Earthly Observations
	'A Tongue In Cheek Humor Column For Parents of ADD and/or LD Children' By Roberta Mann, Pseudoanalyst Extraordinaire Today's Topic: Enabling

       These days you can find a support group for just about anything: Gambler's Anonymous, La Leche League for breast feeders, even CHADD for children and adults with ADD. But what about you! What about YOUR needs?!?!? It doesn't take years of therapy for me to know that I am in dire need of a group that should go by the acronym EA...Enabler's Anonymous. Sure, I can GO to any other support group's meetings and find plenty of people just like me there. I mean, it takes an enabler to make so many of the other support groups have members that have successfully evaded all attempts at true intervention for a good deal of their lives. It takes a 'good wife and mother' to cover the tracks of an alcoholic husband, as she enables him to continue to go about his life while denying and concealing his problems. It takes a 'good wife and mother' to enable an ADD husband to get away with forgetting just about everything, from his important work papers, to the tickets for the game he promised to buy and take the kids to, to just plain old taking the garbage out on the appointed morning of pick up. It takes a 'good wife and mother' to clean her son's filthy room so no one will be embarrassed when company's coming. That's how I know that so many people like me would be there...I'm a 'good wife and mother!' You can recognize me by the circles under my eyes and my ADD/LD husband's and son's responsibilities that I carry on my back!

       It's hard work, being an enabler. Have you ever chased a child around and tried to get that child to do one thing, say, pick up a dirty towel and throw it in the hamper? Reminded that child, oh, four hundred times to do it? Then, after hours of walking around, fuming mad, eyeing that towel on the bathroom floor while the child plays Nintendo, just picked it up and put in the hamper yourself, thus ending EVERYBODY'S tension? Were you relieved that it was over? Was the child oblivious to the fact that anything was amiss, with no consequences for not picking up the towel whatsoever, only an unexplained look and a sigh? Have you ever found yourself muttering that you are the ONLY person in the house or in your family that EVER does ANYTHING for ANYONE else? Are you under the mystical spell and belief that only YOU can run the washing machine, vacuum cleaner, make a meal, write down phone messages, or pick up a mess? Then guess what! You may be an enabler, too!

       The problem with enabling is, it's a tough habit to break. It carries an air of importance about it, this title does. What would happen if you didn't do all the things you do? Why, the entire universe as you know it would fall apart! God forbid you should forget to do anything that might adversely effect a loved one negatively! That would reflect, not on that person, but badly on YOU! You would have let that person down, while they sit on their laurels and criticize a job not done at all. Don't get me wrong, it's nice to be NEEDED, but do you really need to be THIS indispensable? So...how does one go about breaking this bad, but also self serving habit? Good question!

       You must start by assessing your life, your daily routine. How much of what you do is REALLY work that someone else could and should be doing for themselves? Can your child make his own bed properly? Does it matter? He can TRY! It's not like the Queen of England will be dropping by anytime in the near future and peering into his room to see if there are hospital corners under that comforter! Can your husband REALLY not remember those important work papers? Does he REALLY need YOU to chase after him with them in the morning, drive them to work if forgotten, or even leave a note on his briefcase? I don't think so! What you COULD do is simply remind him to write HIMSELF a note, while you sip herbal tea and watch 'Friends' with your feet up! Must you, like 'The Little Engine That Could,' follow ANYONE around repeating, "Brush your teeth, brush your teeth, don't forget to brush your teeth!?" How does it feel to be told that there is a show that someone else wants to see at 8:00 PM, and then, like Big Ben or the town crier, the job of announcing the time every five minutes until 8:00 is suddenly yours, or all else will not be done in time and all Hell will break loose? Try, just once, NOT doing any of these things. What will happen? Perhaps a bed will be messy, an important paper will be forgotten, a cavity will form, a show will be missed. That shouldn't be allowed to effect you! Just throw caution to the wind! Announce that you will no longer be taking responsibility for anybody else's personal areas of life or interests! Let them know you mean business! And let them know that the consequences of their own actions will be theirs to bare! Refuse to be held accountable for everything that goes awry in others lives around you! Now who's responsibility is it!?!? The great part is watching how very quickly they learn to do the jobs on their own!

       Sounds pretty easy, maybe a little devious and selfish even, doesn't it? But it works, that's all I can tell you. You will find yourself free to enjoy your own life to the fullest. Of course you will still have your own responsibilities. In addition, there's no need to go cold turkey. The shock could be far too enormous for you or the person/people you enable if you suddenly stop ALL enabling activities. The real trick to successfully weaning yourself from your position and the ones around you from theirs is to target one enabling behavior at a time, give it about a week, then set your sights on another one. Before you know it, everyone is much less dependent on you, and you can learn to use the phrase, "It's wherever you left it!" instead of getting up for the umpteenth time and saying, "I'll find it!" It's true that if you want any job done right that you have to do it yourself, but in many instances there is more than one right way to do a job. Be careful. They will try to manipulate you into believing they are helpless. I am reminded of my own little scam as a child. In order to not have to fold any laundry more cumbersome than a washcloth, I had my mother fully believing that I was hopelessly incapable of learning how to fold any other item. Oh, she bought it hook, line, and sinker, too! Conveniently LD, I walked away feigning distress and frustration over my horrible disability, trying not to grin, as she called upon an older sister to help with the task! She never did catch on! Be vigilant for this behavior! Stay on your toes! Above all do NOT feel guilty! You are building another person's independence, self-esteem, and confidence! That's the kind of enabling that ANY therapist will smile upon, making YOU the BEST wife and mother yet!

       So then, what about MY needs?!?!? I have decided, after a few years of special needs family therapy and lots of observing from the outside in and from the inside out, EXACTLY what my requirements are. I have come to the rational realization that I need a 'good wife and mother,' just like me! Now all I have to do is start a chapter of Enablers Anonymous, and keep my eyes open for 'Ms. Right.' But with my luck, I would just end up being the ONLY person that EVER brings the refreshments!

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