A must-read for anyone who has felt they are at a disadvantage simply because they are single or unmarried. Married Americans enjoy over 1,000 benefits and entitlements that are withheld from our non-marital counterparts. Health insurance, immigration rights, tax privileges (such as the estate tax), and hiring policies favor the married. Marriage is subsidized and incentivized by the federal government. Social customs such as blockbuster weddings, subsidized honeymoons, and gifts reserved for wedded couples reify matrimony as a centering norm and further the idea that "marriage is best," a commonplace in popular psychology, where marriage-averse people are often tarred as "commitment-phobes." Despite this blatant and widespread prejudice, non-marital Americans—non-marital people—have not galvanized as a group to demand equality and inclusion. Why? Moving Past Marriage argues that it is because of our troubled relationship to history. As women's history once was, non-marital history has been buried, so that the disenfranchisement that non-marital people share in wedlock-dominated societies, as well as our remarkable, far-ranging achievements, have been hard to spot. In recovering our own history, non-marital people can become self-aware as a group and begin to challenge marriage-centric thinking and practice.

Compares the transitional cycles of marriage to those of nature, describes the attitudes and emotions of each season, and offers seven strategies that enable couples to enhance and improve their marital relationship.

This book has been replaced by Getting Past the Affair, Second Edition, ISBN 978-1-4625-4748-7.

'So compellingly personal you feel you're looking over her shoulder as she sits down to write' New York Times 'Electrically entertaining ... Funny, generous, spirited and kind' The Times This Is the Story of a Happy Marriage is an irresistible blend of literature and memoir revealing the big experiences and little moments that shaped Ann Patchett as a daughter, wife, friend and writer. Here, Ann Patchett shares entertaining and moving stories about her tumultuous childhood, her painful early divorce, the excitement of selling her first book, driving a Winnebago from Montana to Yellowstone Park, her joyous discovery of opera, scaling a six-foot wall in order to join the Los Angeles Police Department, the gradual loss of her beloved grandmother, starting her own bookshop in Nashville, her love for her very special dog and, of course, her eventual happy marriage. This Is the Story of a Happy Marriage is a memoir both wide ranging and deeply personal, overflowing with close observation and emotional wisdom, told with wit, honesty and irresistible warmth.

Life is not a flow chart. We weren't meant to master it on our own. The discussion guides in the Transformation of a Man's Heart series put us in conversation with God and with one another to see how God shapes and transforms us in the ordinary experiences of our lives.This guide by Stephen W. Smith and Gary Chapman demystifies marriage for men.

How safe is your marriage? The answer may surprise you. The biggest threat to any marriage isn’t infidelity or miscommunication. The greatest enemy is ordinary. Ordinary marriages lose hope. Ordinary marriages lack vision. Ordinary marriages give in to compromise. Ordinary is the belief that this is as good as it will ever get. And when we begin to settle for ordinary, it’s easy to move from “I do” to “I’m done.” Justin and Trisha Davis know just how dangerous ordinary can be. In this beautifully written book, Justin and Trisha take us inside the slow fade that occurred in their own marriage—each telling the story from their own perspective. Together, they reveal the mistakes they made, the work they avoided, the thoughts and feelings that led to an affair and near divorce, and finally, the heart-change that had to occur in both of them before they could experience the hope, healing, and restoration of a truly extraordinary marriage.

A bestseller for over 20 years, I Don’t Want to Talk About It is a groundbreaking and hopeful guide to understanding and destigmatizing male depression, essential not only for men who may be suffering but for the people who love them. Twenty years of experience treating men and their families has convinced psychotherapist Terrence Real that depression is a silent epidemic in men—that men hide their condition from family, friends, and themselves to avoid the stigma of depression’s “un-manliness.” Problems that we think of as typically male—difficulty with intimacy, workaholism, alcoholism, abusive behavior, and rage—are really attempts to escape depression. And these escape attempts only hurt the people men love and pass their condition on to their children. This groundbreaking book is the “pathway out of darkness” that these men and their families seek. Real reveals how men can unearth their pain, heal themselves, restore relationships, and break the legacy of abuse. He mixes penetrating analysis with compelling tales of his patients and even his own experiences with depression as the son of a violent, depressed father and the father of two young sons.

A step-by-step approach to making your marriage loving again.

Buddhism has been applied to everything from parenting to golf, but until now no one has offered Buddhist principles as a healing path through divorce. In Storms Can't Hurt the Sky, Gabriel Cohen bravely delves into his personal experience-along with insights from Buddhist masters, parables, humor, social science studies, and interviews with other divorces-to provide a practical and very helpful guide to surviving the pain of any break-up. Focusing on the emotions most common in the dissolution of a relationship-anger, resentment, loss, and grief -- Storms Can't Hurt the Sky shows how thinking about these feelings in surprisingly different ways can lead to a radically better experience. This compulsively readable book offers sound advice and much-needed empathy for anyone dealing with a break-up.

What happens when a wife says, "I don't love you anymore"? What happens when a husband says he is going to move out? What does the partner do? How does he or she survive the devastation? Clinical psychologist Dr. David Hawkins offers heartbroken readers his straightforward yet sensitive wisdom for rebuilding their lives. He addresses the realities that reconciliation is not easy and may require separation first--or may not come at all. He helps readers work through their grief and the tough decisions ahead in order to heal their lives, whether or not their marriage is ultimately reconciled. Dr. Hawkins's trustworthy guidance offers compassion and hope to both partners in a failing relationship. Pastors and counselors will recommend this book to those facing this urgent yet rarely addressed struggle.