Sheeeeeee’s here! It’s been quite a long wait, my friends, and I apologize profusely for the delay in writing, but I have GREAT, FABULOUS NEWS! My new book, that I have been dying to share with you Girl Rebuilt: advice on how to ditch Mr. Unavailable and become the girl of your dreams is now available for sale in paperback from Amazon and Barnes & Noble, Google and a slew of other vendors. Ten years in the making and a few weeks to print, and voila! My life’s work ready. Available to purchase and devour or sit by your bedside for quick reference. Want a sneak peek? Here you go…

CHAPTER 1. How Can a Love Addict Help Me Find Healthy Love?

You know the theory that you become a world-class expert after devoting at least 10,000 hours of “deliberate practice” to something? It’s what made the Beatles the best in the music industry. It’s what made Bill Gates a computer tech billionaire. And it’s what made Michael Jordan the greatest basketball player in history.

When I came upon this theory a few years ago in Malcolm Gladwell’s book Outliers, it hit me like a hard punch to my stomach. What, if anything, had I devoted 10,000 hours to? Sadly, the only thing I could come up with was…men. And worse than just men—as if that’s not bad enough—unavailable, avoidant men. I had practically devoted my entire life to becoming a master at bad relationships. At least, it felt that way.

Years before this realization, I had another one. A big one. I was a love addict. Well, who knows. Maybe I was; maybe I wasn’t. There’s no real “disorder” for love addiction. It’s certainly not listed in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders. And what’s more, I was so desperate for answers, I didn’t care about labels. What mattered to me was getting healthy. And, I remember the exact moment the truth to all my problems made itself known. I was chipping away at my 10,000 hours, obsessing over trying to figure out what was wrong with my then avoidant, unavailable, drug addicted boyfriend, (nothing was wrong with me, of course) when I came across this little chart online that defined the “love addict/avoidant pattern.” There, for the first time in my life, right before my very eyes was an actual definition of my relationship. In fact, it defined almost every relationship I had ever had.

I stared at it for a very long time. Too long to remember. How could I be an addict when I grew up with an alcoholic father? There’s only room in the family for one addict, right? While all the rest of us were victims, or co-dependents. That was the pattern that was drilled into me. And that was the pattern I believed. And yet, here I was, unable to deny this description of myself. An addict. I was feeling an enormous sense of shock and disbelief, because for so many years, I’d lived with the same, nagging, unanswered questions:

Why do I keep attracting the same type of unavailable, avoidant, men?
Why do I always feel so needy in my relationships?
What am I doing wrong?

But I also felt relief. For the first time, I felt like I was pointing in the right direction. Or at the very least, I was at a starting point that had the potential to lead me down the right path.
Little did I know I was in the very first few minutes of 10,000 new hours of learning how to have healthy relationships.

I really, really hope you buy the book and leave a review. Or, at the very least post a comment here, ask a question, start a discussion. I am so glad to be able to finally share this with you.