Shortlist of Recommended Self-Help Books |
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After the Affair: Healing the Pain and Rebuilding Trust When a Partner Has Been Unfaithful Janis A. Spring For the seventy percent of couples who have been affected by extramarital affairs, this book offers strategies for surviving the crisis and rebuilding the relationship. Dr. Spring, a psychologist, guides both hurt and unfaithful partners through the three stages of healing: normalizing feelings, deciding whether to recommit, and revitalizing the relationship. The book offers practical advice to help you cultivate trust and forgiveness and build a healthier partnership. 1997, Perennial Currents |
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The Couples Companion: Meditations & Exercises for Getting the Love You Want , A Workbook for Couples Harville Hendrix This collection of practical exercises gives couples a useful structure to help develop communication skills, conflict resolution skills and alternative ways for dealing with painful and powerful emotions. This is a toolbox to help you make significant improvements in your marriage or relationship. These exercises will enhance self-understanding as well as understanding your partner. 1994, Atria |
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Create Your Own Love Story: The Art of Lasting Relationships David McMillan Each couple has its own story, the essence of its relationship. Dr. McMillan shows you how to transform your shared history with your partner into a true love story that makes your relationship stronger, more enduring and more soul-satisfying. 1997, Beyond Words Publishing |
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The Dance of Intimacy: A Woman’s Guide to Courageous Acts of Change in Key Relationships Harriet Lerner Lerner outlines the steps to take so that good relationships can be strengthened and difficult ones can be healed. She highlights the importance of women defining themselves, their needs and limits rather than emotionally distancing themselves from problems or over-reacting. She encourages women to explore their family of origin to clarify the genesis of non-adaptive behavior patterns.. 1990, Perennial |
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Divorce Busting: A Step-by-Step Approach to Making Your Marriage Loving Again Michele Weiner-Davis Offering a brief solution-oriented approach, Michele Weiner-Davis gives straight- forward and effective advice on how couples can stay together. Her approach focuses on the present and the future rather than the past, and on identifying problem-solving behavior that works. Many case histories illustrate techniques which can be used even if only one partner participates. 1993, Simon & Schuster |
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Fear of Intimacy Robert Firestone and Joyce Catlett The authors argue that relationships fail primarily because psychological defenses formed in childhood act as a barrier to closeness in adulthood. Powerful personal accounts illustrate how the “fantasy bond,” a once useful but now destructive form of self-protection, jeopardizes meaningful attachments. 2000, American Psychological Association |
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The Fragile Bond: In Search of an Equal, Intimate, and Enduring Marriage Augustus Napier Focusing on the author’s own marriage and on a group of case studies, Napier vividly illustrates the obstacles married couples face today, and offers help in overcoming them. 1990, HarperCollins |
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Getting the Love You Want: A Guide for Couples Harville Hendrix This popular book is divided into three sections: the first, “the unconscious marriage” describes how left-over desires and behavior from childhood interfere with the current relationship. The second section “the conscious marriage” describes how a marriage could fulfill childhood needs in a positive manner. The third section is a course in relationship therapy which gives detailed exercises for both partners to follow in order to learn how to replace confrontational criticism with a healing process of mutual growth and support. 2001, Owl Books |
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Grow Up!: How Taking Responsibility Can Make You a Happy Adult Frank Pittman In this witty yet profound book, Dr. Pittman discusses the complexities of marriage, divorce, child-rearing and forgiving your parents. He emphasizes that the true essence of happiness stems from personal honor and integrity and argues that changing gender roles and society's emphasis on narcissism and blaming others for our predicament keep us from fully inhabiting our adulthood. 1999, St. Martin's Press |
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The Heart and Soul of Sex: Making the ISIS Connection Gina Ogden Based on a landmark sex survey, researcher and sex therapist Ogden found "the language of spiritual experience comes closest to expressing the fullness of our sexual response, for it is the language of connection and ecstasy." The book guides the reader on a path to her sexual "center" where healing, ecstasy and transformation occur. 2006, Trumpeter This book was a Self-Help Book Pick of the Month! Read David's full Book Review. |
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The High-Conflict Couple: A Dialectical Behavior Therapy Guide to Finding Peace, Intimacy, And Validation Alan Fruzzetti When out-of-control emotions are the root cause of problems in a relationship, no amount of effective communication or intimacy building will fix what ails it. This book teaches you how to use mindfulness and distress tolerance techniques to de-escalate conflict situations before they have a chance to flare into serious fights. 2006, New Harbinger |
