Showing titles in Dysfunctional Families

Coercive control is a form of domestic violence experienced by millions of children. It involves a perpetrator using a range of tactics to intimidate, humiliate, degrade, exploit, isolate, and control a partner or family member. Some coercive control perpetrators use violence, others do not. Drawing on interviews with children and mothers who have experienced coercive control-based domestic violence, this book sheds light on the impacts of coercive control on children, how it is perpetrators who must be held accountable for those impacts, and how resistance by children and mothers occurs.

Conventional wisdom says that women are the manipulative ones - but tell that to the thousands of desperate women suffering at the hands of a manipulative man. Men can be just as sneaky, passive-aggressive, needy, underhanded, whiny, guilt-inducing, and emotionally demanding as women are accused of being - and more so!

Like everyone else in Palm Springs, Gish idolizes her smart, beautiful, kind older sister. Even their parents compare Gish unfavorably to Gloria—threatening to send her to boarding school once the more perfect sister leaves for college.

Based on the public television series of the same name, Bradshaw On: The Family is John Bradshaw's seminal work on the dynamics of families that has sold more than a million copies since its original publication in 1988. Here, you will discover the cause of emotionally impaired families. You will learn how unhealthy rules of behavior are passed down from parents to children, and the destructive effect this process has on our society.

The Marshalls were the model family of Tom’s River, New Jersey, living the American dream and seemingly in possession of all that money could buy. Rob Marshall, a successful insurance broker, was the big breadwinner, king of the country-club set. Maria Marshall was his stunningly beautiful wife and the perfect mom to their three great kids.Then one night, while the couple drove home from Atlantic City, Rob, his head bloodied, reported Maria had been brutally slain. Sympathy poured in - until disquieting facts began to surface....

Heavily tattooed and foul-mouthed, Nadia Bolz-Weber, a former stand-up comic, sure as hell didn't consider herself to be religious-leader material - until the day she ended up leading a friend's funeral in a smoky downtown comedy club. Surrounded by fellow alcoholics, depressives, and cynics, she realized: These were her people. Maybe she was meant to be their pastor. Using life stories, Nadia uses humorous narrative and poignant honesty to portray a woman who is both deeply faithful and deeply flawed, giving hope to the rest of us along the way.

Evie and Elliot are scrawny, filthy, and wide-eyed with fear when they turn up on foster carer Maggie Hartley's doorstep. Aged just two and three years old, this brother and sister have hardly set foot outside their own home. They have been prisoners, locked in a terrifying world of abuse, violence, and neglect. Maggie soon realizes that Evie and Elliot are lacking the basic life skills we all take for granted. The outside world terrifies them; the sound of the doorbell sends them into a panic that takes hours to abate.

In The Emotionally Abused Woman, therapist Beverly Engel introduced the concept of emotional abuse, one of the most subtle yet devastating forms of abuse within a relationship. Now Engel exposes the most destructive technique the abuser uses to break our spirit and gain control - and guides listeners on how to free themselves from the shame that can keep them from the life (and the love) they deserve.

The wife is the “unexpected” abuser/reviler in a marriage. Biblically, the term “revile” speaks of the verbal aspect of mistreatment of others. It is a “non-contact” weapon in the arsenal of the bitter, controlling person. Both in society and in the Church, it is assumed that the husband is the one who reviles the wife, yet there is a growing trend where the opposite is the case. And this trend will continue to get worse as role confusion in marriage and relationships escalates in the modern world. Men in marriages where they are reviled feel alone, judged, and hopeless. Most ...

When police are called to a local supermarket late one evening, they find an angry shopkeeper and a silent young woman. It's the third time 24-year-old Zoe has been caught stealing in the past few days. Eyes filled with panic, Zoe has been hiding bread, milk, Calpol and nappies under her coat. As police officers break down the door of Zoe's flat they find seven-year-old Coco and two-year-old Lola, home alone, huddled on the floor in a freezing cold bedroom, crying out for their mummy.

