To Enable Or To Nurture

The dictionary states that nurture is to nourish, feed, educate, encourage, tenderly care for, and to help grow or develop. To enable is to provide with the means, knowledge or opportunity to make possible and to give sanction to something. When nurturing has gone too far, it can become enabling; there is a fine line between them.

A nurturing person is one who helps others; supports their ideas and what they do; offers encouragement and praise, and is kind and patient. A nurturer will help loved ones be responsible for their actions even if it means becoming the target for another’s anger. Those with problems should be encouraged to be responsible for their own problems. It is the same actions as those of a parent who will disapprove of the behaviour of their child but will still love him.

Being an enabler allows loved ones to behave in ways that are destructive. i.e.: an enabler may buy an alcoholic spouse alcohol; continue to lend someone money who is constantly going into debt again. By trying to help and protect, they are inadvertently making a chronic problem worse.

Some enablers also become codependents. As a codependent, they may adapt to or ignore problems. By allowing the continuation of a problem in order to avoid conflicts, it allows the person to continue to act in a destructive way. i.e.: a person who covers for her husband after being abused; or one who will make excuses for an alcoholic spouse. An enabler feels the need to be needed but on the other hand will feel taken advantage of. The enabler will sometimes enable out of fear of reprisal but lack of conflict does not solve the problem as it was intended to do.

The difference between helping and enabling is: to help is to do something for someone that they are not capable of doing themselves; to enable is to do something for them when they are capable of doing it themselves.

Tough love may become necessary when the person’s behaviour continues or becomes worse. Most enablers act out of love, loyalty and concern but they nurture dependency. Enabling can be positive. i.e.: time spent with a child, listening and letting them know how important they are to you as the parent. As a result they have enabled the child to be confident and happy. There is a fine line between the roles of nurturer and the enabler who nurtures dependency.