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How Can I Get Through to You?: Closing the Intimacy Gap Between Men and Women Terrence Real Real believes that men and women do not speak the same emotional language because boys’ early emotional relationships were squelched by peers, siblings and fathers, while girls early on learned to be accommodating in emotional relationships. He believes healthy marriage follows a repeated pattern of harmony, disharmony, and restoration; and teaches skills for accomplishing the crucial ongoing task of relationship repair, including holding the relationship in high regard, preserving intimacy, and using relational speaking, listening and negotiating skills. A practical and helpful book. 2002, Scribners |
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How One of You Can Bring the Two of You Together Susan Page Susan Page's ground-breaking approach to relationships gives readers the tools and encouragement they need to bring positive changes to their relationship, even when their partners are unwilling to do the work. Step-by-step Page demonstrates that with tangible goals, and new ways of thinking, one partner can bring new levels of harmony and love to a relationship. 1998, Broadway, reprint edition |
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Intimacy After Infidelity: How to Rebuild And Affair-proof Your Marriage Steven D. Solomon, Lorie J. Teagno This book offers readers a compassionate and effective strategy for recovery after their partner has cheated by identifying the three kinds of infidelity; overcoming the pain of betrayal; and learning to rebuild a healthier "affair-proof" relationship. 2006, New Harbinger |
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Intimate Strangers: Men and Women Together Lillian Rubin This book explains how the differences between women and men arise and how they affect such critical issues as intimacy, sexuality, dependency, work and parenting. Lillian Rubin decodes human behavior with a lively combination of intuition and scholarship and offers hope for every man and woman who has yearned for an intimate relationship and wondered why it seemed so elusive. 1990, Perennial |
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Introvert & Extrovert in Love: Making It Work When Opposites Attract Marti Olsen Laney, Michael Laney The (introvert) best-selling author of The Introvert Advantage teams up with her (extrovert) husband to offer this warm and witty collection of tips for making the most of differing social needs, conflict styles, and personal priorities that are common to these kinds of "mixed" relationships. The key to introvert/extrovert bliss lies in understanding what makes the other person tick and using your differences to help balance and enrich the relationship. 2007, New Harbinger |
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Journey of the Heart: The Path of Conscious Love John Welwood This book stands out as a poetically written, wisdom-filled guide to a deeper understanding of the desires and directions of the human heart. The book does not provide easy answers or quick fixes; it gives instead superb suggestions for joining in the most powerful and spiritual union possible. Welwood offers advice for couples on using love’s challenges to grow as individuals and in their relationships. He shows people how the most difficult and confusing areas of relationships can be used to awaken the deepest human strengths and resources. 1996, Perennial |
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Keeping the Love You Find Harville Hendrix This guide for singles who seek a loving and rewarding romantic relationship shows readers how to meet the challenges of a new relationship and avoid making the same mistakes, and how to deal with emotional issues and improve their odds of achieving the kind of relationship they most deeply want. Hendrix especially focuses on how to maintain a positive relationship with someone you love over the long term. 1993, Atria |
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Lesbian Couples: A Guide to Creating Healthy Relationships Merilee Clunis and Dorsey Green For lesbians (as for all couples) achieving and sustaining intimacy remains a challenge. From mind-reading and making assumptions to conflict and disillusionment, the book examines the strengths and weakness, flagging potential problem areas and offering real-life examples and solutions to the challenges lesbian couples experience. 2005, Seal Press |
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Love and Awakening: Discovering the Sacred Path of Intimate Relationship John Welwood Psychologist Welwood challenges couples to approach difficulties as opportunities for spiritual growth rather than conflict. This is a guidebook for couples seriously committed to spiritual and personal growth. It provides a wealth of practical guidance on how to deal with difficult problems and includes lively dialogues from Welwood’s workshops that illustrate his ideas. 1997, Perennial Currents |
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Loving Someone With Bipolar Disorder: Understanding and Helping Your Partner Julie A. Fast, John D. Preston This is a ground-breaking book for couples who want to prevent manic-depressive disorder from hijacking their relationship. Once medication has been prescribed, the key is studying the specific ways your partner is affected. This allows couples to develop proactive strategies for treating and stabilizing mood swings and symptoms, before they develop into full-blown crises. This book is an oasis of relief and hope. 2004, New Harbinger | ||
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Love is Never Enough: How Couples Can Overcome Misunderstandings, Resolve Conflicts, and Solve Relationship Problems Through Cognitive Therapy Aaron Beck Dr. Beck analyzes the most common problems in marriage: the power of negative thinking, disillusionment, rigid rules and expectations, and miscommunication. This highly rated self-help book is filled with practical suggestions, exercises and encouragement. 1989, Perennial Currents |
