By Lisa A. Romano, Sat, 02/01/2014 - 23:00
Many children who have alcoholics as parents are unaware at just how deeply their perceptions about life and about self have been negatively impacted by alcoholism. Because children come into this world knowing they are powerless--they naturally look to their parents for...
By Lisa A. Romano, Sun, 01/19/2014 - 23:00
I often hear people ask, "Why am I always thinking negative thoughts?" or, "Why do bad things keep happening to me? When it rains it pours?"
As with everything there is to the nature of life, there is also a flip side to any situation and or thought.
These days I say...
By Lisa A. Romano, Tue, 01/14/2014 - 23:00
Adult children of alcoholics, as well as any child born into a dysfunctional family system were unable to get their emotional or psychological needs met by their caretakers.
By Lisa A. Romano, Fri, 01/10/2014 - 23:00
None of us were bestowed a handbook that outlined what love is, what it looks like, or what it should feel like. All of us learned to define love by what we observed as children--while perceiving the authorities in our lives, over and over and over. Through observation, perception and repetition we learned to...
By Lisa A. Romano, Mon, 12/30/2013 - 23:00
By Lisa A. Romano, Fri, 12/27/2013 - 00:00
If you're like me, and your mother is an adult child of an alcoholic, you may have grown up feeling more like a specimen in a petri dish, than a carefree--joy-seeking, innocent little child. If your mom is an acoa who has not done her recovery work, you may have grown up feeling like something was always wrong, but...
By Lisa A. Romano, Sun, 12/22/2013 - 23:00
From time to time we all wonder, "Hmm, am I in love with this person--in a healthy way--and are the things that I am doing for him/her codependent related--or is this a healthy relationship I am in?"
When we find ourselves relating to a lover, sometimes the feelings we experience...
By Lisa A. Romano, Sat, 12/21/2013 - 23:00
Any adult child of an alcoholic or any adult child of an emotionally manipulative parent would tell you that the slightest conversation about the most mundane thing is enough to cause a total breakdown in communication with one of or both of their dysfunctional parents.
Whether it is a conversation about the weather, or about a news story on television, when trying to communicate with an alcoholic--or emotional manipulator--even the most simple conversation topics are enough to...
By Lisa A. Romano, Thu, 12/19/2013 - 23:00
The holidays are particularly stressful for most people, let alone ACOA's and those beings who are survivors of emotional abuse and neglect.
In the air hangs the stinky presumption that families should be together, and that merriment should be had by everyone.
Some of us have family members who...
By Lisa A. Romano, Tue, 12/17/2013 - 23:00
