Runaway Bride Reflection

I watched Runaway Bride again recently. It's an older movie with Julia Roberts and Richard Gere, but this time I saw it through entirely different eyes.

I found myself relating deeply to Julia's character—changing something as simple as the way she liked her eggs depending on who she was dating. At first it seems funny, but underneath it is something much deeper: losing yourself, or perhaps never really knowing yourself in the first place, and slowly molding your likes, dislikes, opinions, and dreams to fit the person you're with.

I've spent the last ten years on a journey of self-discovery.

Relationships have never come easily for me. I'm a shy introvert, and, as I've come to realize, I'm also codependent.

When a counselor told me that after about ten minutes of our first session, I was furious.

There was absolutely no way I was codependent.

I was one of the strongest, most independent people I knew. Did she have any idea what I had survived? I had raised a child as a single mom. Some of the happiest years of my life were the years I was on my own. I didn't need anyone.

Needless to say, I never went back for a second appointment.

Fast forward nine years.

One day a quote about codependency appeared in my social media feed. It caught my attention, so I clicked. Before long I was reading article after article about the characteristics of codependency.

That counselor had been right.

Painfully right.

I saw myself in nearly every description.

Like Julia's character, I often became whatever my partner wanted me to be.

One loved riding motorcycles through small towns on long road trips. Suddenly, I loved that too.

One didn't like spicy food. Neither did I.

One loved standing shoulder to shoulder with thousands of people watching fireworks, then sitting in traffic for hours afterward. Sure—that sounded wonderful.

More than anything, I became skilled at saying what I thought the other person wanted to hear. I became so focused on keeping someone else happy that I stopped asking myself a simple question:

What do I actually want?

The truth is, I genuinely enjoy a lot of different things. But over the past several years I've intentionally tried to find my own voice. I've practiced stating my own opinions instead of simply going along with everyone else's.

It hasn't been easy.

Having your own voice sometimes creates disagreement. It creates confrontation—something I have spent my entire life trying to avoid.

But I've learned that avoiding conflict often means abandoning yourself.

Finding my voice has meant uncovering the part of me that had been buried beneath expectations, control, fear, the longing to belong, and the desire to keep everyone else comfortable.

That voice had always been there.

It was just very, very quiet.

There is nothing wrong with wanting to make someone you love happy. There is nothing wrong with discovering new interests because of the people in your life.

Just don't disappear in the process.

Love what they love if you truly love it too.

But don't forget to ask yourself how you like your eggs.