"As for being co-dependent, well most marriages are aren't they?"
No they are not. Some people are co-dependent and that is an emotionally unhealthy state to be in. Some narcissistic people are very dependent on others to help them.
What makes interconnections healthy is interdependency – not codependency. Paradoxically, interdependency requires two people capable of autonomy – the ability to function independently. When couples love each other, it’s normal to feel attached, desire closeness, be concerned for one another, and to depend upon each other. Their lives are intertwined, and they’re affected by and need each other. However, they share power equally and take responsibility for their own feelings and actions and contribution to the relationship. Because they have self-esteem, they can manage their thoughts and feelings on their own and don’t have to control someone else to feel okay. They can allow for each others’ differences and honour one another’s separateness. Thus, they’re not afraid to be honest and can listen to their partner’s feelings and needs without feeling guilty or becoming defensive. Since their self-esteem doesn’t depend upon their partner, they don’t fear intimacy, and independence doesn’t threaten the relationship. In fact, the relationship gives them each more freedom. There’s mutual respect and support for one another’s personal goals, but both are committed to the relationship.
Broadly speaking, in dysfunctional helping relationships, one person’s help supports (enables) the other’s underachievement, irresponsibility, immaturity, addiction, procrastination, or poor mental or physical health.
The helper does this by doing such things as rescuing the other from self-imposed predicaments, bearing their negative consequences for them, accommodating their unhealthy or irresponsible behaviours, and taking care of them such that they don’t develop or exhibit competencies normal for those of their age or abilities. Although these unbalanced relationships can go on for some time, they are ultimately unsustainable due their consumption of the helper’s physical, emotional, or financial resources, and because they lead to resentment and relationship strain.
Dysfunctional helping relationships don’t necessarily involve co-dependence, but they may. Co-dependent relationships are close relationships where much of the love and intimacy in the relationship is experienced in the context of one person’s distress and the other’s rescuing or enabling. The helper shows love primarily through the provision of assistance and the other feels loved primarily when they receive assistance. The intense shared experiences of the other’s struggles and disasters and the helper’s rescues deepen the emotional connection and feelings of intimacy.
In the co-dependent relationship, the helper’s emotional enmeshment leads them to keenly feel the other’s struggles and to feel guilt at the thought of limiting their help or terminating the relationship. This motivates them to reduce the other’s suffering (and their own) by continued helping and makes them quick to back off of any limits they set.
Helpers prone to co-dependent relationships often find intimacy in relationships where their primary role is that of rescuer, supporter, and confidante. These helpers are often dependent on the other’s poor functioning to satisfy emotional needs such as the need to feel needed, and the need to keep the other close due to fears of abandonment. Feeling competent (relative to the other) also boosts the low self-esteem of some helpers.
In the co-dependent relationship, the other’s dependence on the helper is also profound. The other is bound to the helper because the helper’s lengthy aid has impeded their maturity, life skills, or confidence, or enabled their addiction, or poor mental or physical health, making them dependent on the helper’s assistance. Their poor functioning brings them needed love, care, and concern from the helper, further reducing their motivation to change.
Due to their below average functioning, these others may have few relationships as close as their relationship with the helper. This makes them highly dependent on the helper to satisfy many of the needs met by close relationships (such as the need to matter to someone and the need for care). It is this high degree of mutual, unhealthy dependence on the part of both the helper and the other that makes the relationship “co-dependent” and resistant to change.