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theme is closely based on Kathleen James’ own story. Helen still carries a buried grief. Birth mothers had no contact with their children, and only minimal initial information was ever provided. Years later when Helen is divorced and beginning a new phase of life, with a 19-year-old son Nick, she hopes for a reunion with Simon when he turns 21.
At this time Helen falls in love with single parent Marco Lucini, and the family secrets of both the Armstrongs and the Lucinis gradually come to light. Helen learns a lot about her beloved Uncle Mick (a gambler and a ‘ladies’ man,’) who together with her Auntie Vera ran the Armstrong’s Family Hotel in Katoomba back in the 1930s. Finding out about Mick’s all too human failings and his troubled past helps her to come to terms with her own. Marco also learns how complicated families can be, when he discovers a whole new family of ‘outlaws’ in Italy, (‘outlaws’ being those parenting or born outside of marriage).
The story takes us from a Sydney waterway to the NSW South Coast and Blue Mountains, and to Parma and Venice in Italy. The three narrators: Helen, Marco and Mick span two generations, in alternating chapters, giving the reader three different points of view.
In its extensive exploration of adoption this novel gives a voice to the many women who, under the influence of others, gave up their babies and feel silenced by a sense of loss and shame.
‘Kathleen James deals with the issues of adoption with grace, sensitivity and sincere compassion. This is a wonderful read and personally it touched me on so many levels…. To bring to others the dilemma that is adoption with such understanding is a huge achievement.’
Penelope Wise, representative of the Adoptive Parents Association (APA) on the NSW Standing Committee on Adoption from 1977 to 1990.
Congrats, you've graduated! You have your whole life ahead of you. Do you feel overwhelmed? Unsure? Deluged with information, but no real plan? Jenny Blake's Life After College gives you practical, actionable advice, helping you to navigate every area of your life--from work, money, dating, health, family, and personal growth--to help you see the big picture. It will get you focusing on your goals, dreams, and highest aspirations so that you can create the life you really want. Now in a repackaged edition!
She wanted to know precisely how the baby's brain is formed, and when and how each sense, skill, and cognitive ability is developed. And just as important, she was interested in finding out how her role as a nurturer can affect this complex process. How much of her baby's development is genetically ordained--and how much is determined by environment? Is there anything parents can do to make their babies' brains work better--to help them become smarter, happier people?
Drawing upon the exploding research in this field as well as the stories of real children, What's Going On in There? is a lively and thought-provoking book that charts the brain's development from conception through the critical first five years.
In examining the many factors that play crucial roles in that process, What's Going On in There? explores the evolution of the senses, motor skills, social and emotional behaviors, and mental functions such as attention, language, memory, reasoning, and intelligence. This remarkable book also discusses:
how a baby's brain is "assembled" from scratch
the critical prenatal factors that shapebrain development
how the birthing process itself affects the brain
which forms of stimulation are most effective at promoting cognitive development
how boys' and girls' brains develop differently
how nutrition, stress, and other physical and social factors can permanently affect a child's brain
Brilliantly blending cutting-edge science with a mother's wisdom and insight, What's Going On in There? is an invaluable contribution to the nature versus nurture debate. Children's development is determined both by the genes they are born with and the richness of their early environment. This timely and important book shows parents the innumerable ways in which they can actually help their children grow better brains.
From the Hardcover edition.
An extraordinary literary work, Dear Mr. You renders the singular arc of a woman’s life through letters Mary-Louise Parker composes to the men, real and hypothetical, who have informed the person she is today. Beginning with the grandfather she never knew, the letters range from a missive to the beloved priest from her childhood to remembrances of former lovers to an homage to a firefighter she encountered to a heartfelt communication with the uncle of the infant daughter she adopted. Readers will be amazed by the depth and style of these letters, which reveal the complexity and power to be found in relationships both loving and fraught.
Why does it feel sometimes as if our children have special powers that enable them to tune us out completely? You ask your child to do her homework, get ready for school or bedtime. You think she heard you but . . . no response. You’ve tried everything—time-outs, nagging, counting to three—and nothing seems to work. In this invaluable book, Amy McCready, founder of the popular online parenting course Positive Parenting Solutions, presents a nag-and-scream-free program for compassionately yet effectively, correcting your children’s bad behavior.
McCready draws on Adlerian psychology and Positive Discipline, which focuses on the central idea that every human being has a basic need to feel connected and empowered—children being no exception to the rule. According to McCready, when this need isn’t met in positive ways, kids resort to negative methods. In this book she provides parents with a virtual toolbox of strategies they can use to give their children the attention and power they crave—and do away with the misbehaving that adults dread.
