What Happens When Two Codependents Get in a Relationship?

Photo by Sharon McCutcheon on Unsplash

Based on the nature of a codependent being a people pleaser, someone who will sacrifice their wellbeing in order to preserve a relationship and bases their self-esteem on the opinions of others, I believed that a codependent could only end up with a narcissist.

A narcissist in this context is someone who places their wants above the other person and ignores the opinions of others, especially if negative. It’s important to note that this person does not necessarily have narcissistic personality disorder.

The main similarity between the codependent and the narcissist is that they both want the relationship because they both lack self-love. The difference is that the codependent will sacrifice themselves to get love, while the narcissist will sacrifice the codependent to get love.

The two go together in a grand ol’ dance of dysfunction. You simply cannot have one without the other.

I spoke to a friend of mine the other day. She’s a salt of the earth type of girl who got badly burnt by a narcissist in her previous relationship.

She told me that she’s about to embark on another relationship and that this new girl is just like her in that she is always the person who cares more and gives more in a relationship.

Immediately I asked myself, “Can two codependents get together?”

But then I realized of course they can! So I tried to explain the dynamic she was about to sign up for.

Two codependents can get together because they both are trying to find love outside of themselves. But what will happen is that the person who is more selfish will become the narcissist in the relationship and the person who is more selfless will be the codependent.

At first, I expect the relationship to be great but someone is going to get restless.

Either the narcissist will take the codependent for granted (which leads to not contributing to the relationship at best or doing some extra-curriculars with someone else at worst) or the codependent will be angry because she is doing so much and the narcissist is barely doing anything.