Description
About the Author
Dr. Robert Weiss LCSW, CSAT is Chief Clinical Officer of Seeking Integrity LLC, which provides residential and online treatment, education, and support for male sexual addicts and their families. Seeking Integrity also offers specialized residential treatment for men with co-occurring sexual and substance abuse disorders.
An educator, author, and licensed clinician for nearly 30 years, Dr. Rob has created six residential intimacy and addiction treatment programs in the US, Southeast Asia, and the US military. He has served as a subject-matter expert for numerous major media outlets, including CNN, NPR, and The New York Times, among others.
Dr. Rob is the author of eleven books, including Prodependence, Sex Addiction 101, and Out of the Doghouse. His Psychology Today blog, "Love and Sex in the Digital Age," has over 22 million reads, while his podcast, "Sex, Love, & Addiction," has over 1.2 million downloads.
Product Description
Do you love an addict? Do you sometimes feel like their addiction is your fault? Are people calling you codependent? If our treatment toward loved ones of addicts alienates them, it's time we change our approach.
With Prodependence, Dr. Robert Weiss offers us the first fully new paradigm in over 35 years for helping those who love and care for addicts. An attachment-focused model, prodependence recognizes that no one can ever love too much, nor should anyone be pathologized for whomever they choose to love as is often the case. Prodependence informs caregivers how to love more effectively, but without having to bear a negative label for the valuable support they give. When treating loved ones of addicts and other troubled people using prodependence, we need not find something "wrong" with them. Instead, we acknowledge the trauma and inherent dysfunction that occurs when living in relationship with someone whose life is failing and keep moving forward. Validating a caregiver's painful journey for what it is opens the door to support them in useful, non-shaming ways.
Helping people take incremental, positive steps toward intimate healing is what Prodependence is all about!
Review
"Prodependence provides a refreshing, empathetic, and practical approach to understanding partners and families of addicts, and how best to help them learn how to handle their difficult situation. Avoiding the classic split between the trauma and codependency models, Weiss uses the framework of attachment theory to avoid blaming partners and pathologizing their behavior. Instead, he validates and reframes their efforts and provides techniques for helping them heal, improve their self-care, set appropriate boundaries for their own behavior, and deal with their challenges. This beautifully written book is must-reading for all those who love an addict, as well as all mental health professionals."
―Jennifer Schneider, MD, author of Back from Betrayal: Recovering from the Trauma of Infidelity
"Removing codependence and addiction from the list of diseases that afflict humankind and seeing their cause as responses to overwhelming life conditions rehumanizes those who suffer―both addicts and those who love them. This approach rightly acknowledges them as co-participants in the human journey rather than objects of analysis and treatment. In Prodependence, Robert Weiss has not only created a new term but has also boldly challenged the cultural practice of negatively labeling those in service to others. He shows that by doing so, we devalue their selfless efforts and amplify their suffering. This groundbreaking book is a call to awaken from the old way of thinking to find new and positive methods. We recommend it to all mental-health providers and to those whose mental health will improve by reading it.'"
―Harville Hendrix, PhD and Helen LaKelly Hunt, PhD, coauthors of Getting the Love You Want and The Space Between
"At last, a therapist who understands the power of love. Bravo, Robert Weiss! Rather than judging the