Elizabeth Gilbert was using people like drugs: a point she emphasizes throughout her memoir All the Way to the River , released in September.

In the book, Gilbert describes falling in love with her friend Rayya Elias. Elias’s terminal cancer diagnosis compelled Gilbert to reveal her feelings, despite being married at the time. She admits to enabling Elias, a self-described “ex-junkie”, to access hard drugs and alcohol during her final months as a warped act of care.

“I needed Rayya at a level that was far beyond healthy,” Gilbert writes of wanting to demonstrate her commitment with extreme acts.

Confronted by her compulsion to seek meaning through the highs of romantic intensity, Gilbert eventually diagnoses herself as a “sex and love addict”, exploring the label via self-reflection a

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