A leading therapist, this author delves into the complexities of interpersonal relationships and the dynamics of familial bonds. She translates her extensive clinical experience and keen insights into human psychology into compelling narratives that offer readers tools for understanding and navigating challenging emotional landscapes. Her approach is direct yet empathetic, allowing readers to easily connect with the themes and find pathways toward healing and stronger connections.
Now in trade paperback, this bestseller reveals the complex legacy of inadequate, controlling, or abusive parents, and how adult children can get free of these destructive relationship patterns.
Focusing on the challenges posed by difficult in-laws, this book offers practical strategies for couples to navigate toxic family dynamics. Drawing from the expertise of Susan Forward, Ph.D., it provides insights and tools to strengthen relationships while managing the stress that comes from problematic family interactions. The guidance aims to empower couples to create healthier boundaries and foster a supportive partnership amidst external pressures.
With Mothers Who Can't Love: A Healing Guide for Daughters, Susan Forward, Ph.D., author of the smash #1 bestseller Toxic Parents, offers a powerful look at the devastating impact unloving mothers have on their daughters—and provides clear, effective techniques for overcoming that painful legacy. In more than 35 years as a therapist, Forward has worked with large numbers of women struggling to escape the emotional damage inflicted by the women who raised them. Subjected to years of criticism, competition, role-reversal, smothering control, emotional neglect and abuse, these women are plagued by anxiety and depression, relationship problems, lack of confidence and difficulties with trust. They doubt their worth, and even their ability to love. Forward examines the Narcissistic Mother, the Competitive Mother, the Overly Enmeshed mother, the Control Freak, Mothers who need Mothering, and mothers who abuse or fail to protect their daughters from abuse. Filled with compelling case histories, Mothers Who Can’t Love outlines the self-help techniques Forward has developed to transform the lives of her clients, showing women how to overcome the pain of childhood and how to act in their own best interests. Warm and compassionate, Mothers Who Can’t Love offers daughters the emotional support and tools they need to heal themselves and rebuild their confidence and self-respect.
All parents fall short from time to time. But Susan Forward pulls no punches when it comes to those whose deficiencies cripple their children emotionally. Her brisk, unreserved guide to overcoming the stultifying agony of parental manipulation—from power trips to guilt trips and all other killers of self worth—will help deal with the pain of childhood and move beyond the frustrating relationship patterns learned at home.Source: Amazon.com
"If you really loved me..." "After all I've done for you..." "How can you be so selfish..." Do any of the above sound familiar? They're all examples of emotional blackmail, a powerful form of manipulation in which people close to us threaten to punish us for not doing what they want. Emotional blackmailers know how much we value our relationships with them. They know our vulnerabilities and our deepest secrets. They are our mothers, our partners, our bosses and coworkers, our friends and our lovers. And no matter how much they care about us, they use this intimate knowledge to give themselves the payoff they want: our compliance. Susan Forward knows what pushes our hot buttons. Just as John Gray illuminates the communications gap between the sexes in Men Are from Mars, Women Are from Venus, and Harriet Lerner describes an intricate dynamic in The Dance of Anger, so Susan Forward presents the anatomy of a relationship damaged by manipulation, and gives readers an arsenal of tools to fight back. In her clear, no-nonsense style, Forward provides powerful, practical strategies for blackmail targets, including checklists, practice scenarios and concrete communications techniques that will strengthen relationships and break the blackmail cycle for good.
Is this the way love is supposed to feel? • Does the man you love assume the right to control how you live and behave? • Have you given up important activities or people to keep him happy? • Is he extremely jealous and possessive? • Does he switch from charm to anger without warning? • Does he belittle your opinions, your feelings, or your accomplishments? • Does he withdraw love, money, approval, or sex to punish you? • Does he blame you for everything that goes wrong in the relationship? • Do you find yourself “walking on eggs” and apologizing all the time? If the questions here reveal a familiar pattern, you may be in love with a misogynist — a man who loves you, yet causes you tremendous pain because he acts as if he hates you. In this superb self-help guide, Dr. Susan Forward draws on case histories and the voices of men and women trapped in these negative relationships to help you understand your man’s destructive pattern and the part you play in it. She shows how to break the pattern, heal the hurt, regain your self-respect, and either rebuild your relationship or find the courage to love a truly loving man.
Offers help to both obsessors and targets of obsessive love.
In "When Your Lover Is a Liar," Susan Forward, Ph.D., offers essential guidance for women facing betrayal in relationships. Through real-life stories, she explores types of liars, the impact of deception, and practical strategies for healing. Forward empowers readers to reclaim self-respect and navigate the complexities of love and trust.
A revised edition of the author's classic study on the traumatic effects of incest.
Incest and Its Devastation
Incest was once called the ultimate taboo. Today we realize that it is a reality with which millions cope on a daily basis. In this insightful and sensitive book, Dr. Susan Forward, bestselling author of Men Who Hate Women and the Women Who Love Them and renowned expert on sexual abuse and addictive relationships, uses twenty-five case histories-including father and daughter, mother and son, siblings, grandfather and granddaughter, mother and daughter, and father and son-to explore the traumatic effects of incest and to analyze its causes and consequences on every member of a family. In Betrayal of Innocence, Forward shows that the public's new awareness of the problem and increased availability of treatment can be of enormous benefit to victims and their families. By breaking the silence that has always surrounded this devastating subject, Betrayal of Innocence offers practical help and comfort to the survivors of child abuse and to those who love, live, or work with them.
