Codependent No More: How to Stop Controlling Others and Start Caring for Yourself

This book is a necessity for anyone who's had a less-than-perfect family situation and who has the tendency to people-please. If you get wound up and anxious about other people's lives, moods, emotions, feelings, etc., to the point that you're sacrificing your own needs, you're probably co-dependent and you can live a much happier life if you start addressing your co-dependent habits.

Thanks to this book I am taking better care of myself--the person who all these years needed much more help than what I was willing to bend-over-backwards for other people.

This review is short and sweet. The book is a very easy read and very useful. Luckily for me, I had already made all the changes, and read the book for awareness - to understand why I did certain things and why I felt the way I did. It's a great book, one I keep on my shelf and refer to when I need that "wake-up call." I got that life lesson and am moving forward. Life is so much kinder when you take care of yourself.

First, if someone else's behavior (like your son, spouse, family member, etc) is making you scared, unhappy, resentful or in any other way unhappy, then this book will give you the tools to not only deal with the situation, but fix it. It's because it teaches you that the only thing you can fix is yourself! That's what you truly have control over and thank God for that! If your happiness and peace of mind really were someone else's responsibility, you'd be in big trouble.

Here's a great quote from the book, "The Wisdom of the Rooms":

"Put the magnifying glass down and pick up the mirror"

Oh how I love focusing on you. If you would only stop doing this or that, or if you'd start doing this or that, then finally, maybe I'd be happy. Relieved of the responsibility of self, it was so easy to be critical, resentful and dependent on you. If you only knew what you were doing to me. If you loved me you wouldn't act this way. Don't you care about me? These were my constant thoughts.

When I first entered Al Anon, my sponsor told me something shocking - he told me that my happiness and well being were MY responsibility. He told me it was and always will be up to me to make my life enjoyable and safe. "But what happens when she does this?" I protested. "Put down the magnifying glass and pick up the mirror," he told me. What was I doing to cause, contribute or in reaction to it was my only concern.

It took me a while to see the profound wisdom of this new way of thinking. Once I put the focus on me, I regained the power to influence and direct my life and happiness. If it's all about you, and I have absolutely no control over you, then I will forever be a victim. But when I do place the power and responsibility where I do have some control - over my own life - that's when I begin to recover and regain hope. It's about the mirror, not the magnifying glass today.

If that made any sense to you then buy both these books and read them right away! You can live a better life and you deserve it!

Michael Z, author of The Wisdom of the Rooms "A Year of Weekly Reflections"

In my opinion, the information covered in this book should be a mandatory education read at some point. All of us know a codependent. If you must pick only 1 book on codependency, enabling, addiction, alcoholism, or the like, I HIGHLY recommend this be the one you choose. It is the textbook.

What an excellent book for someone who questions what is "Co-dependence" and for someone who is involved with a recovering addict or still in their addiction. It is powerful and life changing. I cover this book at least twice a year to support my own recovery.