I am new to this group, as well as new to the realization that I am codependent. My boyfriend, who is an alcoholic, is now in recovery. He recently confronted me with the fact that he was not the only one with a PROBLEM. I know it took courage for him to talk to me about this: he knew that making me aware of this might mean the end of our relationship. I moved in with him a year ago because he needed help financially. He was frequently unemployed, he was lonely, and he insisted that he needed me there. He went so far as to threaten to break up with me. He said that it was the 'next step' in our relationship, and that if I wasn't willing to make the next step, we should break up. We had been together less than a year at this point. I spent the last year believing that I was trying my hardest to help him, but I was only enabling him. He drank nearly every night. When he couldn't afford his own drinks, I bought them. I paid the majority of our shared bills while drowning in my own personal debt. He often went without work because he knew I would be there to cover the rent. Now that he is sober, he is overwhelmed with guilt and I'm wondering how I could have made the same mistake I made with every other man. We've decided to get separate apartments. It's the first step in mending our wounds. I'm very scared, as is he. This will be the first time I've ever lived on my own. As a child I lived with my alcoholic father and manic-depressive mother. After my mother died, my father began drinking even more, dating drug-addicted women. My father was simultaneously alcoholic and codependent. Then I moved in with two alcoholic friends. When I moved back home, my Dad was sober and married to a neurotic, needy woman, and it was my little brother who was the alcoholic, as well as exhibiting symptoms of manic-depression. My stepsister also mover back in with her three children: she was dying of AIDS. It was a terrible environment, and living with my boyfriend was probably better at first. But having me there only enabled him to continue his self-abusive behavior. For the first time in my life, I feel like my eyes are open. But I've been living to take care of others for so long that I feel like I don't even know who I am. I'm so scared. I really have no idea where to start.