Enabling vs Helping: What’s the Difference?

There are some times where it’s wisest to get as far away from the situation as you can (if your safety is at risk, for example). Their continual destructive choices may destroy you and your life if you stay with them, if the behavior is serious enough. This article is not intended to provide advice to people who are in psychologically or physically abusive relationships. Recognizing when a pattern of enabling behavior has developed is vital.

People tend to engage in enabling behavior out of pity, guilt, or shame. It feels like they’re helping when, in fact, it causes more harm than good. One example is giving money to a spouse or child living with a drug addiction instead of helping them get treatment. Helping friends, family members, or other loved ones who are experiencing mental health conditions or substance misuse can be challenging and confusing.

Enabling behaviors can be subtle and deeply ingrained in relationships. They often emerge from a place of love, fear, and a desperate desire to protect the person struggling with addiction. Codependency recovery requires recognizing the subtle differences between genuine support and harmful enabling. Support is an intentional act of empowerment that encourages growth, accountability, and personal responsibility. Enabling, in contrast, is a well-intentioned behavior that ultimately protects the individual from experiencing the natural consequences of their actions.

The Difference Between Traditional Therapy and CBT for Addiction

This distinction is critical as the difference between helping and enabling reshapes the outcomes of recovery efforts, promoting long-term improvement. For those looking for more guidance on handling addiction issues, getting help for an adult child addicted to drugs and alcohol is an invaluable resource. It is essential to recognize that enabling behaviors can stem from a place of good intentions. However, they often perpetuate the cycle of addiction and hinder the recovery journey.

It helps you create an environment that nurtures growth while maintaining clear, consistent boundaries. Create an environment that supports positive change and growth. Surround the person with positive influences, such as supportive friends, family, or mentors. Encourage participation in activities or communities that promote healthy behaviors and provide positive role models. There’s nothing harder than watching your loved one make the same wrong decision time and time again. You just want to help them stop facing so much pain and heartbreak.

The 6 Dangers of Enabling Mental Health

This can create an environment where resentment builds over time, potentially damaging relationships further. Additionally, without confronting the real issues, the person struggling with addiction may feel isolated and unsupported, which can exacerbate their challenges. Establish clear boundaries regarding what you are willing and able to do to help. Communicate your limits and make it known that you will not enable destructive behavior.

Enabling involves protecting a person from consequences, while supporting empowers them to take active steps in their recovery. Supporting encourages positive change, while enabling reinforces unhealthy behaviors. Individuals observing these patterns in their relationships should evaluate whether their actions genuinely help or merely enable unhealthy behaviors.

Seeking Professional Help for Enabling Behavior

• Additionally, she shared some helpful reminders to keep in mind as you shift away from enabling.
• Enabling, in contrast, is a well-intentioned behavior that ultimately protects the individual from experiencing the natural consequences of their actions.
• You’ve, in essence, crossed the thin line from helping to enabling.
• The consequences of enabling can include hindering personal growth, fostering dependence, and letting unhealthy patterns continue.

This may look like a loved one over-functioning to compensate. While this may seem supportive from afar, it actually creates and increases dependency. The study further demonstrates how having strong bonds with others encourages and supports a person’s quality of life. Enabling reflects our own discomfort with boundaries, uncertainty, and letting go of an outdated identity.

Lifestyle

• Addiction treatment programs offer structured environments where individuals can receive the support they need while addressing enabling dynamics.
• By defining and respecting these boundaries, individuals can navigate the fine line between supporting and enabling someone in need.
• Enabling behaviors lack boundaries and perpetuate the problem.
• Boundaries should be re-evaluated and adjusted according to changing circumstances, ensuring they align with self-care goals and are effective in breaking any patterns of codependency or enabling.
• If that’s out of your reach, talk about your situation with a wise person in your life, whose relationships are going well.

If you do something that the person can and should do for themselves, you are enabling. The doctor over-prescribed pain medications for your loved one. Your loved one had a tough childhood, or a tough break-up, or a demanding job.

Boundaries play a crucial role in addressing enabling behaviors related to substance use disorders and other challenges. By setting clear rules and guidelines, individuals can protect their own well-being and refrain from shielding their loved ones from the consequences of their actions 4. Supporting someone is an act of kindness done to show love and offer care, whereas enabling involves overdoing support in a way that causes harm to the person offering or receiving it 2.

Your instinct to protect someone you love collides with the harsh reality that protection sometimes harms. It’s important to acknowledge that every situation is unique, and what works for one person may not work for another. This complexity requires a nuanced approach that prioritizes both empathy and accountability, enabling individuals to take responsibility for their actions while still feeling supported. To stop being an enabler in your loved one’s life, you must first recognize that your actions are doing more harm than good.

Mental Health

It’s important to communicate these boundaries clearly and consistently, ensuring that they are respected and enforced. By acknowledging the issue, individuals can begin to reflect on their own behaviors and their impact on the person they are trying to help. It is important to understand that enabling behaviors ultimately perpetuate the problem by protecting or safeguarding a person against experiencing the full consequences of their actions. Recognizing the difference between enabling and supporting is key to breaking this cycle. Recognizing an enabling behaviors list is essential in understanding support vs enabling and can help families stop these destructive patterns.

How can I support without enabling?

While enabling behaviors might instill a fleeting sense of stability, they ultimately hinder the individual from confronting the underlying issues that require resolution. This repetitive cycle can profoundly influence the emotional well-being of the enabler and the mental health of those they attempt to help. Enabling behaviors may superficially appear as supportive actions, but they ultimately perpetuate the person’s issues by shielding them from facing the full consequences of their actions. When individuals are consistently enabled, they may develop a dependency on these behaviors, which impedes their motivation to seek help or take responsibility for their lives.

What you’re doing is enabling the same behaviors that got them in trouble in the first place. Problem-solving is a great life skill to have and can be taught to a child or an adult. Provide help by teaching your family member, friend, or coworker how to handle and solve challenges instead.

“People often do not realize that they are crossing the fine line between support and enabling,” Stuempfig said. The person you love may begin isolating themselves enabling vs helping and withdrawing from social contact with you, making it more confusing and challenging to know what to do next.

Encourage the development of skills and independence by empowering the person to solve their problems. Offer guidance and support in acquiring new skills, setting goals, and making positive changes in their lives. Enabling can strain relationships between the enabler and the enabled person.

Show empathy and actively listen to the person’s concerns and challenges. Validate their emotions and experiences while still holding them accountable for their actions. Be supportive, but also encourage them to explore alternative perspectives and consider the long-term consequences of their choices. Promote accountability by encouraging the person to take responsibility for their actions and the consequences that arise from them. Help them recognize their role in their current situation and empower them to make positive choices and decisions. Helping generally has a positive impact, as it supports individuals in developing skills, confidence, and resilience.