Image credit: Photo by evilnick on Flickr Licensed under Creative Commons Our family keeps a pretty rigorous schedule, with nearly every night of the week blocked out for some activity or another, but rather than shuttling between soccer games and dance practice, like many parents in our social group, we're shuttling between different 12 Step [...]
Posts under ‘codependence’
Love at First Sight
Image credit: Photo by marimoon on Flickr Licensed under Creative Commons I remember the first time I ever saw my husband; I even remember what he was wearing. It was our first week of college, and he was standing in line behind me, wearing Coke bottle glasses, a white, retro (to put it kindly), marching [...]
Codependence Is the Mother of Invention
Before I knew my husband was a sex addict, I knew that he liked flirting with other women. Probably a little too much. I could tell he got a thrill out of it, and I worried that he would accidentally take this "entertainment" too far. He'd lead some poor woman on and she'd get aggressive [...]
Replay
Image credit: Photo by Great Beyond on Flickr Licensed under Creative Commons Earlier this year, I read an article about technology that would allow us to record and store every moment of our lives. Imagine: our whole lives stored in a single searchable archive. We could settle those arguments with the boss by replaying what [...]
Starbucks
Image credit: Photo by brownpau on Flickr Licensed under Creative Commons Just days before I discovered my husband Mark's sex addiction, we were shopping in Target, when we passed a young woman. "Hi, Mark!" she chimed, smiling brightly. Then she turned to her shopping companion, a man who was glowering at Mark, and said, "Jimmy, [...]
My Muse
Image credit: Photo by Ape Lad on Flickr Licensed under Creative Commons "You know," joked my husband Mark, "I think you ought to be paying me royalties. You wouldn't have anything to write about without me..." "I know. It's true. That's the sad life of a codependent. My problem is being all wrapped up in [...]
The Grocery Store Gamut
Image credit: Photo by blackbiscuits on Flickr Licensed under Creative Commons One day, early in his recovery work around sex addiction, Mark and I were standing in line at the grocery store, when I commented on a headline on one of the news magazines. "I can't look," Mark said. "What?" "It's not good for me. [...]
Killing Me Softly
Image credit: Photo by Estrella Esteve on Flickr Licensed under Creative Commons "I can't hear this song without thinking of you," I said to Mark as The Cure's "Just Like Heaven" came on my music mix a few days ago. It reminded me of falling in love with him in college: how he made me [...]
Out of the Mouths of Babes
Image credit: Photo by Christaface on Flickr Licensed under Creative Commons A few days ago, my daughter Janie walked into the kitchen, which my frantic holiday baking had turned into an indoor winter wonderland, covered in soft mounds of flour and dustings of sparkling sugar. "What are you making, Mama?" she asked. "A pie for [...]
A Very Codependent Christmas
Image credit: Photo by Jon Curnow on Flickr Licensed under Creative Commons Last night my husband Mark and I stayed up past midnight finalizing the details of our Christmas budget and to do list. We divided up the errands and agreed on which of us would buy for whom and how much money we would [...]