Mayim Bialik was the child star of the popular 1990s TV sitcom Blossom, but she definitely didn’t follow the typical child-star trajectory. Instead, Mayim got her PhD in neuroscience from UCLA, married her college sweetheart, and had two kids. Mayim then did what many new moms do—she read a lot of books, talked with other parents, and she soon started questioning a lot of the conventional wisdom she heard about the “right” way to raise a child. That’s when she turned to Attachment Parenting, a philosophy and lifestyle popularized by well-known physicians like Dr. William Sears and Dr. Jay Gordon.
To Mayim, Attachment Parenting’s natural, child-led approach not only felt right emotionally, it made sense intellectually and instinctually. She found that when she followed her intuition and relaxed into her role as a mother instead of following some rigid parenting script, both she and her children thrived. Taking into account her experience as a mother (and her scientific background), Mayim presents the major tenets of Attachment Parenting, including:
Baby wearing: How to “wear” your baby in a sling or a wrap to foster a closer bond with your child—it’s possible even for mamas with bad backs (and with big babies)!
Breastfeeding: Learn how to listen to your baby’s cues rather than sticking to a rigid schedule—and why people on airplanes love a nursing mother!
Gentle discipline: How to get your child to behave without yelling, threats, or time-outs—it really is possible.
Co-sleeping: How to avoid “sleep training” and get a great night’s sleep for the whole family.
Without the pretense and luxuries typical of so many Hollywood actors and parents, Mayim describes the beauty, simplicity, and purposefulness of Attachment Parenting, and how it’s become the guiding principle for her family. Much more than a simple how-to parenting guide, Beyond the Sling shows us that the core principles underlying Attachment Parenting are universal and can be appreciated no matter how you decide to raise your child.
Now, Penguin brings you the works of the great thinkers, pioneers, radicals and visionaries whose ideas shook civilization, and helped make us who we are. Penguin's Great Ideas series features twelve groundbreaking works by some of history's most prodigious thinkers, and each volume is beautifully packaged with a unique type-drive design that highlights the bookmaker's art. Offering great literature in great packages at great prices, this series is ideal for those readers who want to explore and savor the Great Ideas that have shaped the world.
The Stoic writings of the philosopher Seneca, who lived from c. 5 BC to AD 65, offer powerful insights into the art of living, the importance of reason and morality, and continue to provide profound guidance to many through their eloquence, lucidity and timeless wisdom. This selection of Seneca's orks was taken from the Penguin Classics edition of Dialogues and Letters, translated by C.D.N. Costa, and includes the essays On the Shortness of Life, Consolation to Helvia, and On Tranquility of Mind.
From the Trade Paperback edition.
Women have always been wonderful sources of inspiration and support for each other. They are willing to lay bare their souls, even to perfect strangers. Put two random women together in a waiting room, on an airplane, in a line at the supermarket, and the sharing begins, often at the deepest level. Women share hope, humor, and inspiration with each other in these 101 favorite stories from Chicken Soup for the Soul’s library.
The “rules” in this book focus on the toddler and preschool years—an important time for laying the foundation for competent and compassionate older kids and then adults. Here are a few of the rules:
• It’s OK if it’s not hurting people or property
• Bombs, guns and bad guys allowed.
• Boys can wear tutus.
• Pictures don’t have to be pretty.
• Paint off the paper!
• Sex ed starts in preschool
• Kids don’t have to say “Sorry.”
• Love your kid’s lies.
IT’S OK NOT TO SHARE is an essential resource for any parent hoping to avoid PLAYDATEGATE (i.e. your child’s behavior in a social interaction with another child clearly doesn’t meet with another parent’s approval)!
From the Trade Paperback edition.
Full of heartfelt stories about gazing at surprisingly clean bedrooms, starting new careers, rediscovering spouses, and handling the continuing, and often humorous, needs of children, Chicken Soup for the Soul: Empty Nesters will inspire, support, and amuse parents. They’ll nod their heads, cry a little, and laugh a lot, as they read these oh-so-true stories.
Warm and fuzzy, anchored in values, and filled with simple words of wisdom, this beloved, bestselling book for parents speaks to the important business of raising sons, and distills their timeless lessons into one nugget of wisdom per page—some lighthearted, some serious, some practical, and some intangible, and all supported by a strong moral backbone.
