Emotional Blackmail: When the People in Your Life Use Fear, Obligation, and Guilt to Manipulate You [Paperback]

Susan Forward (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 4, 1998

"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.

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal

Forward, who gave us the best-selling The Men Who Hate Women, and the Women Who Love Them, offers a course on self-defense for anyone manipulated by guilt.
Copyright 1997 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Review

"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 --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 252 pages
• Publisher: William Morrow Paperbacks (March 4, 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0060928972
• ISBN-13: 978-0060928971
• Product Dimensions: 8 x 5.3 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (101 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,484 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #76 in Books > Health, Fitness & Dieting > Relationships > Interpersonal Relations

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

634 of 642 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars This book brings a lot of clarity !!!, January 14, 2003

By 

Secunda (Kirkland, WA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Emotional Blackmail: When the People in Your Life Use Fear, Obligation, and Guilt to Manipulate You (Paperback)

I am an emotional blackmailer, I just had no idea until I read this book. It was suggested to me by my soon to be ex- husband who couldn't take it anymore. I thought I was being strong and standing my ground and this book helped me to see that I was emotionally bullying other people. I beleived I was always right and no human being can be. It also helped me to see that it doesn't matter if you are wrong or right, making another person feel as if they must agree with you or they are "bad" is not OK. I was using the behaviors descibed in the book to protect myself from being hurt and have hurt sooooo many others in the process. If you're a person who always feels like a victim or have no idea why so many people don't like you when you think you're such a wonderful person READ IT!!!

530 of 544 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Outstanding book--truly helpful!, December 28, 1999

By 

Kate McMurry "Young Adult Author" (United States) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (TOP 500 REVIEWER)   

This review is from: Emotional Blackmail: When the People in Your Life Use Fear, Obligation, and Guilt to Manipulate You (Paperback)

This book does a very clear job of defining emotional blackmail so you can begin to easily spot emotional blackmailers in your life. It then concludes with telling you specifically how to deal with emotional blackmail, that is, how to keep your energy, resources, and sometimes your very soul, from being stolen by them.

Something that was particularly important for me personally in the book was the part at the end where she talks about not emotionally blackmailing *yourself*! What an insight! I realized that even when rigid, controlling people are not around to inspire guilt, fear and shame in me to get me to do things that are hurtful to me for their selfish benefit, I have a "voice" in my head that does the job for them, telling me that whatever I do that doesn't fit the world view of past and present blackmailers is "wrong," "selfish," or even "evil." So I beat myself up on behalf of my blackmailers even when they are not around to do it.

I also was impressed by the insight that not only does it "take two to tango," that no one can blackmail me if I don't let them, but that it is also possible for me to actually "train" people to blackmail me. This is particularly, true, I think, for those of us raised in rigid, controlling homes with emotionally blackmailing parents. Thereafter, we are, so to speak, fertile ground for any future emotional blackmailers.

I had rather been realizing these sorts of things the past few years now that I'm in my 40s (the middle years when we suddenly reevaluate our whole life), and gradually eliminating emotional blackmailers from my life, without exactly using that term. (The term I used was ridding myself of people whose presence felt like "being nibbled to death by ducks.") This book has validated my innate human "right" to not be eaten alive by the selfish demands of others.

Kudos to Ms. Forward!

174 of 178 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Pearls of Wisdom for Everyone, February 19, 2001

By A Customer

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Emotional Blackmail: When the People in Your Life Use Fear, Obligation, and Guilt to Manipulate You (Paperback)

I have done a pretty thorough reading of books dealing with control, cults, emotional abuse, etc. I feel like I could write a thesis on this stuff by now. This was the best all around. I am a third party observing a loved one in a controlling relationship. There isn't a book out there that really addresses my situation, but I have gleaned wisdom from many. What I love about this book is that it gives very concrete strategies for dealing with controlling people. The strategies are very well laid out, lots of examples of phrases that neutralize the offender. As a therapist, she also addresses the discomfort many of us would likely encounter when trying to put these strategies into practice. In addition to the concrete information on strategies, she describes why it might be hard to recognize that you are in an unhealthy controlling situation and how to know for sure. She helps clarify the personal damage victims of control sustain. I have become much more aware of people in my life that may be using unhealthy methods of control and have used the advice to stop, think and strategize to help me. It even helped me become a little wiser to ploys of friends of my kids. This book shows us how to resolve unhealthy control without necessarily having to end the relationship. With these techniques everyone might just come out a winner.