Help for Families | Secondhand Drinking | Codependency
Secondhand Drinking IS Childhood Trauma
There’s been a great deal of new research about the role childhood trauma plays in changing the neural network wiring of a child’s developing brain. I think Pediatrician Nadine Burke Harris does one of the best jobs explaining (in 15 minutes!), “Childhood trauma isn’t something you just get over as you grow up … the repeated stress…
Read MoreBulimia Was Only a Symptom
After dropping to 95 pounds on my self-imposed daily food allotment of carrots and a can of shrimp with ketchup, I slowly started eating, again. I was 16. But it wasn’t long after giving myself permission to eat that the dam broke. Eating turned into bingeing, which was soon followed by bingeing and then purging occasionally and then more…
Read MoreSober Child With an Addicted Sibling
All too often… all too often, the sober child with an addicted sibling feels invisible, unimportant. And often, they are invisible – sort of, anyway – as their frantic, overwhelmed parent(s) asks or sends silent messages, to “be good,” “don’t cause any more trouble,” “help out with the _______,” etc. And when that sober child tries…
Read MoreRecovery from Rejection and Breakups | Darlene Lancer
In her post today, frequent guest author, Darlene Lancer, JD, MFT, helps readers understand why we feel so much pain from rejection and breakups and what we can do to heal. Darlene is the author of Codependency for Dummies and Conquering Shame and Codependency: 8 Steps to Freeing the True You, and her latest eBook is titled, Dealing with a…
Read MoreCultivating Gratitude – Guest Author Fran Simone
Cultivating Gratitude – a powerful topic and the subject of today’s guest post by Fran Simone. Fran (Frances) Simone, Ph.D., is the author of Dark Wine Waters, My Husband of a Thousand Joys and Sorrows, a memoir that illuminates the heartbreaking story of a marriage compromised by the husband’s alcoholism. She wrote it to help the…
Read MoreDealing with Opiate Withdrawal – Guest Author George Catlin
Dealing with opiate withdrawal is huge and often the basis for the calls I receive from those struggling and the family members who love them. George Catlin, founder of Withdrawal Ease – an outcome of his own struggle with opiate dependency following a surgical procedure in 2007 – shares his top 8 tips. George has written The Opiate Withdrawal Survival…
Read MoreBringing the Family Voice to Addiction and Recovery – Kathy Frasier
It’s not uncommon to learn of the ravages of the addiction from the perspective of the person struggling with this chronic, often relapsing brain disease. But hearing if from the family side – the moms, dads, sisters, brothers, cousins – is a less common occurrence. So when I read Kathy Fraiser’s FB share following the Christmas holiday,…
Read MoreCommunication is Important in Long term Recovery
“We all know how important communication is to relationships in general, but when you’re in a relationship with someone in recovery, it’s absolutely vital,” writes today’s guest author, Nadine Herring. Nadine is the owner of Virtually Nadine, a virtual assistant company that provides online administrative support and social media management to addiction specialists and social service…
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