Freshly updated, the book begins with the Five Keys of Parenting, a guide to navigating the extraordinary, even if sometimes exasperating, journey of parenthood. It’s filled with the importance of nurturing responsibility: Teach him that the world will judge him by his actions, not his intentions. Fun stuff: Have tea with him in the afternoons. Serve cookies. And when he’s ready to go: Hug him fiercely.
Betrayed Not Broken is for the woman who has experienced infidelity or thinks she might have a cheating partner. It is also for the couple wanting to repair the relationship after betrayal. This guide is written in an easy-to-follow format that gives the answers you are looking for right when you need them without any psychobabble-just clear direction. Each chapter ends with questions you can ask yourself as well as provides exercises for both you and your partner as you journey past the betrayal. It's hard to know what to do once infidelity has been revealed; Betrayed Not Broken makes it easier.
But now, Gingras presents readers with a different kind of lesson from a different kind of turtle in the charming book Lessons of a Turtle. And it's a good lesson: Go with the slow! Life is about enjoying what's around you now and finding your own path. It's about the beauty of the journey more than the achievement of the finish line. So be like the turtle . . . notice, savor, bask, risk, grow. Put some life back in your life!
Gingras helps readers get through life by using charming "turtlisms" that complement her just-as-cute turtle illustrations. She teaches us about life's little lessons with little treats like, "You can't move forward until you stick your neck out." and "The slower you go, the more you see." The author's little observations make a big difference on the journey through life.
This book makes a lovely and inspiring gift.
But there is good news as well. Webb describes many extraordinary programs and individuals who are changing the face of dying. An abundant source of comfort and hope, The Good Death shows how the essential elements of humane--even uplifted--death are available to all of us, if we know what is possible, where to go for help, and how to prepare.
From the Trade Paperback edition.
Few behavioral problems challenge and frustrate parents, caregivers, and teachers as does verbal rudeness in children of any age. Reinforced by the wise-cracking kids on TV and in the movies, backtalk has become all too common among today's youngsters. But there is nothing cute about this behavior. Remarks like "Yeah, right," "Big deal," and "Make me" -- form children as young as three -- get in the way of real communication between parents and kids, and can also be detrimental to a child's social and intellectual development.
Now two experts in the field share their simple and specific four-step program for ending backtalk and restoring balance in relationships between parents and children, from preschoolers to teens. You'll learn how to recognize backtalk, how to choose and enact a response that will make sense to you and the backtalker, and when to disengage from the struggle and move forward. Full of advice and encouragement as well as suggestions on how to keep track of what works and what doesn't, Backtalk can be put to use immediately, before you hear another "Whatever."
Previously published as What’s Eating Your Child? and now with a new chapter on the unexpected connection between gluten and insatiable appetite, Cure Your Child with Food shows parents how to uncover the clues behind their children’s surprisingly nutrition-based health issues and implement simple treatments—immediately.
You’ll discover how zinc deficiency can cause picky eating and affect growth. The panoply of problems caused by gluten and dairy. How ear infections and mood disorders, such as anxiety and bipolar disorder, can be a sign of food intolerance. Plus, how to get your child to sleep, soothe hyperactivity, and deal with reflux using simple nutritional strategies.
Ms. Dorfman, a nutritionist whose typical family arrives at her practice after seeing three or more specialists, gives parents the tools they need to become nutrition detectives; to recalibrate their children’s diets through the easy E.A.T. program; and, finally, to get their children off drugs—antibiotics, laxatives, Prozac, Ritalin—and back to a natural state of well-being.
"'Mean' moms make kids learn to do things for themselves from making breakfast to finding inner peace. I'm hoping I'm a little meaner myself after reading this book." —Lenore Skenazy, founder of the book and blog Free–Range Kids
"I've chosen to be the kind of mother I feel is best, and that kind of mother is mean."
MEAN MOMS SAY NO.
MEAN MOMS ARE CONSISTENT.
MEAN MOMS TRUST THEMSELVES.
MEAN MOMS DON'T CARE WHAT EVERYONE ELSE IS DOING.
MEAN MOMS TEACH KIDS THE LIFE SKILLS THEY NEED TO KNOW.
MEAN MOMS SLOW IT DOWN.
MEAN MOMS FAIL THEIR KIDS A LITTLE BIT EVERY DAY.
And mean moms prepare their kids for the world, not the world for their kids, raising children into adults who know how to make themselves happy.
Mean Moms Rule.
And their kids benefit
Denise Schipani writes about all things mean and motherly at www.confessionsofameanmommy.com
Heralding the arrival of an original American voice, By the Iowa Sea is a wrenching, unsentimental account of the heartbreaks and ecstasies of marriage, fatherhood, and small-town Midwestern life.
