Mrs Olga Stych, daughter of an Ukrainian immigrant, has finally made it to the top of her social pyramid. But in doing so she has neglected her son and made many enemies. So when her moment of decline arrives, it is greeted with joy by her rivals.

A guide offering parents and their children solutions for reducing problems and anxieties.

Based on research about after-school experiences and dilemmas conducted over a four-year period with employed parents and their children, this book draws on the stories these parents and children told--often using their actual words--to emphasize the wide variety of children's after-school arrangements, children's movement over time in and out of different arrangements, and the importance to children of multiple facets of their after-school arrangements, not simply the presence or absence of an adult caretaker. The book also emphasizes that children are not randomly assigned to after-school arrangements. Rather, parents and children struggle to reach optimal solutions to what are often difficult child care dilemmas. To understand these dilemmas, and the diverse strategies that families adopt, one must attend to the individual situations of children as family members understand them. This book was written to contribute to the development of new family and work policies and practices by illuminating the difficulties families face and their consequences for children. Written for psychologists, sociologists, and other social scientists who study families, maternal employment, child care, or child development, it will also be useful for parents, educators, community leaders, and public policymakers concerned about the well being of children whose parents are employed.

Growing up on a Manchester council estate was tough in the '70s. But when your mother is a cold woman with little time or care for you, beats you regularly, forgets to feed you and your sister, orders you out of the house each day and leaves you home alone at night, it's little wonder you find yourself on the wrong path in life. The Latch Key Kid is the author's moving and powerful memoir which delves deep into his early childhood and adolescent struggles. But unlike other tales of unfortunate circumstance, this frank and at times heart-breaking story also depicts the author's journey of living with a relatively unknown mental health condition called 'anhedonia'. This condition suspends its sufferers at a zero level on the emotional scale - so they never feel pleasure, happiness, joy, excitement, or even sadness in the same way everyone else does. All that's left is an overwhelming sense of injustice: how can everyone else listen to a song and feel the urge to dance? How can people eat a meal and then smile with satisfaction? Why do people see a goal on a football pitch and get all fired up? When all Mike feels is nothing? But, whilst this disorder has made the author's life unimaginably different from yours or mine, it is anhedonia that has prevented him from going under - even when pushed to extremes. Now happily married, with five children and a successful business, Mike tells the hard-hitting story of how his double-edged sword - anhedonia - has shaped his life. This is not based on a True Story it is a True Story.