Recommended Readings

This book is based on a study of many families over a number of years.  Gottman has identified 4 skills that parents of emotionally intelligent children have.  He has parenting questionnaires that assess your parenting style and then he tells you specific skills to work on, given your parenting style.   This book also has a great chapter on dads as parents.

This is a seminal work in parenting. It is great to help parents begin to take their children’s perspective and learn to listen to their children’s feelings and thoughts.

This book is based on research showing that pessimism is the single strongest predictor of a child developing depression.  The techniques discussed in this book to increase optimism, are like a vaccination, designed to inoculate children against depression.

This wonderful book uses attachment theory to promote the use of a playful style of parenting.  It wisely talks about the times when playfulness is not appropriate and has many suggestions for how to take the edge off of difficult situations.

This book is quite unique.  It is based on numerous Jewish teachings and each chapter talks about a different “blessing.”  For example, the chapter on the blessing of a skinned knee talks about how important it is to not protect our children too much and to let them experience pain so they can learn to confidently manage the challenges of life.

This is an in-depth look how the brain is preprogrammed to promote and elicit attachment.  It is intended for the professional, but is excellent for the parent who wants to see the evidence behind the link between brain development and attachment.

This book recounts and explores the history of attachment theory and research.  I recommend it for the parent who wants a better understanding of attachment theory and how revolutionary attachment theory is.   This book has an excellent chapter on children’s relationships with fathers.

Dr. Sue Johnson, is a preeminent researcher on couples therapy and romantic relationships.  She discusses the new scientific evidence (in an understandable way) that helps us to better develop long term romantic partnerships.

This book talks about and gives many examples of how couples rely on each other.  She de-pathologizes dependency, seeing interdependence- a balance between healthy dependency and autonomy -over independence as the ultimate goal in a relationships.  Dr. Solomon does a particularly nice job showing how a person’s family history can impact romantic relationships.

Gottman’s book on marriage is based on the study of over 100 couples in the mid 1980’s.  Gottman concludes that a lasting relationship results from a couple’s ability to resolve conflicts through any of the three styles of problem-solving that are found in healthy marriages. Numerous self-quizzes help couples determine the style that best suits a couple.

This book describes five different types of marriages that “work.”  Within the fascinating case descriptions, you can see the complexities that marriage often presents.  Wallerstein and Blakeslee also look at a marriage developmentally, and identify 9 issues (e.g.; children) that couples usually face as they live together as a married couple.

Although written for the layperson, this book is dense reading. Her discussions of adult emotional problems and their roots in early childhood development are incredibly insightful. She focuses on how couples must learn to “be” individuals, but also “love” the other, and thus be dependent.

Welwood focuses on deepening intimacy in relationships. He introduces ways to dialogue that help clarify issues and bring couples closer.

Dr. Sharpiro founded EMDR and in this book she brings the principles of EMDR to the general public.  She explains trauma in an accessible manner and suggests concrete activities to support those who have trauma in their history.

This book helps people who are struggling with relationships.  It uses relaxation training, cognitive restructuring, and other techniques to help people develop self-acceptance, self-soothing, and a sense of self-worth.

Viorst looks at how loss is necessary for people to form a positive self image and identity.   Using a developmental perspective, she examines how loss promotes growth throughout the lifespan.

This book gives advice about how Buddhism can help people to cope with fear, despair, rage and the feeling that we are not in control of our lives.  Chodron discusses how effective the Buddhist point of view can be in bringing order into disordered lives.