Toxic Parents: Overcoming Their Hurtful Legacy and Reclaiming Your Life

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Random House Publishing Group, Dec 16, 2009 - Self-Help - 320 pages
BONUS: This edition contains an excerpt from Dr. Susan Forward's Men Who Hate Women and the Women Who Love Them.


When you were a child...

Did your parents tell you were bad or worthless?

Did your parents use physical pain to discipline you?

Did you have to take care of your parents because of their problems?

Were you frightened of your parents?

Did your parents do anything to you that had to be kept secret?

Now that you are an adult...

Do your parents still treat you as if you were a child?

Do you have intense emotional or physical reactions after spending time with your parents?

Do your parents control you with threats or guilt?

Do they manipulate you with money?

Do you feel that no matter what you do, it's never good enough for your parents?

In this remarkable self-help guide, Dr. Susan Forward drawn on case histories and the real-life voices of adult children of toxic parents to help you free yourself from the frustrating patterns of your relationship with your parents -- and discover an exciting new world of self-confidence, inner strength, and emotional independence.
 

Contents

Introduction
1
Godlike Parents
15
Just Because You Didnt Mean It Doesnt Mean
30
Why Cant They Let Me Live My Own Life?
47
No One in This Family Is an Alcoholic
69
The Bruises Are All on the Inside
92
Sometimes the Bruises Are on the Outside Too The Physical Abusers
111
The Ultimate Betrayal The Sexual Abusers
131
You Dont Have to Forgive
177
Im a Grownup Why Dont I Feel Like One?
182
The Beginnings of SelfDefinition
194
Whos Really Responsible?
205
The Road to Independence
223
Healing the Incest Wound
260
Breaking the Cycle
290
EpilogueLetting Go of the Struggle
301

Why Do Parents Behave This Way? The Family System
157
RECLAIMING YOUR LIFE
173
Suggested Reading
307
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About the author (2009)

Susan Forward, Ph.D., is an internationally renowned therapist, lecturer, and author of the number one New York Times bestsellers Toxic Parents and Men Who Hate Women and the Women Who Love Them, as well as Betrayal of Innocence: Incest and Its Devastation, Money Demons, Emotional Blackmail, When Your Lover Is a Liar, and Toxic In-Laws.

In addition to her private practice, for five years she hosted a daily ABC talk-radio program. She has also served widely as a group therapist, instructor, and consultant in many southern California medical and psychiatric facilities, and she formed the first private sexual abuse treatment center in California. She lives in Los Angeles and has two grown children.

Dr. Forward maintains offices in Sherman Oaks, California. For further information, call (818) 986-1161.


Craig Buck, a film and television writer and producer, has also written extensively on human behavior for many national magazines and newspapers. He is the co-author, with Susan Forward, of Toxic Parents, Betrayal of Innocence, and Money Demons. He lives in Los Angeles with his wife and daughter.

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