Partner Development

In the Dream House is Carmen Maria Machado's engrossing and wildly innovative account of a relationship gone bad, and a bold dissection of the mechanisms and cultural representations of psychological abuse. Tracing the full arc of a harrowing relationship with a charismatic but volatile woman, Machado struggles to make sense of how what happened to her shaped the person she was becoming. And it's that struggle that gives the book its original structure: each chapter is driven by its own narrative trope - the haunted house, erotica, the bildungsroman....

Betrayal has many faces, including anger, abuse, deceit, and infidelity. These feel like betrayal because they violate the implicit promise of emotional bonds, that your loved one will care about your well-being and never intentionally hurt you. If you've recently left a relationship where you felt betrayed by your partner, you may have difficulty moving on. In fact, it can seem impossible to view the world without the shadow of past betrayal hovering over you. As a result, you may struggle to create meaning in your life and to build new, loving relationships.

Separating or divorcing a narcissist or someone who has narcissistic traits can be a difficult, draining experience. This book is written for the spouse of such a personality to support them step by step through the legal process, as well as through the difficult emotional journey that they'll be undertaking. It will help you recognize narcissistic behavior, prime you on what challenges lie ahead, and provide practical insights on how to survive the process. It will also help you work with your lawyer so you can both understand the potential pitfalls.

We call it domestic violence. We call it private violence. Sometimes we call it intimate terrorism. But whatever we call it, we generally do not believe it has anything at all to do with us, despite the World Health Organization deeming it a 'global epidemic'. In No Visible Bruises, journalist Rachel Louise Snyder gives context for what we don't know we're seeing. She frames this urgent and immersive account of the scale of domestic violence in our country around key stories that explode the common myths....

Narcissistic personality disorder is a mental condition in which those affected have a deep need for excessive admiration and attention, a lack of empathy for others, an inflated sense of their own importance, and troubled relationships. A narcissistic parent will try to prioritize their needs over everyone else’s. It is difficult to deal with a narcissist because not only do they have a lack of empathy, but they also have a deep tendency to push back with defensiveness, anger, and criticism. This book has something for everyone who has had to deal with a toxic, narcissistic ex.

This extraordinary novel by Jim Rohn and Chris Widener will inspire you to take your life to the next level and beyond. It will challenge and encourage you to become the best you can be! Twelve Pillars blends together the fundamental principles and teachings of Jim Rohn into the unique tapestry of a fictional account that imparts the secrets to success in life.

Being in a relationship without knowing how to share your feelings and receive your partner’s feelings in useful ways is like jumping into a pool without knowing how to swim. You can flail around all you want, but it’s not going to keep you afloat for very long—you need to be able to move in any direction at will. Like swimming, knowing how to share your feelings and respond to your partner's feelings will move your relationship in the direction you want: toward more intimacy, closeness, connection, and trust.

More than 60 million people have been in a pathological love relationship with someone who has an impaired conscience. Using the stories of survivors and social psychological research on compliance, cognitive dissonance, and thought control, Why Can't I Just Leave? explains how relationships with pathological partners can create impossible dilemmas that trap you in a distorted dream state and hijack your thoughts and emotions. Learn what those who are conscience-impaired don't want you to know and find out how to wake up and walk out of your partner's invisible prison forever.

You fell in love with him. But over time you've come to realize he's in love with himself - and you feel trapped. His needs, his problems, and his plans always seem to take precedence over yours. Dr. David Hawkins, director of the Marriage Recovery Center, offers a guide to help you identify signs of narcissism, understand how your loved one's issues are affecting you, and prepare a biblical game plan for freeing yourself to live courageously in light of God's love.

Ingrid Yung's life is full of firsts. A first-generation Chinese American, the first lawyer in her family, she's about to collect the holy grail of "firsts" and become the first minority woman to make partner at the venerable old law firm Parsons Valentine & Hunt. Ingrid has perfected the art of "passing" and seamlessly blends into the old-boy corporate culture. She gamely banters in the corporate cafeteria, plays in the firm softball league, and earnestly racks up her billable hours.

