Second Book

A memoir of recovery from codependency, both personal and familial.

Both Buddhism and Christianity teach us to “help others.”  Recovery work for codependency teaches us to focus on self-care and “stop bothering everyone else.”  Barbara West lives at the intersection of these seemingly paradoxical imperatives.

The book opens with her mysterious breakdown in a movie theater as the credits for Edward Scissorhands are rolling.  Over the course of thirty years, only-parenting a son, she demonstrates how our imperfect impulses to help so often hurt others and ourselves.  Starting from a family of radical Christians, she moves through apprenticeship in her adopted Buddhist lineage, and lands in the folding chair rooms of 12-Step Recovery.

Having been raised to save the world, she learns to save herself.