Facing Love Addiction: Giving Yourself the Power to Change the Way You Love Paperback – April 29, 2003

This book is saving my relationship. I can feel it working. The hardest thing to do is hold a partner in postive regard when you feel they are distancing from you. But I realized that was the key to detaching from him with love. I see things in Black and White. I thought it was Borderline personality disorder but I see I'm just a love addict and possibly bipolar. This book is teaching me how to love myself and care for myself. It deals with codependence which I wasn't aware that I had. It all ties in together and is helping me love this man who triggers my fear of abandonment. When he distances, I chase him and it feels like neglect. But really the avoidant just feels like I'm needy. I understand now why he feels superior and sees me as weak. Thanks to Pia Melody, I feel empowered and I can detach with love. I can hold that gray area and it's taking daily journaling. I'm also going to a Shaman. I am in therapy weeks and use DBT skills to cope with the silence when we're not being intense. It's a process for sure. But this book hit me at the core where my addiction truly lays. He's just not that important and when I realized that I was able to take him off the pedastal and put him where he belongs, and in doing so I can love him better for who he truly is. This is my story and I put it out there in hopes that it helps someone relate and pick up this book, read it and do the work. I feel free from two decades of love addiction. It's good to go to SLAA meetings too. There are phone meetings. I wouldn't have invested my heart with this man if I didn't love him. And beyond addiction, the love is there between us. I just hope it can survive without the intensity of our interaction. I believe it will. I'm scared, but I have confidence now. If you get healthy with this book, and surely you will if you do the work, and your partner leaves you it's because they are addicted to intensity. That's on them. You may get healthy and find a healthier relationship. Either way you win if you do the work and keep the focus on you. This book is truly empowering, finally someone understands the love addict. Pia gives the compassion, understanding and resources for us to change the way we love. I am humbled for the first time, and confident in myself- beyond addiction and the low self-esteem and all the shame I felt inside all these years that were unecessary, all due to trauma. Take your time with this book. Do the work, the journaling, go to meetings, therapy and believe in yourself. I think confidence is the most important part. If I can do this at 39 years old after messing up a handful of long term, dysfunctional relationships, you can do it. There's another book that can help with the withdrawel process without having to use anti-depressants, the Art of Living by Thich Nhat Hahn.

Most books about codependency focus on the classic relationship dichotomy of co-dependent and alcoholic/addict/narcissist. This is the only book I have found that deeply explores the relationship that is created when two co-dependents come together.For years I have been involved in a relationship that I knew was co-dependent, but none of the books I found on codependency really captured my situation. When I started reading this book my heart started pounding-- It was as if the author knew me, my partner and my relationship inside and out. I am only through part one of this book, but it has already transformed my understanding of my current romantic issues.To summarize, there are co-dependents who are love-addicted and co-dependents who are love-avoidant:Love addicts are driven by a primary fear of abandonment spawned from childhood neglect/abandonment. They are characterized by low-self esteem and neediness, and are looking for someone to rescue them and fill the hole in their hearts.Love avoidants are driven primarily by guilt and a fear of intimacy. During childhood they took an inappropriate "care-taking" role for a parent, which taught them that loving is to care for another, but also that to love is to be drained and controlled by another persons need. They are often characterized by being very capable and very busy, but also controlling (to avoid being controlled) and fickle.When the two come together they are initially very happy. But, with time, the neediness of the love-addict activates the love-avoidant's fear of intimacy and being controlled. The avoidant then begins to pull away, activating the abandonment fears of the love addict, and driving them to be even more desperate and needy. And thus the downward spiral begins...The love avoidant feels suffocated and wants to pull away, but often cannot leave because of the crippling guilt they feel at the thought of abandoning the already damaged love-addict. Meanwhile, the love addict will supplicate themselves and engage in dangerously manipulative behavior in order to save the relationship and avoid the feeling of abandonment. The result is an incredibly unhealthy relationship in which neither party has their emotional needs met (in part because neither party can acknowledge their own emotional needs).This book spoke to me in a way that no other book on the topic of codependency has. It is not only incredibly enlightening, but also well-written and an engaging read. What's more, I really appreciate the tone of the book. Where as most books written about codependency tend to be overly sympathetic and almost coddling to the co-dependent reader (for example, the Melody Beattie series), the author's approach to this kind of codependency is very detached, analytical and clinical. I personally found this a much more approachable and helpful style for my personality type.All in all, I am incredibly glad I bought this book (on a whim!) and I am really looking forward to finishing this book and working on my issues as a love-avoidant.

I recommend this book to anyone who is seeking spiritual growth

This book is the best book I have ever read. If you are struggling with romantic relationships and experiencing a lot of heartbreak, and wonder what is wrong, pick this up and see if you find answers here. Tremendous insights.