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Should I Stay Or Go? : How Controlled Separation (CS) Can Save Your Marriage
 
 
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Should I Stay Or Go? : How Controlled Separation (CS) Can Save Your Marriage [Paperback]

Lee Raffel (Author)
4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (38 customer reviews)

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Book Description

September 1, 1999

Until now, couples facing the dilemma of deciding whether or not to stay in an unhappy marriage had three options: individual or couples therapy, separation, or divorce. Should I Stay or Go? provides these couples with a fourth option--the Controlled Separation (CS). Should I Stay or Go? explains CS and shows how it can be used as a tool to help couples make the best decision for both partners.


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Should I Stay Or Go? : How Controlled Separation (CS) Can Save Your Marriage + Too Good to Leave, Too Bad to Stay: A Step-by-Step Guide to Help You Decide Whether to Stay In or Get Out of Your Relationship + Contemplating Divorce: A Step-by-Step Guide to Deciding Whether to Stay or Go
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Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Lee Raffel, M.S.W., is founder and clinical director of Awareness Counseling Services, Inc. She has counseled couples for more than 25 years using the CS method.


Product Details

  • Paperback: 304 pages
  • Publisher: McGraw-Hill; 1 edition (September 1, 1999)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 0809225131
  • ISBN-13: 978-0809225132
  • Product Dimensions: 9 x 6 x 0.8 inches
  • Shipping Weight: 1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
  • Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (38 customer reviews)
  • Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #61,478 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Lee Raffel is a practicing psychotherapist for over 35 years. She is a published poet and author of I Hate Conflict (McGraw-Hill, 2008) and Should I Stay or Go? How Controlled Separation (CS) Can Save Your Marriage (McGraw-Hill, 1999). Lee is a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist and Licensed Clinical Social Worker, Clinical Member of the American Association for Marriage and Family Therapy, Board Certified Diplomate in Psychotherapy and Behavioral Medicine, and relationship coach, mediator and educator.

A recognized expert on marriage and interpersonal relationships, Lee has appeared on The Today Show, Good Morning New York, hosted a radio show, and appeared on ABC, NBC, CBS nationwide addressing Controlled Separation. She also has been featured in Psychotherapy Networker, O - The Oprah Magazine, The Wall Street Journal, Ladies' Home Journal, The Chicago Tribune, The Los Angeles Times, Chicago Sun-Times, and radio and newsprint nationwide. Lee has also presented a radio show titled Should I Stay or Go? Straight Talk About Troubled Relationships.

Lee, proprietor of Awareness Counseling Services, Inc., maintains a private practice and as founder of Fresh Perspectives Training Institute(R), presents numerous programs on the complexity and possibilities inherent in conflicted relationships. She also is available to offer workshops on Controlled Separation, and troubled family relationships. Her provocative insights and timely strategies have been utilized nationally and internationally for people at risk of destroying their meaningful connections.

Lee says that much of what she has learned about healthy relationships has come from sharing 24 years with her husband, Mark, who initiated much laughter and made every day a fruitful experience even when there was sorrow. Mark died suddenly on December 12, 2000. Since then, Lee continues to reinvent herself over and over again.Lee Raffel is a practicing psychotherapist for over 35 years. She is a published poet and author of I Hate Conflict (McGraw-Hill, 2008) and Should I Stay or Go? How Controlled Separation (CS) Can Save Your Marriage (McGraw-Hill, 1999). Lee is a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist and Licensed Clinical Social Worker, Clinical Member of the American Association for Marriage and Family Therapy, Board Certified Diplomate in Psychotherapy and Behavioral Medicine, and relationship coach, mediator and educator.

A recognized expert on marriage and interpersonal relationships, Lee has appeared on The Today Show, Good Morning New York, hosted a radio show, and appeared on ABC, NBC, CBS nationwide addressing Controlled Separation. She also has been featured in Psychotherapy Networker, O - The Oprah Magazine, The Wall Street Journal, Ladies' Home Journal, The Chicago Tribune, The Los Angeles Times, Chicago Sun-Times, and radio and newsprint nationwide. Lee has also presented a radio show titled Should I Stay or Go? Straight Talk About Troubled Relationships.

Lee, proprietor of Awareness Counseling Services, Inc., maintains a private practice and as founder of Fresh Perspectives Training Institute(R), presents numerous programs on the complexity and possibilities inherent in conflicted relationships. She also is available to offer workshops on Controlled Separation, and troubled family relationships. Her provocative insights and timely strategies have been utilized nationally and internationally for people at risk of destroying their meaningful connections.

Lee says that much of what she has learned about healthy relationships has come from sharing 24 years with her husband, Mark, who initiated much laughter and made every day a fruitful experience even when there was sorrow. Mark died suddenly on December 12, 2000. Since then, Lee continues to reinvent herself over and over again.

 

Customer Reviews

38 Reviews
5 star:
 (26)
4 star:
 (3)
3 star:
 (3)
2 star:
 (3)
1 star:
 (3)
 
 
 
 
 
Average Customer Review
4.2 out of 5 stars (38 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

103 of 105 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Tried traditional marriage therapy? NOW read this., January 27, 2004
This review is from: Should I Stay Or Go? : How Controlled Separation (CS) Can Save Your Marriage (Paperback)
You know that you are in an unhealthy relationship. And, you have repeatedly PROVEN you cannot work it out under the same roof.

