Who Am I Doing This For?
I’ve been working on my second book and this is a potential chapter I wrote for it and I thought I would give you a sneak peak at it.
Who Am I Doing This For? That’s the question to ask yourself every time you have to make a decision. So often, you may believe you’re acting based on your loved one’s needs, but if you step back and get truly honest, you may realize you’re actually trying to meet your own.
Maybe you let them move back in so you can keep an eye on them. Maybe you create a relationship full of strings, hoping you can somehow control their behavior. You might give them money or order them DoorDash because you “just can’t let them starve.” You pay their rent because you can’t bear the thought of them being on the street. You keep their phone on because you need to know you can reach them.
In each of these situations, if you trace it back far enough, you’ll usually find your own needs at the center: your fear, your anxiety, your heartbreak. It’s hard to see how buying someone food could ever be wrong. And yet, despite everything you do, their suffering continues.
We have to be mindful of what our actions are actually telling our loved ones.
Every choice you make is sending a message, whether you mean it to or not. When you rush in to fix, rescue, or soften the consequences, they may be hearing messages like:
“You can’t handle life without me.”
“I don’t trust you to figure this out.”
“Your choices don’t really have consequences.”
“If you’re in enough pain, I’ll eventually give in.”
“You don’t have to change; I’ll change for both of us.”
These are not the messages you want to send. In your heart, you’re probably trying to say, “I love you,” and “I don’t want you to suffer.” But love without boundaries often gets misread as permission—or as a lack of faith in their ability to grow.
This is why the question “Who am I doing this for?” matters so much.
Trying to control their behavior by attaching strings to your love or support usually backfires. When they can’t live up to your conditions, they often end up feeling unloved, rejected, and unable to trust you. In relationships affected by addiction, “dangling carrots” — rewards, threats, or ultimatums meant to force change — simply doesn’t work the way we hope it will.
If you’re doing it for your own anxiety, your fear of what might happen, your guilt about the past, your need to be needed, or your image in front of others, then the decision—no matter how loving it feels—is probably not aligned with their long-term best interest, or with your own health.
When you pause and ask, “Who am I doing this for?” you give yourself a moment to step out of automatic, fear-based reactions and into intentional, values-based choices.
Instead of, “I’ll pay their rent because I can’t stand the thought of them being homeless,” you might move toward, “I won’t pay your rent, but I will sit with you and look at treatment options, shelters, or other resources. I’m willing to support recovery; I’m not willing to support continued use.”
Instead of, “I’ll let them move back home because I’m terrified something will happen to them out there,” you might move toward, “I love you, and it’s not safe for you to live here while you’re actively using. When you’re ready to get help, I will do what I can to support that.”
Notice the shift: you’re no longer acting just to calm your own fear in the moment. You’re acting in line with your values and with what actually supports change.
Healthy support often sounds like: “I love you too much to keep pretending this is okay.” Or, “I will not fund your addiction, but I will help you get into treatment.” Or, “You’re responsible for your choices, and I believe you’re capable of facing the consequences and learning from them.”
These kinds of messages say: “I believe you are capable. Your life belongs to you. I respect you enough to let reality be your teacher. My love is steady, but my support depends on your safety and honesty.”
This doesn’t mean you stop caring, or that you harden your heart. It means you choose a different way to care—one that doesn’t demand you sacrifice your own sanity, health, or sense of self.
Because here is the other half of that question: “Who are you doing it for?” has to eventually include you.
You are part of this story. Your needs matter too. Your safety, your other children, your marriage, your finances, your mental health—they all matter. You can’t be a stable, loving presence in anyone’s life if you’re completely depleted, resentful, or living in constant terror.
Sometimes, doing what’s truly in your loved one’s best interest will hurt in the short term—for both of you. It may look like saying no when every part of you wants to say yes. It may mean allowing them to experience homelessness, legal trouble, or job loss when you could step in and stop it. It may mean standing your ground in the face of their anger, manipulation, or blame when you hold a boundary.
There is no perfect formula, and you won’t get this right every time. There will be moments when fear wins, when you give in, when you overstep, or when you don’t do enough. That doesn’t make you a bad parent—it makes you human.
What can change your life—and theirs—is developing the habit of pausing, even for a few seconds, to ask yourself:
What am I actually hoping will happen if I do this?
Is this about easing my discomfort, or supporting their growth?
If I weren’t so afraid right now, what would I choose?
If they were in solid recovery, looking back, what would they say they needed from me in this moment?
Sometimes the most loving decision will still be to help: a meal, a ride to treatment, a safe place in a true crisis. Other times, the most loving decision will be to step back, to let consequences unfold, and to let them feel the full weight of their choices.
The difference is not in the specific action, but in the motive and the message behind it.
You are moving from “I must save them” to “I will love them, and I will not abandon myself.”
Who am I doing this for?
When your honest answer includes both your loved one’s long-term well-being and your own health and integrity, you’re no longer just reacting to addiction. You are beginning to recover, too.
