Anchored in the author's personal experience, Wisdom for Separated Parents: Rearranging Around the Children to Keep Kinship Strong traces the long arc of family change through the actual words of men and women who have struggled through separation and co-parenting. This book provides stories from separated parents that share what they've learned from co-parenting and discovering new kinds of families, revealing insights on the process of untangling, rearranging, and reinventing straight and gay families. The extensive interviews in this book reach back as far as the 1950s and explain what it has meant to be separated for decades. These candid stories provide revelations on how to deal with the loss gracefully and minimize ill will, and recount the joys of having a bigger family and more kin connections. This book speaks to two different audiences: today's struggling parents, who will find valuable wisdom as they make crucial decisions about separation and divorce; and readers who have lived this history and will identify with the stories and gain insight and validation regarding their long-ago choices. Reviews: "This is a ground-breaking book, full of surprises and insight about parents who separate after having children. It turns out that most separated families don't fit our stereotypes at all. Thanks to Judy Osborne's extensive research and long-term experience working with couples from diverse backgrounds, including gay and straight, the book reveals a world of unexpected ways that couples remain in connection with each other around parenting, and invent new kinds of family bonds. The stories of separation and re-connection are fascinating, and Osborne's observations are those of a true expert. She has been offering workshops and counseling for years, and now we have the good fortune to see her wisdom captured in book form. We will be recommending this book highly to parents who have separated, those contemplating a separation, and anyone whose own parents have separated. It is also essential, eye-opening reading for students and practitioners working with couples and families." "This engaging and well-written study of separated families persuasively argues that families that are separated are not broken, rather, they are rearranged. This is one of the most insightful books about how extended families of unrelated or previously related persons can pull together by 'creating a benign emotional space' and by rearranging families. Osborne demonstrates that divorced families are not necessarily broken, rather they are rearranged and sometimes strengthened. She also points out the difference between a single mother and one who has the support, either financial or practical, of a former spouse. Her re-conception of separated families into healthy working units is original and useful. This book is a must-read for anyone who has a separated relative. The hints for supporting reconfiguring families are useful to all." "Judy Osborne, a marriage and family therapist and founder and director of Stepfamily Associates in Brookline, MA, has written an insightful and valuable book on how families in which parents have separated from the conjugal relationship remain tied together in their close involvement in raising their children. To a great extent, the book is also a social history of marriage and family and the role of women in our society from the 1960s to the present time. Ms. Osborne's book focuses primarily on individuals who married from the 1960s to the '80s and separated 10 to 15 years later. In the '60s, divorce was not as commonplace as it is today. The '60s was a time when women were still tentatively exploring professional opportunities outside of marriage and many saw themselves primarily as mothers. In divorce arrangements, the phenomenon of the disappearing father and the sole-caregiver mother was still a predominant reality. The solutions found by the many family interviewed by Ms. Osborne were indeed "revolutionary' for their time and radically changed the way children in divorced families were raised. These individuals were the pioneers who found new - and successful - ways of remaining a family and continuing the 'kinship' relationship while separating and even remarrying. Their kinship solutions became the models for contemporary families and for the counselors and therapists who work with these families. Their stories are moving, honest and inspiring. Ms. Osborne has made it possible for us to hear them. " Table of Contents: Acknowledgments -- 1. Introduction: The Secret Life of Separated Parents -- 2. A Story of Untangling with Young Children in the '70s -- 3. Untangling: Normal Differences and Formal Separations -- 4. A Family Rearranges through the '80s and '90s -- 5. Rearranging -- 6. Grandchildren See Everyone as Kin -- 7. Stories of Six Families Recognizing Moments of Kinship -- 8. Stories of Double Pioneers: Lesbian and Gay Families Recognize Kinship -- 9. Becoming Partners Again? -- 10. Wisdom for Separated Parents -- Notes -- Bibliography -- Index. About the Author: Judy Osborne, MA, a marriage and family therapist for more than thirty years, is founder and director of Stepfamily Associates (www.stepfamilyboston.com), Brookline, MA. |