It is a phrase I hear often. Often the person who says it appears to be angry or scornful. Usually the other person becomes angry or defensive. The phase interferes with constructive communication. “That’s a lie” is received as a close cousin of “You are a liar.” Even people who know they are lying […]

  Recently I was having dinner with a group of friends who all run their own businesses. Most of them had husbands with jobs and also had children under age 12. This means that their families were dealing with the usual work/family/life balance issues. With normal kids needing normal amounts of parental attention, one job,

    Recently I read a HuffPost article about regrets about being a stay-at-home mom. It was a good article about the long-term economic, social, and psychological costs of leaving a career to stay at home and raise children. (You can find the article here.) The comments after the article come from many different perspectives. Is

by guest author Sharon Zarozny   Ask anyone who’s been through it, and they’ll tell you one of the most gut-wrenching aspects of separation and divorce is figuring out how to co-parent going forward. It can bring out the worst in the best of us. While married, most parents understand the importance of modeling good

  Recently an important member of my family died. So I am reminded of Kübler-Ross’s “stages” of grieving: denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and, eventually, acceptance. For example: Denial: “This isn’t happening. This can’t be happening. This didn’t happen.” Anger: blaming, rage, punching things, sometimes envy, sometimes guilt. Bargaining: “Please God, bring him back to life,

  Recently I read many of the comments on a Huffington Post article about the new documentary film, Split, in which children describe and illustrate how their parents’ divorces affected them. The film is scheduled for release in June. The comments to date have covered a wide range of opinions, including the statements below. True or False: 1.

  This topic is challenging. If a stepparent gets off to a bad start with the stepchildren, he or she may never be able to recover. Sadly, this happened when I remarried. My husband and I each had two children in the third grade to tenth grade age range. My husband knew that I had

    It’s a tough topic. People don’t like to think about it. They don’t want to know how many people are affected by it. According to a 2010 CDC study,* one of every four women and one of every seven men experience stalking or physical violence from an intimate partner. That’s 25% of women

  Most children do not want their parents to get divorced. They may feel angry, depressed, and/or scared. It may take them some time to regain their sense of security. Most, however, are resilient. They learn to cope with the changes in their lives. Lasting damage results not primarily from the divorce itself but from

  Today’s tip: If you have a Court Order about custody, visitation, or support, read it at least once a year. You may have rights or obligations that you have forgotten about. One time I worked with a dad who had the right to take his child somewhere for 3 hours after school every school