A Deadly Bucket List

Codependency, just like any other addiction does kill. The person suffering from obsessive care-taking may not have the dramatic death or lock up of an active alcoholic or addict, but they will surely die a spiritual, emotional and mental death. The family members and loved ones of addicts need recovery too. They are suffering from the disease of addiction. First and foremost we recommend Al-Anon Family Groups, but many co-dependents need a residential treatment to learn the tools of recovery.
Here’s a story I heard from a speaker at the Banff Springs Round Up years ago. I call it:

Crabs in a Bucket

One day a little girl was down at a seaside dock with her parents. She skipped down the pier and came across an old man doing some crabbing. The little girl was fascinated! The old man pulled the crab trap out of the water and put several squirming, pinching crabs into a steel bucket that already contained some live crabs. He then turned away to re-lower his trap.
“Hey Mister!” the little girl was concerned, she spoke, “your crabs are trying to get out of the bucket! Don’t you want to put a lid on them, so they don’t get out?”
The old man turned to the little girl, and to the crabs, who were scrambling to pull themselves out of the bucket, he said, ” Girl, them crabs is just like people. When one crab gets a hold of the top of the bucket, and tries to pull his self up and out, dem other crabs reaches out and pulls him back down”.

Pay attention to who is in your bucket. Do they really want you to succeed and leave them behind? 
I think this little story is almost like a Zen Koan!