you experienced as a child plays an important role.
The way caregivers expressed love to you during childhood holds significance.
The instances and figures you witnessed in your household are important.
Many of us grew up with beliefs like:
- “You have to endure in a relationship.”
- “All men cheat” or “All women are not trustworthy.”
- “One person must lead, the other must submit.”
- “Two captains cannot be on one ship.”
These ideas, which sound normal because of their frequent repetition, become deeply held beliefs that mold our capacity for love.
Instead of seeing love as self-respect with boundaries, they condition us to perceive it as sacrifice without end.
My Personal Realization: When Love Meant Losing Myself.
There was a time in my life when I believed that being quiet was love.
That putting others first, no matter the cost, was love. I believed my own happiness should mirror everyone else’s contentment.
I felt responsible for everyone… except myself.
I was always trying to fix things, to make things work, and to keep the peace, because that was the only way I knew how to feel needed, valued, and loved.
But during my healing journey, I realized something life-changing:
Those were not acts of love.
They were trauma responses, patterns formed from long-term emotional wounds.
That realization was painful, but it was also a turning point. It opened my eyes to what true self-love means.
Many people think self-love is just occasional pampering, like buying nice things or taking pictures.
But true self-love goes much deeper than that.
So What Is Codependency? (Simple Explanation)
Let us break this down in a simple, real way, because many people are living this but do not have the word for it.
Codependency is losing yourself while trying to keep someone else.
It means:
- You depend on others to feel okay about yourself.
- Your happiness is based on how they feel about you.
- You feel responsible for their emotions.
- You prioritize their needs above your own
You say words like:
- “If they are happy, then I am okay.”
- “If they are upset, I feel like I have done something wrong.”
- “I need to fix things so everything can be okay again.”
- “If I don’t do anything, everything will fall apart.”
- “I have to be there for them; I cannot fail them.”
- “I am not enough; I need to get them to love me.”
Your life begins to revolve around someone else’s emotions, fulfilling their needs, fixing their problems, helping them, and seeking their approval to feel fulfilled.
You go the extra mile to make them happy, even if it means sacrificing your own happiness, your dreams, or even your identity.
You may dim your light just so theirs can shine.
At that point, you no longer feel good enough on your own; you need their approval to feel secure.
It resembles a person who remains uncovered but chooses to give their clothes to others, feeling satisfied simply because others are clothed, while they go about naked.
In simple terms:
Codependency is losing yourself while trying to keep someone else.
What Is People-Pleasing?
People-pleasing is the behavior that keeps codependency going.
It is when you constantly try to make others happy, even at your own expense.
It looks like:
- Saying “yes” when you want to say “no.”
- Keeping quiet to avoid conflict
- Ignoring your own needs so others can feel comfortable.
- Feeling guilty for putting yourself first
- Trying to be “good” so people will accept or love you.
In simple terms:
People-pleasing is abandoning yourself to be accepted by others.
What Is True Self-Love?
Self-love is not just pampering, taking pictures, or buying things.
Self-love is how you treat yourself daily.
It means:
- You respect your own feelings and needs.
- You don’t ignore yourself to please others.
- You speak up for yourself, even when it’s uncomfortable.
- You protect your peace without guilt.
- You choose what is healthy for you, not just what makes others happy.
In simple terms:
Self-love is choosing yourself without feeling selfish.
How Codependency Makes You Lose Yourself in Relationships
You do not wake up one day and decide to lose yourself. It happens slowly, and it is rooted in what you have learned about love.
1. You were taught that love means enduring.
You learned to tolerate instead of express.
To stay silent instead of speaking.
2. You Start Living for Approval.
Your focus shifts from “Who am I?” to “How can I be accepted?” due to past painful experiences.
Maybe someone left you in the past, or you grew up in a home where love was inconsistent, or someone hurt you deeply, and you still carry that wound or memory in your heart.
These traumatic experiences shape your perspective on self-acceptance, and you start living for approval instead of living for yourself.
3. You feel responsible for everyone but yourself.
You carry everyone’s emotions, but neglect your own. You feel responsible for making everyone happy and for everything running smoothly, and that without you, they cannot be happy or okay.
Children who grew up taking adult responsibilities at a younger age are prone to this. So, in a relationship, they believe it is their responsibility to change every weakness and negative thing they see in their partner.
They become the parent in the relationship rather than a partner. They scold, complain, cry, and nag.
They stay in a toxic relationship, enduring, praying when they ought to walk away, and loving themselves.
Many will say, “Maybe if I behaved better, he or she would change.”
4. You Confuse Being Needed with Being Loved.
You feel valuable only when you are helping, fixing, or sacrificing because that is where your self-worth comes from.
Many cannot leave this pattern because it has become an addiction to them, feeling responsible, getting the approval makes them feel special, and when it stops, they cannot feel whole or enough, because the root of this is they have unhealed trauma wounds, and many are not ready to confront these wounds.
5. You Stop Listening to Yourself.
You stop asking what you feel, need, or want, and focus only on others.
How It All Connects.
- People pleasing is what you do.
- Codependency is the pattern you are stuck in
- Lack of self-love is the root of it all.
When you lack self-love, you:
- Seek validation from others.
- Struggle with boundaries
- Feel responsible for people’s emotions.
And that is how the cycle continues.
Conclusion: You Don’t Have to Lose Yourself to Be Loved.
Losing yourself in a relationship is not love; it is a pattern called codependency.
It is something many people learned from their upbringing, environment, and experiences.
But the good news is this:
You can unlearn it.
You can learn to love without losing yourself.
You can learn to speak without fear.
You can learn to exist fully in your relationships.
Start today:
- Speak up in one situation.
- Say “no” without guilt.
- Choose yourself in one decision.
Because the moment you stop abandoning yourself…
It’s the moment you reclaim your power and begin your true healing journey.
This is Part 1 of the Codependency Series.
Let this be your first step toward a more authentic, empowered version of yourself. The best is yet to come.
In the next article, we’ll go deeper into codependency, childhood trauma, and narcissistic relationships, how they are all connected, and why many people find themselves repeating the same painful patterns.
Stay with me on this journey, because understanding is the first step to healing.