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Marriage, a History: From Obedience to Intimacy, or How Love Conquered Marriage Stephanie Coontz When considered in the light of history, "traditional marriage" is not so traditional at all. Author Coontz argues that marriage has always been in flux, and "almost every marital and sexual arrangement we have seen in recent years, however startling it may appear, has been tried somewhere before." Coontz's fascinating study places current concepts of marriage in broad historical context. 2005, Viking Adult |
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Mating in Captivity: Reconciling the Erotic and the Domestic Esther Perel Focusing on "erotic intelligence", psychotherapist Perel asserts that languishing desire in a relationship actually results from all the factors people look for in love and marriage: grounding, meaning, continuity. She recommends several proposals for rekindling eroticism: cultivating separateness (autonomy) in a relationship rather than closeness (entrapment); exploring dynamics of power and control (i.e., submission, spanking); and learning to surrender to a "sexual ruthlessness" that liberates us from shame and guilt. Perel sanctions fantasy and play and offers the estranged modern couple a unique richness of experience. 2006, HarperCollins |
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Passionate Marriage: Love, Sex and Intimacy in Emotionally Committed Relationships David Schnarch Schnarch says that a man is more likely to let a relationship suffer in order to hold on to his sense of self, while a woman is more apt to let her identity suffer to help strengthen a relationship. Schnarch explains how to alter this pattern, encouraging each partner to move towards “differentiation” -- which means holding on to the self while simultaneously remaining in contact with one’s partner. Schnarch teaches how to find inner strength and resilience that can be used to reaffirm a relationship and reignite sex. A classic, highly recommended. 1998, Owl Books |
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The Power of Two: Secrets Of a Strong and Loving Marriage Susan Heitler and Paula Singer This practical guide for strengthening marriage offers advice for couples seeking to understand themselves and each other, including dealing with differences, supporting each other, building emotional and sexual intimacy, and living together with kindness. 1997, New Harbinger |
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Private Lies: Infidelity and the Betrayal of Intimacy Frank Pittman For people who suspect their spouses are having a secret romantic affair, or who are coping with the aftermath of one, this book offers sensible counsel. Dr. Pittman, a psychiatrist, draws profiles of four basic patterns of betrayal: accidental flings which “just happen;” habitual philandering, which he believes to be motivated by insecurity and fear of the opposite sex; crazy, in-love romantic states that cloud one’s judgment; and marital arrangement ranging from sexual supplements to flamboyant revenge affairs. The book explores the whys and wherefores about infidelity and offers advice for both the unfaithful and the wounded partner. 1990, Norton |
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Receiving Love: Transform Your Relationship by Letting Yourself Be Loved Harville Hendrix and Helen LaKelly Hunt This book addresses a common relationship problem: the difficulty of accepting love which may be expressed by criticizing a gift from one's partner or spurning an intimate gesture. The authors point out that there are many ways to defend yourself against someone else's desire to encourage, help or love you. This may occur through overvaluing your partner and feeling unworthy of his or her love or through devaluing that partner and seeing him or her as unworthy of giving love. The authors provide concrete steps to help you learn how to receive love in the vulnerable context of an intimate relationship. 2004, Atria |
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Reconcilable Differences Andrew Christensen, Neil S. Jacobson This book speaks directly to the heart. Couples in conflict will recognize themselves in these pages and learn how to move beyond conflict to acceptance, understanding and change. 2002, The Guilford Press |
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Rekindling Desire: A Step-by-Step Program to Help Low-Sex and No-Sex Marriages Barry and Emily McCarthy Sex and marital experts Barry and Emily McCarthy offer a ground-breaking ten-step program to help couples break down the barriers that have developed between them and rebuild closeness and longing. First they show couples how to root out the “poisons” that inhibit sexual desire: shame, guilt, anger, and passivity as well as medical side effects and physical dysfunctions. They then offer techniques and strategies to help couples revitalize desire and integrate intimacy and eroticism. 2003, Brunner-Routledge |
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The Relationship Cure: A Five-Step Guide to Strengthening Your Marriage, Family, and Friendships John Gottman and Joan DeClaire Gottman offers a research-based approach to improving intimate relationships. He provides a remarkable set of tools for relationship repair. The authors state that happiness is based on everyday communication that involves emotion and how other people respond or fail to respond to this communication. A five-step program shows readers how to improve their emotional communications. 2002, Crown |
