I am a licensed therapist, college instructor, and non-fiction author, specializing in divorce, marriage, children, and relationships. I am a regular contributor to The Gottman Relationship Blog, Patheos.com, marriage.com, Huffington Post, TheGoodMenProject.com, DivorcedMoms.com, and DivorceMagazine.com.

My book, Daughters of Divorce: Overcome the Legacy of Your Parents’ Breakup and Enjoy a Happy, Long-Lasting Relationship, was co-authored with my daughter Tracy and published by Sourcebooks in 2016. As a therapist, I am interested in helping people heal from the pain they experience related to divorce and other challenges and losses. My interest in the lives of women who grew up in divorced families began with my own experience. My passion for this topic grew as my clinical practice included many daughters of divorce and I experienced divorce. When I wrote Daughters of Divorce, I supplemented my clinical and personal experience by interviewing more than 300 hundred women raised in divorced families.

My initial research study in 1995 included 198 women and I discovered that the loss of access to both parents was associated with low-self-esteem in daughters of divorce. Following that, I studied a larger, diverse sample of over 300 adults and examined issues such as interpersonal relationships, trust, family climate, and self-esteem. Both studies were published in the Journal of Divorce and Remarriage. My book, Daughters of Divorce, discusses findings from my research and offers poignant stories from the women I interviewed about their quest for fulfilling relationships that endure the test of time.

My new book, The Remarriage Manual: How to Make Everything Work Better the Second Time Around, will be published by Sounds True in February of 2020. It provides powerful real-life stories, action steps, and strategies for the millions of couples who are taking a chance on love in a second (or third) marriage. Grounded in 100 in-depth interviews of remarried people, The Remarriage Manual gives readers a clear road map to better relationship skills so they can build the happy, long-lasting marriages they desire.

If this is your first time to visit my website, I hope you will Start Here and learn more about me and my work. I post blogs bi-weekly on a variety of topics ranging from divorce, remarriage, children of divorce, and relationship issues.