Narcissistic abuse was originally defined as a specific form of emotional abuse of children by narcissistic parents, but more recently the term has been applied more broadly to refer to any abuse by a narcissist (someone that who admires their own attributes), in particular in adult-to-adult relationships the abuse may be mental, physical, financial, spiritual or sexual. If you have been through an abusive relationship with someone who has Narcissistic Personality Disorder, you will know that no one understands what you are going through unless they have personally experienced it.

Rumination—obsessive thinking about an idea, situation, or choice that can interfere with normal life—is a common and destructive issue that can negatively impact romantic relationships. You may feel anxious, worried, hopeless, and frustrated, but even if you know your overthinking is a problem, it can be seriously hard to stop. In Stop Overthinking Your Relationship, certified couples therapist Alicia Muñoz draws from cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) and mindfulness to offer an effective, four-step approach to reduce rumination and change negative thinking patterns.

In this one-of-a-kind guide, dad, doula, and certified lactation counselor Brian Salmon and perinatal mental health and relationship expert Kirsten Brunner offer practical, modern-day survival tips for expectant dads and birth partners. Based on Salmon’s Rocking Dads childbirth course, this book provides everything dads need to know about supporting their partner through labor, birth, breastfeeding, and beyond.

When a parent singles out a child for special privileges and attention, that child is often unaware that the relationship is unhealthy - even incestuous. As adults, these children struggle to feel validated, because while they have not been directly abused, they feel a sense of violation and crossed boundaries - usually done in the name of 'love' and 'caring'. The parent's love feels more confining than freeing, more demanding than giving, more intrusive than nurturing. Yet these children suffer from what psychologist Kenneth Adams calls The Silent Seduction.

Legendary personal development icon Jim Rohn explains the parallels between life and the changing seasons. To realize that the seasons will change without fail and what we can do to utilize each season to get the greatest rewards. This popular book is based on the parable of the sower and the reaper. What to do in one season to ensure success in another season. It's great for those who are going through difficult times personally or financially, because it helps them see that this "winter" in their life will eventually give way to "spring."

Since the publication of Running on Empty: Overcome Your Childhood Emotional Neglect, many thousands of people have learned that invisible Childhood Emotional Neglect, or CEN, has been weighing on them their entire lives, and are now in the process of recovery. Running on Empty No More: Transform Your Relationships will offer even more solutions for the effects of CEN on people's lives: how to talk about CEN, and heal it, in relationships with partners, parents, and children.

If you are someone who is going through separation and divorce my hope is that you find this book to be a much-needed support and resource as you go through the process. If you don’t "see yourself" or your particular situation in this book, I hope that you will make at least use of the resources I have included.

When our partner is a narcissist, only those who've actually experienced the madness will ever understand what we're going through. When Love Is a Lie is a straight-up, tell-all book about narcissism in relationships that skips the clinical bullshit to focus solely on the personal experience. A narrative that holds nothing back, Zari Ballard's story will educate, enlighten, and empower you to evaluate (and fully understand) the mind-boggling dysfunction in your own relationship.

Living with an emotionally absent partner can be overwhelming. Constantly overcoming the silent distance can leave you with the sense that the give and take in your relationship has disappeared. But even the most broken relationship can be reinvigorated. In helping real-world couples achieve fulfilling futures, Harvard University clinical psychologist Dr. Holly Parker has developed a program filled with practical exercises and powerful advice for individuals on both sides of an emotionally damaged relationship.

In Vindicated: Confessions of a Video Vixen, Ten Years Later, Karrine takes listeners into the belly of the beast as she harrowingly chronicles the systematic breakdown of her mind, body, and spirit at the hand of one man and the events that propelled her back to prosperity after losing everything. She candidly shares her struggle to be what others demand, her obsession with the American dream, her desperation to appear normal, the lengths to which she went, and the price she paid for it all.