But you don't want a divorce. And you don't want things to stay the same.... Whoah: There is another option to those 2 extremes! CONTROLLED separation.

{Note: 2 Marriage therapists got rich off us & FAILED us because they lacked this vision. To them: PLEASE READ THIS BOOK. Can't hurt to add to your repetoire!}

This book helped me break that paralyzing fear of staying 10 more years VS. cutting all ties & being suddenly alone.

It gives you structure. You work out your own contract, with or without therapists. Once apart, you can conduct a productive exploration of your self & your relationship. And talk to each other as you decide, on a VERY limited schedule, to see how it is going. No fault finding, no blaming. (We each have therapists and support groups on the wagon for this venting.)

Read chapter "My Marriage is Making Me Sick" first. Then, read the "Differences between trial and controlled sep.". This was better for my husband's attention span. Then, he was hooked.

Then get a 6 month lease somewhere. If you have a verbally/emotionally distant, abusive or very insensitive mate,
this may mean PEACE for you the 1st time in years.

THE GOAL IS: Happy, healthy reunification. But -- If nothing else, this approach lets you KNOW you tried EVERYTHING you could before divorcing. And you learn how to avoid similarly BAD partner match-ups for the future.

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116 of 126 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars Great 4 back-up plan, March 7, 2001
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This review is from: Should I Stay Or Go? : How Controlled Separation (CS) Can Save Your Marriage (Paperback)
I bought this book as if looking for permission to do what I thought I wanted to do. I ate it up, because it gives such clear directions--with thorough explanations of every term or idea with case studies & every-day real-life examples. It is so fair to both parties in a relationship that my husband--who had fought this trongly--was willing to accept it, discuss it (!!!), and even plan a date that was more financially feasible for this to work!

Meanwhile I have a therapist who against all ethical rules of her profession, keeps interjecting her opinion & retracting it (one week she TELLS me to leave the guy, the next week she's ok that I didn't, adding to my confusion!), making my stuckness even worse. I'm stuck still, after reading this book, because my husband took me seriously when he saw this book on the coffee table every night, obviously well read, ear marked, highlighted, etc. LOL

NOW he's listening, NOW he's paying attention & changing the harmful behaviors I could not live with. This book still sits there on the coffee table, the contract still sits on my computer hard drive where I saved "our" version & it is all ready to use at a moment's notice. This makes it easier to take one last look at the possibility of staying together.

The sample contract is in the front of the book--the rest of the book explains how the contract works. Each couple can customize the contract specifically for their own issues--but the reason the rating is a 4 instead of a flat out 5 is that it does NOT include sample contracts for different situations, nor examples of how to fill out the contract specifically. Still, it gives enough information that couples could choose to do this easily without a therapist's guidance if desired, and in case that worked better for him & I to do this on our own (without my therapist making it worse with her own issues projected into ours).

We're both discovering our dysfunctional family roots & the damage caused in our childhood from abuse, neglect, being forced to create false selves because our real one's weren't acceptable to our mentally sick parents. This journey is bringing us together in a healing way to change our self-defeating behaviors. I chose him because of a sick part of myself just as he chose me for his own sick reasons. Now we're rooting out those issues & have hope. It ALL started with THIS book, as we both knew if we split there would be no coming back.

Good luck on your journey & if you too are stuck & can't decide because one day your SO is being great but most days suck, this book gives you the clear directions you need to get UN-stuck, however that may work out for YOU. And if a separation IS in the picture, this is the fairest version going to keep you (or create) advocates instead of adversaries.

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43 of 44 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars An incredible read., October 27, 2000
By A Customer
This review is from: Should I Stay Or Go? : How Controlled Separation (CS) Can Save Your Marriage (Paperback)
I loved this book. I was so glad to find a book that deals with this difficult situation with such compassion. It also helps you transition any children into the separated state. Many of the books I have read on separating consider the parties involved mortal enemies without hope for an amicable parting. Ms. Raffel shows how to make a separation work for you and your relationship instead of against you. Whether you're the initiator or the one being left this book is helpful on all levels in that it helps you to see all sides of the situation. I highly reccomend this book to anyone in this unfortunate situation. It truly does give you hope and insight during a period that can feel so hopeless.
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Inside This Book (learn more)
First Sentence:
IT'S NOT A question of the zip being gone from your marriage. Read the first page
Key Phrases - Statistically Improbable Phrases (SIPs): (learn more)
situational separation, invested intimacy, couple advocacy, transitional separation, marital impasse, structured separation, bedroom antics, verbally abusive relationship, pending separation, good divorce, active waiting, ugly divorce, trial separation, aggressive communication, dating others, marital separation
Key Phrases - Capitalized Phrases (CAPs): (learn more)
Controlled Separation, Downstairs Pals, Love Thee, United States, Alcoholics Anonymous, Broken Children, Costa Rica, Money Counts
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