Adopted Women and Biological Fathers offers a critical and deconstructive challenge to the dominant notions of adoptive identity. The author explores adoptive women’s experiences of meeting their biological fathers and reflects on personal narratives to give an authoritative overview of both the field of adoption and the specific history of adoption reunion. This book takes as its focus the narratives of 14 adopted women, as well as the partly fictionalised story of the author and examines their experiences of birth father reunion in an attempt to dissect the ways in which we understand adoptive female subjectivity through a psychosocial lens. Opening a space for thinking about the role of the discursively neglected biological father, this book exposes the enigmatic dimensions of this figure and how telling the relational story of 'reconciliation' might be used to complicate wider categories of subjective completeness, belonging, and truth. This book attempts to subvert the culturally normative unifying system of the mother-child bond, and prompts the reader to think about what the biological father might represent and how his role in relation to adoptive female subjects may be understood. This book will be essential reading for those in critical psychology, gender studies, narrative work, sociology and psychosocial studies, as well as appealing to anyone interested in adoption issues and female subjectivity.

In this practical book, Michelle McColm takes the adoptee and birth parent carefully through the process of adoption reunion; drawing on extensive interviews and the experience of her own reunion.

Adopted Women and Biological Fathers offers a critical and deconstructive challenge to the dominant notions of adoptive identity. The author explores adoptive women’s experiences of meeting their biological fathers and reflects on personal narratives to give an authoritative overview of both the field of adoption and the specific history of adoption reunion. This book takes as its focus the narratives of 14 adopted women, as well as the partly fictionalised story of the author and examines their experiences of birth father reunion in an attempt to dissect the ways in which we understand adoptive female subjectivity through a psychosocial lens. Opening a space for thinking about the role of the discursively neglected biological father, this book exposes the enigmatic dimensions of this figure and how telling the relational story of 'reconciliation' might be used to complicate wider categories of subjective completeness, belonging, and truth. This book attempts to subvert the culturally normative unifying system of the mother-child bond, and prompts the reader to think about what the biological father might represent and how his role in relation to adoptive female subjects may be understood. This book will be essential reading for those in critical psychology, gender studies, narrative work, sociology and psychosocial studies, as well as appealing to anyone interested in adoption issues and female subjectivity.

Do you and your partner argue about the same things over and over again? Are you often confused about why your partner is so angry with you? Are things getting worse and worse even though you’ve tried everything you can think of to make them better? In this breakthrough guide to repairing romantic relationships, therapist and marriage researcher Dr. Stephen Betchen presents a powerful new explanation of what leads to this kind of escalating conflict in couples and how you can repair your relationship and find a whole new level of happiness. Based on his extensive experience as a couples’ therapist, Dr. Betchen has discovered that the prevailing idea that opposites attract is wrong. Instead, one of the strongest forces that attracts people to one another is that they share a hidden, inner conflict in their lives—an unconscious struggle within themselves that each of them developed growing up—which he calls a "master conflict." The fact that a couple shares a master conflict acts as an almost magnetic force of attraction, but, over time, master conflicts often begin to push a pair apart—many of the very things you most appreciated about each other start to grate on you, producing increasing hostility. The good news is that by identifying the master conflict that you share, you and your partner can take the steps to break the cycle of fighting and come to a new place of understanding and happiness in your relationship. Often, just the realization that you have this hidden conflict acts as a powerful cure, allowing you to appreciate each other once again and to be empathetic about the things that have been irritating you both. From his years of work with couples, Betchen has identified the nineteen most common master conflicts—such as getting your needs met vs. caretaking; giving vs. withholding; commitment vs. freedom; power vs. passivity—and for each he provides vivid stories of couples who have struggled with them, as well as simple tests that help you to: • Identify the core master conflict that is causing your relationship problems • Understand the origins of your conflict and how it drew you to your partner • Diagnose how the conflict is now pushing you apart • Come to new terms with the conflict to save your relationship As Dr. Betchen writes, knowledge of a master conflict is power, and Magnetic Partners is an empowering guide that will help you not only to identify and control your master conflict, but also to bring your relationship to a new level based on deeper understanding, ultimately leading to greater fulfillment and long-term resilience. Partners

Originally published in 1993, this classic piece of literature on adoption has revolutionised the way people think about adopted children. Nancy Verrier examines the life-long consequences of the 'primal wound' - the wound that is caused when a child is separated from its mother - for adopted people. Her argument is supported by thorough research in pre- and perinatal psychology, attachment, bonding and the effects of loss.

"Birthdays may be difficult for me." "I want you to take the initiative in opening conversations about my birth family." "When I act out my fears in obnoxious ways, please hang in there with me." "I am afraid you will abandon me." The voices of adopted children are poignant, questioning. And they tell a familiar story of loss, fear, and hope. This extraordinary book, written by a woman who was adopted herself, gives voice to children's unspoken concerns, and shows adoptive parents how to free their kids from feelings of fear, abandonment, and shame. With warmth and candor, Sherrie Eldridge reveals the twenty complex emotional issues you must understand to nurture the child you love--that he must grieve his loss now if he is to receive love fully in the future--that she needs honest information about her birth family no matter how painful the details may be--and that although he may choose to search for his birth family, he will always rely on you to be his parents. Filled with powerful insights from children, parents, and experts in the field, plus practical strategies and case histories that will ring true for every adoptive family, Twenty Things Adopted Kids Wish Their Adoptive Parents Knew is an invaluable guide to the complex emotions that take up residence within the heart of the adopted child--and within the adoptive home.

Steve Inskeep tells the riveting story of John and Jessie Frémont, the husband and wife team who in the 1800s were instrumental in the westward expansion of the United States, and thus became America's first great political couple John C. Frémont, one of the United States’s leading explorers of the nineteenth century, was relatively unknown in 1842, when he commanded the first of his expeditions to the uncharted West. But in only a few years, he was one of the most acclaimed people of the age – known as a wilderness explorer, bestselling writer, gallant army officer, and latter-day conquistador, who in 1846 began the United States’s takeover of California from Mexico. He was not even 40 years old when Americans began naming mountains and towns after him. He had perfect timing, exploring the West just as it captured the nation’s attention. But the most important factor in his fame may have been the person who made it all possible: his wife, Jessie Benton Frémont. Jessie, the daughter of a United States senator who was deeply involved in the West, provided her husband with entrée to the highest levels of government and media, and his career reached new heights only a few months after their elopement. During a time when women were allowed to make few choices for themselves, Jessie – who herself aspired to roles in exploration and politics – threw her skill and passion into promoting her husband. She worked to carefully edit and publicize his accounts of his travels, attracted talented young men to his circle, and lashed out at his enemies. She became her husband’s political adviser, as well as a power player in her own right. In 1856, the famous couple strategized as John became the first-ever presidential nominee of the newly established Republican Party. With rare detail and in consummate style, Steve Inskeep tells the story of a couple whose joint ambitions and talents intertwined with those of the nascent United States itself. Taking advantage of expanding news media, aided by an increasingly literate public, the two linked their names to the three great national movements of the time—westward settlement, women’s rights, and opposition to slavery. Together, John and Jessie Frémont took parts in events that defined the country and gave rise to a new, more global America. Theirs is a surprisingly modern tale of ambition and fame; they lived in a time of social and technological disruption and divisive politics that foreshadowed our own. In Imperfect Union, as Inskeep navigates these deeply transformative years through Jessie and John’s own union, he reveals how the Frémonts’ adventures amount to nothing less than a tour of the early American soul.