It Will Never Happen to Me: Growing Up With Addiction As Youngsters, Adolescents, Adults

by Claudia Black

Tags: codependency, dysfunctional family, emotional problems, adult children

While hundreds of thousands of people are in recovery from chemical dependency, codependency, and adult child issues, our communities continue to be impacted by addiction. Heroin, cocaine, crystal methamphetamine, and marijuana use is rampant throughout our communities. But historically, the number one abused drug is alcohol.

While the focus of this book will remain on homes where alcohol is the primary drug, it is my hope the reader will see similarities in other substance abusing families. The commonalities will be living with extremes, living with the unknown, or the fears. It is the living in a system where the addiction has become central to the family and the needs of the individual family members become secondary to the needs of the addict and his or her addiction.

This book is meant to offer a foundation for understanding what occurred growing up in an addictive family and to offer hope for recovery.

I want to acknowledge each and every one of you who have ever thought, spoken, believed and hoped "it will never happen to me". Because of that conviction, and because of your impact on me, together we have the possibility of creating a different journey for ourselves and others.

Claudia Black shares the poignant experiences of being raised with addiction, walking the reader through the process from childhood into adulthood. With over 2 million copies of the first edition in print, "It Will Never Happen To Me" is heralded as the primer in understanding what it means to grow up with chemical dependency.

"It will never happen to me" is spoken by all who have been raised in a family where one or both parents have a problem with addiction. In addictive families most children move through adolescence appearing to survive the problems and hardships of life. They abide by the laws - Don't Talk, Don't Trust, Don't Feel. The survival techniques practiced as children contribute to a variety of problems in adulthood, among them depression, inability to maintain intimate relationships, marrying an addict, and becoming addicted.

While continuing to recognize alcohol as the primary addiction within families, this edition broadens the concepts to include addictive disorders such as other drugs, money related addictions, food disorders, relationship, sex and work addictions