Surviving Toxic Relationships Podcast with The Matadoras · Elizabeth Jane and Deana Lynn

Episode #70: How to Stop Being Codependent; Self Esteem, Boundaries, and Inner Healing

·28 min·1 clip

Lizzie says her ex's comments about her learning disability shaped how she saw her intelligence.

1. Surviving Toxic Relationships Podcast with The Matadoras centers Episode #70 on codependency, self-esteem, boundaries, and inner healing. 2. Lizzie and Dina co-host as survivors, mothers, grandmothers, and women of faith who say they are not therapists. 3. The episode asks what codependency looks like in marriages, families, and faith-based relationships, and how someone starts reversing it. 4. Dina defines codependency as sacrificing your needs for someone else's needs and says it often enables toxic behavior. 5. She ties codependency to childhood trauma, dysfunction, addiction in the family, and learned behavior passed down through generations. 6. Lizzie gives examples from her own marriages, including a husband who could not handle itinerary changes and another who acted out during softball. 7. Dina describes an alcoholic husband example where rage, apologies, and repeated chaos left everyone walking on eggshells. 8. Lizzie says faith language can also become a cover when people reduce destructive conduct to "sin" without changing the pattern. 9. Dina says toxic people can manufacture dramatic events, such as false illness stories or sudden trauma flashbacks, to avoid accountability. 10. The hosts connect low self-esteem to emotional dependency, control, and the need to feel needed by a partner. 11. Dina says people who always put others first lose personal identity, decision-making confidence, and emotional energy. 12. She names chronic stress, burnout, anxiety, and depression as consequences of living that way. 13. Lizzie says she once believed she was a horrible student because her ex told her she had a learning disability. 14. She describes writing a new paper in her own voice, earning an A, and then graduating college. 15. Dina says narcissistic partners often find a person's pain point and use it to keep control through approval and criticism. 16. She says external validation from work, community, or friends can help interrupt that control cycle. 17. The episode has a conversational, back-and-forth format with each host interrupting, affirming, and adding personal examples. 18. The tone stays direct and practical, with repeated warnings, personal confession, and faith-based encouragement. 19. Best for listeners rebuilding self-esteem after controlling relationships. 20. Skip it if you want a clinical, research-heavy discussion without personal testimony.

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