A moving, compelling memoir about growing up and escaping the tragic legacy of mental illness, suicide, addiction, and depression in one of America's most famous families: the Hemingways.

Nicole Treska was born to a family of gangsters. In the 1970s, during Boston’s mob wars, her grandfather’s diner was an unofficial headquarters for Whitey Bulger and other members of the Winter Hill Gang. Nicole’s father was also an associate of the gang: there was talk that, before Nicole could walk, her stroller was used as a decoy to sell drugs. In 1985, her father too was arrested and tried—sentenced to two years in prison for federal drug trafficking. Wanting to offer a better life to her children, Nicole’s mother moved her and her sister out of Boston.

I suffered at the hands of a malignant narcissist for seven years. I was emotionally tortured by his nasty, venomous words, his hateful behavior towards me and his sadistic enjoyment of anything that upset me. For years I was under his control, beaten down to the point where I had no perception of reality. I was a shell of a human. I wrote this book for anyone else who is suffering at the hands of a malignant narcissist. I want to offer not only healing words but also guide you through understanding the disorder in order to better help you deal with it.

After Rihanna and Alanis Morissette and Amber Smith and Rachel Uchitel, we've all heard about love addiction--people who feel they can only be happy when they are deep in an all-consuming love. There are a handful of books about it (including Facing Love Addiction by Pia Melody, Women Who Love Too Much by Robin Norwood, Love Addict by Ethlie Ann Vare, and others), and many rehab and recovery centers are now advertising that they help clients with love addictions and codependency. But no one has approached the subject of its equally damaging cousin--relationship addiction. Relationship ...

From rule breaking and risk taking to defensive communication and disrespect, parenting a teenager can feel like modern warfare - but it doesn't have to be that way. In 1-2-3 Magic Teen, internationally renowned parenting expert Thomas W. Phelan explains how to better understand your teenager, which problems are not worth fighting over, and why your child's behavior likely matches the definition of a normal adolescent.

Coupling stories of abused women and abusive men from her own case studies, Patricia Evans here gives you the tools you need to transform your relationship. Most important, she assures you that such a transformation is possible—given the right circumstances. Evans also helps you determine if your abuser really has changed—or if he’s merely creating the illusion of change. And if he hasn’t changed, Evans helps you decide whether it’s time to leave the relationship—and what to do when it is.

In this powerful and practical guide, Minaa shares therapeutic tools, client stories, and actionable insights to help you on your healing journey, along with reflections from her personal experiences. Each chapter focuses on a common emotional struggle—from overcoming dysfunctional family patterns to developing emotional maturity, finding our village, navigating racial trauma, and moving past isolation and despair.

On March 26, 2018, rescue workers discovered a crumpled SUV and the bodies of two women and several children at the bottom of a cliff beside the Pacific Coast Highway. Investigators soon concluded that the crash was a murder-suicide, but there was more to the story: Jennifer and Sarah Hart, it turned out, were a white married couple who had adopted the six Black children from two different Texas families in 2006 and 2008. Behind the family's loving facade, however, was a pattern of abuse and neglect that went ignored.

Here, Dr. Patricia Love offers adults real hope - and help - in overcoming the hurtful legacy of being a chosen child. Based on proven therapeutic techniques and using real-life case histories, her total program of recovery will help you identify the signs of emotional incest, confront your parents - and your past - with love and understanding, disentangle your life from theirs, and create a positive relationship with your parents - and your own children.

To outsiders, Jessica Berger Gross's childhood - growing up in a "nice" Jewish family in middle class Long Island - seemed as wholesomely American as any other. But behind closed doors, Jessica suffered years of physical and emotional abuse at the hands of her father, whose mood would veer unexpectedly from loving to violent. At the age of 28, still reeling from the trauma but emotionally dependent on her dysfunctional family, Jessica made the anguished decision to cut ties with them entirely.