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Resurrecting Sex: Solving Sexual Problems and Revolutionizing Your Relationship David Schnarch and James Maddock By showing couples how they can turn their worst sex and relationship disasters into personal growth and spiritual connection, Dr. Schnarch offers couples the best sex of their lives. In addition to taking an unflinchingly honest, realistic, and erotic approach to sex, Dr. Schnarch reveals the complicated emotional interactions hidden within couples’ most private moments. This sympathetic book shows how couples can cure the rejection, hostility, and emotional alienation that often accompany sexual problems and thus deepen and strengthen their relationship. 2003, Perennial Currents |
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The Seven Principles for Making Marriage Work: A Practical Guide from the Country’s Foremost Relationship Expert John Gottman and Nan Silver This highly ranked self-help book offers positive approaches for helping couples make sense of their difficulties and work to make their relationship successful. Gottman’s principles for successful marriage include turning toward each other instead of away, letting your partner influence you, moving through conflict and creating shared meaning. 2000, Three Rivers Press |
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Sexual Awareness: Couple Sexuality for the Twenty-First Century Barry McCarthy, Emily McCarthy This book is written for people who want to enhance intimacy and sexual satisfaction. It is a practical, confidence-building book that shows you how to increase your sexual pleasure, focusing on feelings and fulfillment for both partners. 2002, Carroll & Graf Publishers; Revised and updated edition |
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The Sex-Starved Marriage: A Couple’s Guide to Boosting Their Marriage Libido Michele Weiner Davis Candid and sensible counsel for couples with mismatched libidos. She looks at the problem of low sexual desire from a couples’ perspective. Both the low desire partner and the higher desire partner will find useful exercises to help bridge the desire gap and restore intimacy and friendship to the marriage. The book includes many moving first-hand accounts of couples who have struggled with the erosion of desire and have rebuilt their passionate connection. 2003, Simon & Schuster |
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Take Back Your Marriage: Sticking Together in a World that Pulls Us Apart William J. Doherty This book helps couples pinpoint hidden marital problems and take positive steps to stay close and connected everyday. Readers learn to break free of such common traps as confusing desires with needs, drifting apart without working on the relationship, or becoming over-time parents instread of full-time partners. This book shows how to fight back to restore a marriage worth saving. 2003, The Guilford Press |
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Uncoupling: Turning Points in Intimate Relationships Dianne Vaughan Based on ten years of research, the book examines the break-up of relationships and identifies the key steps in uncoupling -- from both partners’ points of view. The book is invaluable because it normalizes a universal experience often viewed as unique by the participants and because it will help those in the early stages of uncoupling to identify what is happening, enabling them to take the steps necessary to avoid the final breakdown of the relationship. 1990, Vintage |
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When Anger Scares You: How to Overcome Your Fear of Conflict and Express Your Anger in Healthy Ways John Lynch Anger is a natural response that can be, if properly channeled, a powerful source of energy and motiviation for growth. Some people, whom author Lynch calls "anger avoiders" habitually shy away from their own angry feelings and potentially anger- provoking situations. This book teaches you to separate anger from rage or fear. Then simple, easy to follow exercises coach you to openly express your anger and constructively address difficult people and situations. 2004, New Harbinger |
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When Parents Disagree and What You Can Do About It Ron Taffel This book is a hands-on practical guide to understanding child rearing differences between parents and how to work through conflicts arising from these. It is filled with real life examples from Dr. Taffel's practice and offers practical and reasonable guidance that helps both parents feel that they are, after all, on the same side. 2002, The Guilford Press |
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When Someone You Love Is Depressed Laura Rosen and Xavier Amador Psychologists Rosen and Amador explain the mechanisms of depression that can cause communication breakdown, increase hostility, and ultimately destroy relationships. They teach concrete methods that you and your loved one can use to protect yourself and your relationship from depression’s impact. They give sensitive guidance about how to recognize your needs, how to provide the best kind of support, and how to encourage the depressed person to seek treatment. 1997, Free Press |
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Why Marriages Succeed or Fail: And How You Can Make Yours Last
John Gottman Researcher Gottman found that healthy marriages were those in which couples were able to resolve conflicts through one of three styles of problem solving: validating, conflict avoiding and volatile. The book offers a four-step program for breaking through negativity and allowing one’s natural problem solving abilities to flourish. 1995 Simon and Schuster |
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Why Talking Is Not Enough: 8 Loving Actions That Will Transform Your Marriage Susan Page Susan Page presents a novel relationship strategy based on subtle, powerful changes in your own actions. Her pioneering 8-step program invites you to give up problem solving and move directly to a warmer, more loving and fun relationship, based on universal spiritual principles. 2006, Jossey-Bass |
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