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“The Big Book of Alcoholics Anonymous describes how addicts always end up “puzzled and humiliated,” no matter how hard they try to get their lives straight. That’s how I have always felt at the end of my relationships: puzzled and humiliated. And because I have a lifelong tendency to fall in love with people who are either alcoholics or addicts themselves or the adult children of alcoholic or dysfunctional families, my partners were always in a state of disarray, as well. They brought their own disorder to my already disordered life, which added exponentially to my upheavals. One of my most chaotic relationships, for instance, was with a man who, at the time we met, was being fired from his job, breaking up with his girlfriend, and getting evicted from his apartment—all at the same time. “Move in with me!” I said, naturally enough. And so I welcomed him—this heartbroken, unemployed stranger (who, like me, was clearly struggling to find his way in the world)—into an apartment I’d rented for myself only a week earlier.” — Elizabeth Gilbert