Emotional Blackmail: When the People in Your Life Use Fear, Obligation, and Guilt to Manipulate You ― A Therapist's Practical Self-Help Guide - Softcover

Forward, Susan; Donna Frazier

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0060928972 ISBN 13: 9780060928971

Publisher: Harper Paperbacks, 1998

Synopsis

A practical guide to better communication that will break the blackmail cycle for good, by one of the nation's leading therapists, Susan Forward.

“Breathe a sigh of relief! Susan Forward helps you identify and correct an intensely destructive and confusing pattern of relating with those you love. I highly recommend this important book!"—Susan Jeffers, Ph.D., author of Feel the Fear and Do It Anyway

"If you really loved me..."

"After all I've done for you..."

"How can you be so selfish..."

Do any of the above sound familiar? They're all examples of emotional blackmail, a powerful form of manipulation in which people close to us threaten to punish us for not doing what they want. Emotional blackmailers know how much we value our relationships with them. They know our vulnerabilities and our deepest secrets. They are our mothers, our partners, our bosses and coworkers, our friends and our lovers. And no matter how much they care about us, they use this intimate knowledge to give themselves the payoff they want: our compliance.

Susan Forward knows what pushes our hot buttons. Just as John Gray illuminates the communications gap between the sexes in Men Are from Mars, Women Are from Venus, and Harriet Lerner describes an intricate dynamic in The Dance of Anger, so Susan Forward presents the anatomy of a relationship damaged by manipulation, and gives readers an arsenal of tools to fight back.

About this title

About the Author

Susan Forward, PhD, was an internationally renowned therapist, lecturer, and author. Her books include the number one New York Times bestsellers Men Who Hate Women and the Women Who Love Them and Toxic Parents, as well as Betrayal of Innocence, Obsessive Love, Emotional Blackmail, When Your Lover Is a Liar, and Toxic In-Laws. In addition to her private practice, she served widely as a therapist, instructor, and consultant in numerous Southern California psychiatric and medical facilities. She appeared on hundreds of television and radio shows, and hosted her own nationally syndicated program on ABC talk radio for six years. Though Susan passed in 2020, she has left a lasting legacy.

From the Back Cover

"If you really loved me..."

"After all I've done for you..."

"How can you be so selfish..."

Do any of the above sound familiar? They're all examples of emotional blackmail, a powerful form of manipulation in which people close to us threaten to punish us for not doing what they want. Emotional blackmailers know how much we value our relationships with them. They know our vulnerabilities and our deepest secrets. They are our mothers, our partners, our bosses and coworkers, our friends and our lovers. And no matter how much they care about us, they use this intimate knowledge to give themselves the payoff they want: our compliance.

Susan Forward knows what pushes our hot buttons. Just as John Gray illuminates the communications gap between the sexes in Men Are from Mars, Women Are from Venus, and Harriet Lerner describes an intricate dynamic in The Dance of Anger, so Susan Forward presents the anatomy of a relationship damaged by manipulation, and gives readers an arsenal of tools to fight back. In her clear, no-nonsense style, Forward provides powerful, practical strategies for blackmail targets, including checklists, practice scenarios and concrete communications techniques that will strengthen relationships and break the blackmail cycle for good.

Edition details

• Publisher: Harper Paperbacks
• Publication date: 1998
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0060928972
• ISBN 13: 9780060928971
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 272