After his first cross-country motorcycle trip, Joe Blair believed he had discovered his calling: he would travel; he would never cave in to convention; he would never settle down. Fifteen years later, he finds himself living in Iowa, working as an air-conditioning repairman and spending his free time cleaning gutters, taxiing his children, and contemplating marital infidelity. When the Iowa River floods, transforming the familiar streets of his small town into a terrible and beautiful sea, Joe begins to question the path that led him to this place.
Exquisitely observed and lyrically recounted, this is a compelling and often humorous account of an ordinary man’s struggle to live an extraordinary life.
Combining the expertise of its author – a celebrated expert in parent-infant mental health and mother of two – with the latest findings in gene-by-environment interactions, epigenetics, behavioural science, and attachment theory, Scientific Parenting describes how children’s genes determine their sensitivity to good or bad parenting, how environmental cues can switch critical genes on or off, and how addictive tendencies and mental health problems can become hardwired into the human brain.
The book traces conditions as diverse as heart disease, obesity, and depression to their origins in early childhood. It brings readers to the frontier of developmental research, unlocking the fascinating scientific discoveries currently hidden away in academic tomes and scholarly journals. Above all, Scientific Parenting explains why parenting really matters and how parents’ smallest actions can transform their children’s lives.
Combining the expertise of its author – a celebrated expert in parent-infant mental health and mother of two – with the latest findings in gene-by-environment interactions, epigenetics, behavioural science, and attachment theory, Scientific Parenting describes how children’s genes determine their sensitivity to good or bad parenting, how environmental cues can switch critical genes on or off, and how addictive tendencies and mental health problems can become hardwired into the human brain.
The book traces conditions as diverse as heart disease, obesity, and depression to their origins in early childhood. It brings readers to the frontier of developmental research, unlocking the fascinating scientific discoveries currently hidden away in academic tomes and scholarly journals. Above all, Scientific Parenting explains why parenting really matters and how parents’ smallest actions can transform their children’s lives.
If you are always attracted to "bad boys" that make you feel guilty for being with them in the first place, then you should really get this book to learn how to attract the right person for you.
It's never too late. Make yourself a gift!
Grab your copy now to attract and keep the man of your dreams - guaranteed!
Science writer Robin Marantz Henig and her daughter, journalist Samantha Henig, offer a smart, comprehensive look at what it's really like to be twentysomething—and to what extent it’s different for Millennials than it was for their Baby Boomer parents. The Henigs combine the behavioral science literature for insights into how young people make choices about schooling, career, marriage, and childbearing; how they relate to parents, friends, and lovers; and how technology both speeds everything up
and slows everything down. Packed with often-surprising discoveries, Twentysomething is a two-generation conversation that will become the definitive book on being young in our time.
"The fullest guide through this territory . . . A densely researched report on the state of middleclass young people today, drawn from several data sources and filtered through a comparative lens."
—The New Yorker
Succeeding in life takes character, and Lickona shows how irresponsible and destructive behavior can invariably be traced to the absence of good character and its ten essential qualities: wisdom, justice, fortitude, self-control, love, a positive attitude, hard work, integrity, gratitude, and humility.
The culmination of a lifetime’s work in character education from one the preeminent psychologists of our time, this landmark book gives us the tools we need to raise respectful and responsible children, create safe and effective schools, and build the caring and decent society in which we all want to live.
Grab your copy now!
Why am I not happier in my intimate relationships?
How do I become more powerful—without becoming that jerk everyone dislikes?
Robert Augustus Masters has helped thousands of men address and work through such issues. What he’s found is that the common solution to these dilemmas is challenging yet clear: we must face our unresolved wounds, shame, and whatever else is holding us back, bringing “our head, heart, and guts into full-blooded alignment.”With To Be a Man, this acclaimed psychotherapist and relationship expert offers a groundbreaking and deeply insightful guide to masculine power and fulfillment. To Be a Man clarifies what’s needed to enter a manhood as strongly empowered as it’s vulnerable, as emotionally literate as it’s unapologetically alive—a manhood at home with truly intimate relationship.
