• How to Break Your Addiction to a Person

  • When - and Why - Love Doesn't Work
  • By: Howard M. Halpern PhD
  • Narrated by: Sean Pratt
  • Length: 8 hrs
  • 4.6 out of 5 stars (618 ratings)

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How to Break Your Addiction to a Person  By  cover art

How to Break Your Addiction to a Person

By: Howard M. Halpern PhD
Narrated by: Sean Pratt
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Publisher's summary

Are you unable to leave a love relationship even though it gives you more pain than joy? Your judgment and self-respect tell you to end it, but still, to your dismay, you hang on. You are addicted - to a person. Now there is an insightful, step-by-step guide to breaking that addiction - and surviving the split. Drawing on dozens of provocative case histories, psychotherapist Howard Halpern explains to you:

  • Why you can get addicted to a person
  • Why and how you may try to deceive yourself
  • How you can recognize the symptoms of a bad relationship
  • How to deal with the power moves and guilt trips your partner uses to hold you
  • Why strong feelings of jealousy do not mean you are in love
  • How to get through the agonizing breakup period - without going back

©2004 Howard M. Halpern (P)2017 Tantor

What listeners say about How to Break Your Addiction to a Person

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It helped me to feel not alone

I randomly picked up this book when it was already seven months after a breakup from a bad and destructive relationship. At some point I realized that I was still having a strong reaction to that person despite all of the mental work that I'd done. I realized that I was addicted and decided to explore what psychologists have to say about it. I don't care about the explanation that addiction to a person comes from the attachment hunger, from some history of the relationships with mother or father. Maybe it is the right explanation, maybe it is not. What I liked about the book was:

1. The suggested strategies to deal with a bad relationship situation make sense and work. I used many of them intuitively without any advice (journalling, a network of helping friends, costs and benefits analysis, etc).

2. More importantly, I could relate to some stories. It had a therapeutic effect on me. It made me see clearly what is going on with me.

3. I hope the book prepares me to enter a new future relationship with more self-awareness and with more conscientiousness.

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29 people found this helpful

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incredible

this book was honestly one of the best in understanding what made it so difficult for me to move on from my breakup. Thankyou so very much.

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21 people found this helpful

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Great insights without sugarcoating

Would you listen to How to Break Your Addiction to a Person again? Why?

I will listen to this book again. If you find yourself in a never ending cycle of poor relationships and painful break-ups you need to read this book. Sometimes we know we have issues from childhood affecting our adult relationships but we don't know HOW to fix that. This book is a great resource to tackling that old pain and getting over those old loves that we know were no good for us.

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19 people found this helpful

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I just found the root to ALL of my problems

Just, wow!
The aha moment at the end.
Great narration.

I've never been THE priority

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17 people found this helpful

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Great book !!! Life Changing, powerful material ..

This book changed my life it opened my eyes and gave me the knowledge to break away from a toxic person that was sinking my carrer, personal and family life. I feel like I got a second chance in Life.

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11 people found this helpful

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wow.... powerful knowledge

Absolutely loved it. This book helps you hold a mirror up to yourself and examine those nasty little things no one wants to really think about

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Eh...

While the stories in this book were relatable, there wasn’t a lot of content on “how to” actually break the cycle of addiction. The very ending did have some useful information but it was a lot less than I’d hoped for.

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8 people found this helpful

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Extremely helpful!

Extremely helpful, great insights, examples and tools. must have for anyone who feels stuck in an unhappy relationship

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Oh Brother!

Another therapist telling us to blame all our relationship problems on mommy and daddy. Don't waste your money!!! The book is basically a marriage counseling guide to help u decide to stay or go. I thought it would offer help to truly break addictions to...say a lover or friend that discarded another & that person struggled to get thru the loss. Instead this Author says if a person is grieving over another it's because they a reliving their infant crybaby self and mommy didn't pay attention to the need. Good Grief!

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5 people found this helpful

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Important life lessons to break your addiction

This book is for when you don’t know where to start, when therapy is not an option, when you need someone to tell you you’re addicted and how to break free. For recognizing the difference between being in love and being in a loving relationship and realizing that you’ll be OK - this book is where you should start.

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5 people found this helpful