Caring, Care-taking, Enabling: Which Is Which?

In all my friendships over the years I have tried to be a caring, committed friend.  It wasn’t until I had been in Alanon for awhile that I began to see that sometimes what I thought of as caring was actually care-taking, and that often, though unintended, my repeated efforts to ‘help’ a friend could have been seen as disrespectful.  The friend, child or lover needed the time to figure it out, not my suggestions on how to do so.  Even if it took years, and there’s the rub for me.  But one that is my problem, not the friend’s. So what have I learned to do?  First of all, when I feel the need to say something about someone’s choices or behavior over and over, I now know I’m in trouble.  Feeling a knot in my stomach is another good indicator.  Though I sometimes hate this new-found awareness, saving someone I love from a bad decision is not my job.  We each have to make our own mistakes and suffer the consequences.  This said, I still believe if I see a friend doing something that seems perilous to me, it is my responsibility as a friend to say something once, as gently as possible, and then let it go.  The latter is very very difficult for me, to say the least.  Since my mother had her first heart attack when I was four, and I was told by my dad that part of my job was to watch over her so she would not have another, I understand why this is a problem for me.  Understanding doesn’t make it any easier.  Or maybe it does.  I just hate the ache I feel, and the anxiety, about letting a loved one take a treacherous path.  I tell myself I have no idea why they need to go down that road; it may be important for them.  Then I cry, and worry, and eventually let go.  And what’s enabling?  Doing something for someone you love that they could easily do for themselves.  That’s an easy definition.  Another, which I’m just learning, is pretending a friend seems fine when she or he does not.  This seems a bit of a conundrum.  If I can’t repeat my concern, what do I do?  Today I think I step away, though to do so often feels agonizing.  Take a break, take a time out.  It may just be me, but I am a lousy pretender.  I can’t chit chat when I know something is really wrong.  It feels uncomfortable to me, as if I’m colluding with the disconnect. This may not be true, but it is how it feels to me. I loathe losing people I love, even temporarily.  But such is life sometimes.   As always, I welcome your comments and thoughts.  A note:  this weekend we’re going to my older daughter’s wedding, nine hours from here.  So I will be out of touch for a week.  No blog next week,  but I’ll write again on the 12th.  And check out my Facebook page post and comment there.  I’ll get one up by Wednesday. Here’s the link.  http://www.facebook.com/pages/Nancy-Alvarez-Writes/207785325922974