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03/09/2022 07:30 AMOne day, Kathy Leckey started making lists on her phone. She’d put down something she wanted to do, but had doubted she could. Did a person, place, or thing trigger a sense of peace in her daily swirl of life? On the list. Did something make her smile, remind her to simply breathe, inspire her to try? Added in. Before she really realized it, Kathy had built the bones of her new workbook, My Self Care Sh*t.
Newly published in February 2022 and available on Amazon and at her website kathyleckey.com, the workbook is filled with prompts that engage participants in releasing codependency by writing down the things that will ultimately carve out healthy boundaries and allow each person to know themselves, enjoy who they are, and truly care for themselves.
Because the reader provides content to complete the workbook, Kathy encourages each to write their name in a blank space under her name on the cover, as her co-author.
“People that are looking for answers and they’re reading books and they’re talking to other people and trying to figure things out on their own, but they’re not asking themselves the questions they’re asking other people,” says Kathy. “The real answers are inside of everybody, and the answers are different for everybody.”
As Kathy is careful to note its opening pages, this workbook is based on opinion and not to be construed as advice of therapist or other medical/mental health professionals. Kathy is a career/personal development coach focused on healing from codependency. Now a North Guilford resident, Kathy had resided for many years in Madison while raising her two daughters and her son.
What is Codependency?
“Codependency is a lot of things, and it’s usually defined by common behaviors that we see in people,” says Kathy. “But for me, the bottom line of it is that codependency is a disconnection from our own self. And so, the healing from codependency is reconnecting, or connecting for the first time, to ourselves.”
Some of those behaviors or beliefs include looking for validation from other people through your job, as a parent, or in a relationship.
“We’re looking to other people to make us feel good about ourselves, because, deep down, we have fears and maybe beliefs that might not be true about ourselves that we’ve just grown up with and may have become a part of our thinking,” she says.
Fear is a big component of codependency, she adds.
“We’re afraid of making mistakes, we’re afraid of disappointing people, we’re afraid of judgment, and it all comes down to not have a strong sense of self and believing in ourselves,” says Kathy.
Boundaries are a big part of codependency, and defining them is part of the healing.
“When we’re struggling with codependency, we have a lack of boundaries—that’s one of the things I talk about in the group coaching I do,” says Kathy. “And when I was doing the group coaching, one of the things I was hearing, over and over again, was, ‘I just don’t know what I want anymore. I don’t know what I like. I don’t know my favorite color.’”
Kathy adds that, while she had started to make lists so that she could know herself better, hearing those comments in her groups helped to her to realize that other people could benefit from the exercises.
“I thought it would be a great tool for them to help figure out who they are again,” she says.
Because everybody’s boundaries, needs, wants and beliefs are different, by completing the exercises, the boundaries which are specific to each person become defined. Kathy is currently working on a book that guides readers through the different topics of codependency, with activities within the chapter based on her group coaching weekly lessons.
Kathy is also a contributing author in three out of four of Scott MacGregor’s popular “Standing O” motivational book series. The books’ essays focus on gratitude for life lessons learned by a wide spectrum of essayists. Kathy has also developed and shared her discussion “The Choices We Make” with youth, including those to whom she spoke during a Tedx talk inBuffalo, New York, in 2014.
Sharing the Work to Develop Self Care
“For me, I started it because I didn’t know myself,” says Kathy of her new My Self Care Sh*t workbook.
Now, she’s excited to share the healing work she developed for herself so that others can benefit. Kathy says she especially hopes the workbook reaches younger women, before codependency make sink into their lives to the point where they’ve “given up their own identity, their own needs and wants for their partner, or their kids, or their job. I would really love for this to reach younger people before that happens to them.”
In an interesting twist, it’s sometimes hard for us to realize that giving so much of ourselves can drain away the need to also care for oneself.
“The things that we do, as givers, are not bad things. They’re wonderful, they’re helpful, they’re great. But the problem is that they are to the extreme of then not taking care of ourselves,” says Kathy.
She adds its like that airplane oxygen mask analogy for self care: The reason you are instructed to put on your mask first, before helping others, is that you won’t be able to help someone else unless you’ve taken care of yourself first.
“I’ve been learning about this for years now,” says Kathy, adding the journey has brought her through efforts including meeting with therapists, poring over books, and trying some alternative therapies.
“I’ve tried a lot of things, but for me, the real, true healing came when I started to learn about and heal from codependency. And that’s why I want to be able to share it with so many people, because it affects us in every area of our life,” says Kathy. “When we’re struggling with codependency, it affects our relationships with other people, with our partners, with our kids, at work, with money, with food—it affects everything.”
Make no mistake: There is a reason this is called a “work” book. Kathy provides a lengthy, comprehensive list of prompts, questions, and exercises for readers to answer.
“It takes time. It’s not going to be filled out in one sitting,” says Kathy. “It’s going to be something that, hopefully, people can use as something to trigger some curiosity, and go back to and fill out as things come for them.”
As someone who has completed the workbook, Kathy says the result, for her, is a sense of “freedom.”
“It feels like freedom to me,” she says. “It feels like anything is possible. In forgiving yourself, in letting go of guilt and shame, there’s freedom.”