My name is Bernd, and I am a recovering workaholic, and codependant.
    I'm 42, married 17 years, and have been in the Alanon program for 5 years. I has saved
my life...physically, emotionally, and spirtually.
  I still have a long way to go, but the changes I've seen so far in my life are mirculous
in many ways. I despaired many times in my life that I'd always be stuck on the other side
of THAT wall - the one where ppl on the other side seemd happy, successful, and having a
good life.
  Thank God I was weak enuff to realize I was going to die, if I didn't commit myself to
finding some REAL answers when I crashed big time 5 years ago. That crash combined a
business failure, a breakup of our marriage, and a deep pit of depression all rolled into
one. It seemed like hell at the time.
  My dad had died of heart disease in his late forties, and I knew I was headed the same
way. Still am in some ways, but I've realized that changing direction happens only a
little bit at a time in this life.
  Last year, all the therapy, the reading of every book on life and relationships, and all
my Al-anon meetings kicked in big time. It still surprises me how fast things change, once
I've done the "getting ready" work. Sort of like getting ready to move...you don't
actually get to the new place til all the packing, cleaning, etc. have been done enuff in
the old one.
  Our marriage is terrific for the first time in 17 years, and has been for close to a
year now. We still have problems, and challeneges. the difference is that we try now to
accept EVERYTHING, "especially" the rough moments, as gifts. Ghandi said he considered his
failings blessings as much as he did his successes, and I'm starting to see why. There's
no way I could empathize, or share meanigfully with others, if I didn't know how they
felt, or what they were going thru.
  It also helps me a lot to remember that *I* have diseases, that are not my fault - the
codependence, workaholism, and chronic biochemical depression. They however ARE my
responsibility, and whenever I am tempted to judge my spouse, or anyone else, or complain
about them, or blame any part of my feelings or difficulties on them, I try to remember
that it's hard enuff for me to try to change MY faults. Why should it be any easier for
them? When I'm perfect, I'll help them change, but until then, I've got lots of work to do
on me.
  My biggest challenge now is to find loving answers on how to handle my chronic
depression. My workaholism has sorta flipped over in reverse...now I find it HARD to
commit myself to work (I am self-employed). My take home income over the past 2 years has
been about $6,000 a year. My wife works, and our combined income barely gets us by. (She
is the adult chld of an alcoholic).
  For any of you that still find it hard to say in your heart as well as in your head "I
have a disease as every bit as dangerous and destructive as the alcoholic's" (which in my
case is my codependence), what helped me was beginning to see addiction as a blessing,
rather than a curse. My views: Addiction, such as alcoholism, is a secondary disease, and
a symptom of a hidden root illness. A shame based childhood will give us this root
illness, just the same as getting a blook transfusion from an HIV carrier will give us
AIDS. (No one dies of AIDS; it is the diseases that it allows to grow in the body that
kills. But AIDS is still the root cause.)
  The root disease (of which shame was a big part) was not my fault. Period. But unless I
treat it appropriately, it will kill me, and make my life miserable until it does. Period.
  Alanon has been, and will continue to be, a big part of my "treatment". It gives me the
only medicine that really works - love, acceptance, and sound spiritual principles. 
  Just by reading this you've helped me. See, there's another neat part of love I've
discovered. Whenever I give out genuine love, and sharing without any expectation of
getting anything back, then God always gives me back more than I sent out. Always works. I
love it. Everything else is gravy.
  That's all for today. Guess I'm yakked out. Thanks for reading, and if anything in my
life can help anyone else, I would love to hear from you personally. The
only way I can keep what I've gained so far, is to keep giving it away:)