What Children Learn from Their Parents' Marriage: It May Be Your Marriage, but It's Your Child's Blueprint for Intimacy [Paperback]

Judith P. Siegel (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 8, 2001

How are your children learning about intimacy? What are they seeing when they watch you interacting with your spouse?  In a ground breaking approach to family dynamics, What Children Learn from Their Parents' Marriage shows how a child's perception of the marriage his or her parents have created is the key to his or her psychological development and ultimate well-being.

Talking to both intact families and divorcing couples with children, marriage and family therapist Judith P. Sigel identifies seven essential elements of marriage that determine the emotional health of a child.

By combining her own work with the most current research, Dr. Siegal presents an eye-opening and highly readable book -- one that offers illuminating insight for parents everywhere who wish to build the secure foundation their children need for an emotionally healthy future.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"As we all come to realize, sooner or later, our childrens' lives speak our truth. In What Children Learn from Their Parents' Marriage, Dr. Judith Siegel throws a wonderfully clarifying light upon the specific ways in which the ordinary interchanges of the couple create their youngsters' basic blueprint for later loving and relating." -- Maggie Scarf, author of Intimate Worlds

"Dr. Judith Siegel has written a compact, elegantly simple, thoroughly useful book that all parents'and many others'will find helpful and illuminating. One of the most valuable roles a clinician can fill is that of informed messenger, taking the hard-won lessons learned from people in distress and offering them up to others, so that they might avoid the same distress. Dr. Siegel is an honest, careful and intelligent messenger." -- Edward Hallowell, M.D., co-author of Driven to Distraction

"Fear not: The numerous clinical cases illustrated here demonstrate how you can improve your children's perspective of mariltal relationships. It's never too late. All parents can benefit from this solid read." -- Nashville Parent

"Looking at marriage from the child's point of view is a valuable and essential perspective. Dr. Siegel's book is interesting and easy to read, and will be of great value to many parents." -- Donald R. Bardill, Ph.D., Editor, The Journal of Family Social Work

"This startling and significant book is truly a wake-up call for all parents today. Our children are watching!" -- -- Stephen R. Covey, author of The Seven Habits of Highly Effective Families

"This startling and significant book is truly a wake-up call for all parents today. Our children are watching!" -- Stephen R. Covey, author of The Seven Habits of Highly Effective Families --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

About the Author

Judith P. Siegel, Ph.D., C.S.W., is an associate professor at the New York University Ehrenkranz School of Social Work and a marriage and family therapist in private practice. A recognized expert in her field, she is the author of two academic books and numerous articles on marital dynamics and marriage therapy.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 256 pages
• Publisher: Harper Perennial (May 8, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0060929308
• ISBN-13: 978-0060929305
• Product Dimensions: 8 x 5.3 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 6.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #632,821 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

27 of 29 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Children learn what they live, March 23, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: What Children Learn from Their Parents' Marriage (Hardcover)

This book is excellent and really focuses on average families. What kids grown up living in their households is really a reflection on what their future goals will be as molded by their parents. It is a wonderful book to read if you are looking for a practical, easy to understand book on what you can do to make your marriage more wholesome and the reflection of that will set the pace for your children in the future and what choices they make for themselves. I highly recommend it.

17 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Good marriages make healthy children, August 24, 2001

By 

"ploughman7" (Bronx, NY, USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: What Children Learn from Their Parents' Marriage: It May Be Your Marriage, but It's Your Child's Blueprint for Intimacy (Paperback)

It may not come as a shock to most parents that the lessons our children learn in childhood are carried with them throughout their lives, but what this book makes clear is how our own marriages form a blueprint from which all our children's future relationships will be built. Siegel creates a compelling narrative using lots of case histories and anecdotes, which makes this an easy read. She helps us identify not only what we are doing wrong in our marriage, but what we're doing right, which makes our foibles a lot easier to acknowledge. She also helps us to explore how deeply our own parents' marriage affected us. A very important book with a very important goal--"the opportunity to create a positive legacy of love for our children."

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Four copies and counting ..., February 17, 2011

By 

Philip Long - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: What Children Learn from Their Parents' Marriage: It May Be Your Marriage, but It's Your Child's Blueprint for Intimacy (Paperback)

I think that basically every adult should read this book. While the title might suggest a focus on children, the subject matter is really the characteristics of a healthy partnership that, if present and observed by children will give them a positive example that will help them when it is time for them to form their own adult relationships. Or undermine them if they learned unhelpful lessons. Regardless of if a partnership has or will have children, the book is very clear about the characteristics of a healthy and fulfilling marriage. Of course, it also address It is also very concrete about what "for the children" really means in a marriage. Beyond the subject matter, the book is clearly written, is supported by and refers to current research, and uses understandable examples/anecdotes to reinforce the points in the book.

I expect most people will find one section or another uncomfortable because it does make clear ways that we can develop patterns from our own childhood that lead us to do unhelpful things but that seem very rational/reasonable to us.

A month after having bought and read the book, I've purchased three other copies for other friends and family and have recommended it to many other friends.