Gritty 'With or Without You' demonstrates the emotional costs of addiction

Childhood should be a safe and stable place. For too many children, the place holds shame and pain. Domenica Ruta was one of those children. She grew up in a household with a drug using, heavy drinking, promiscuous mother and a parade of mother’s male companions. In her frank memoir “With or Without You,” Ruta shares the results of that life and the story of how she overcame the demons.

From her earliest memories in Massachusetts to her college days and into the present, Ruta details the ups and downs of life with her mother’s habits and the effect those habits had on her own behavior, as well as the sexual abuse she suffered at the hands of a family member. She spares no one in her searing look into the ripples that follow adult decisions and the devastation to children caught in the surge.

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