Breakthrough Life Coach--Codependent No More
May 24, 2018
When I walked into my therapy appointment for the first time, I was seriously doubting my sanity. At the same time I was also obsessing about the self-doubt I felt about being in therapy at all. I was ingrained to believe that self-care was a form of selfishness. It was only because I was so desperate I went at all. Migraines, rashes, hair loss, eczema, and severe asthma were all killing me slowly. I knew in my heart my unhappy marriage was a key to why I was falling apart and seeking therapy felt very much like my last hope.
Within the first hour of the session my therapist diagnosed me with codependency. I had no idea what codependency was, but I didn't care. I was just happy there was a name for what I was experiencing. For years I felt like I was losing my mind and with a name for what I felt, I was feeling relieved to say the least.
My first assignment was to go and buy the book Codependent No More by Melody Beattie. I didn't walk to the Barnes and Noble near my home, I ran there, eager to drink up whatever information this man thought I needed to get well. I remember grabbing Melody Beattie's book off of the shelf at the bookstore and reading as much as I could right there where I stood. My heart was racing wildly, as each word I read seemed to echo some facet of what I had been feeling, perhaps for life.
By the time I got back to my home, I was overwhelmed with a plethora of emotions. To me, finding Codependent No More was like finding the Holy Grail. I mean seriously, I had been searching my whole life for some understanding of myself and the unique way I seemed to view the world, that those I loved didn't. Finding that book as well as my therapist, were the first stages of my recovery from codependency. The keen emotional eye of my therapist, coupled with the insights I gained through reading Codependent No More, helped piece together the puzzle that was my disjointed and mangled life.
Many years later, I am now Lisa A. Romano The Breakthrough Life Coach, Author, and Mentor who is also the creator of the transformational 12 Week Breakthrough Coaching Program. I am also the creator of Lisa A. Romano's Master Class, which is an online program all about the Law of Attraction. When I think back to that first meeting with my brilliant therapist, I am astonished as to what has happened in my life since that time. Putting a name on what was wrong with me allowed me to find a starting point. Once I found that starting point, slowly and I mean very slowly, my life began to morph. All these years later, I am where I am due to incremental shifts in my thinking. These shifts were the product of those who had journeyed on this healing path before me. Both Melody Beattie and my brilliant therapist had been through their own recovery process. They understood my feelings, faulty beliefs, dysfunctional thinking, cognitive dissonance, and people-pleasing because they too had walked a similar road.
Today, this Breakthrough Life Coach is Codependent No More, but if it were not for people like Melody Beattie and my therapist, I might not be here at all.
The power to change exists within each of us. Every human being has the potential to shift what is happening within their mind, so much so, that they can shift their outer reality. These ideas of course, are difficult to believe as well as comprehend, when your mind is in the throws of codependent, entangled, garbled, confusing, and enmeshed thinking.
You are enough, even if no one has ever told you that. You do not have to live a codependent life any longer. You can heal. You can reclaim your life, reprogram your subconscious mind, and live the life you have always deserved. I am thankful to authors like Melody Beattie, who take their pain and transform their suffering into pieces of work that help people like you and I, wake up to what has been keeping us stuck.
Today, imagine where will you be in 15 years if you never gave up believing in your Self. That is what I did many years ago, and I am so thankful I did.
