Alcoholism, Family and the Limits of Love | World of Psychology

Bill White reviews the tv movie airing this Sunday, When Love is Not Enough:

When Love is Not Enough is clearly more than a love story, though it is surely that. Readers of Psych Central and the people they serve will discover in this movie six profound lessons about the impact of alcoholism and alcoholism recovery on intimate relationships and the family.

1. Prolonged cultural misunderstandings about the nature of alcoholism have left a legacy of family shame and secrecy.

2. Alcoholism is a family disease in the sense that it also wounds those closest to the alcohol dependent person; transforms family relationships, roles, rules, and rituals; and isolates the family from potential sources of extended family, social, and community support.

3. The family experience of alcoholism is often one of extreme duality.

4. Family recovery from alcoholism is a turbulent, threatening and life-changing experience.

5. We cannot change another person, only ourselves.

6. The wonder of family recovery.