In this book, readers will explore: • How your past may be dominating your present • Shame in its healthy and unhealthy forms, and how to make wise use of it • How vulnerability can be a source of strength • Emotional literacy—an essential skill for relational well-being • Releasing sex from the obligation to make you feel better • How to disempower your inner critic • Bringing your shadow (whatever you’ve disowned in yourself) out of the dark • Embodying your natural heroism and persisting regardless of fear • What women need from men • Understanding and outgrowing pornography • Entering the heartland of true masculine power
If you’ve read your share of popular advice on relationships and being a man—but realize on a gut level that it’s going to take some serious inner work—here’s a great guide to that most rewarding of challenges: doing what’s needed to fully embody your authentic manhood.
They get STDs. They get pregnant too young.
They have "friends with benefits" but with no benefit to themselves.
They don't get called. They get dumped.
They hate themselves for being unlovable for being needy.
They are loose girls they are everywhere and they need our help.
In the provocative hit memoir Loose Girl, Kerry Cohen explored her own promiscuity with brutal candor and stunning clarity. Dirty Little Secrets is the eye-opening follow-up readers have been clamoring for, a riveting look at today's adolescent girls who use sex as a means to prove their worth. Cohen lays bare the hard truths about this dangerous life that reveals itself in girls you wouldn't expect and in ways you might not see-and that can seriously damage and hurt these girls. Featuring stories from self-admitted loose girls across the country, Dirty Little Secrets is an unforgettable wake-up call for our culture, ourselves, and our vulnerable daughters.
"Very few people can write about teen girls' sexual promiscuity with the candor, empathy, and intelligence Kerry Cohen does...I think any girl who reads this will recognize at least one girl she knows-and that girl may be looking back at her in the mirror."
-Rosalind Wiseman, new york times bestselling author of QUEEN BEES AND WANNABES and BOYS, GIRLS, AND OTHER HAZARDOUS MATERIALS
"As compassionate as it is enlightening, Kerry Cohen's Dirty Little Secrets argues for female safety and desire, and provides a road map for authentically healthy, vital sexuality."
-Jennifer Baumgardner, author of Look Both Ways, F 'Em, and Manifesta
"A must-read, for it sheds light on the truth behind the secrets and lies teens tell themselves... Women of all ages can relate and benefit from this book-I can't recommend it enough. Dirty Little Secrets is urgently needed."
-Amber Smith, model and star of Dr. Drew Pinsky's Celebrity Rehab and Celebrity Sex Rehab
"Kerry Cohen has 'been there'-and it shows in her empathy, her insight, and her remarkable ability to draw out the truth...Dirty Little Secrets busts the myths, breaks down walls, and takes us where we need to go to understand the private lives of so many young women today."
-Hugo Schwyzer, PhD, Pasadena City College, Coauthor, Beauty, Disrupted: the Carré Otis Story
Christina Amini and Rachel Hutton have brought together the very best writing on this unpredictable -- and often hilarious -- time. This book features essays by celebrated writers such as Joel Stein, Thisbe Nissen, Thomas Beller, Found magazine's Davy Rothbart, and ReadyMade's Shoshana Berger, as well as exciting new writers.
It’s often said that babies don’t come with an instruction manual. This book actually provides parents with information and practical steps for writing their own—as they work to create the kind of home and family they choose to build. This includes strengthening their own marriage relationship, setting plans and expectations for parenthood, increasing communication, and preparing for the new stage of their family life that is just ahead. Ideal for first-time parents, this book would also be helpful for couples wanting to explore and prepare for the emotional, physical, and spiritual life changes that come with the arrival of any new child into the family.
Mara Dalton has a life that most women only dream of. She has an amazing husband, a new baby boy and owns her own company.
When her husband and son are killed tragically just days before Christmas, Mara stops living as well.
For years she tries to live but finds herself only existing. She attempts to avoid reliving another year of horrible memories at Christmas by leaving her home; which has become her tomb.
While traveling with not much of a plan other than avoidance, she discovers a small town in Alabama. The quaint town seems the perfect place to avoid the holiday and her pain.
She finds more than she bargained for in the Lambert family; a family whose roots are buried deep in their small southern town.
Mara discovers the one thing she has lost, herself.
She struggles to allow herself to live again, at the same time breathing life into the town and the Lamberts.
Sometimes we don’t get to choose where we lay our roots, it chooses us.
Topics covered range from the role of the parent as supporter/protector to the efficacy of daycare and the ways parents can prepare for and assist in a child's education. The book also looks at parenting after a divorce, at the importance of fathers in children's lives, and at such 21st-century issues as cyberbullying and the anxiety-producing effects of societal pressures. One of the unique aspects of the book is that it presents and explains expert knowledge from journals and research studies that are often inaccessible to the everyday reader. Centers of parenting advice such as the Internet and parenting magazines are evaluated as well.