New Families

Book excerpt: Family has always been an important aspect of a healthy life. New Families is a new handbook on how to create more meaningful bonds within families. With over twenty-two years of experience in private practice, author C. Margaret Hall shows readers how to make family bonds come to life in creative and flexible ways rather than becoming tight and restrictive. New Families presents not only real-life family experiences but also suggests ways families can become stronger through more meaningful interaction with other family members. For readers searching for ideas on how to help clients improve their family ties, they'll find it in this book: compile a family history and locate "lost" relatives learn creative strategies for knowing family history and using that to move forward cope with family crises and learn to grow from them participate in and benefit from special celebrations and life transitions like births, marriages, and even funerals take the drudgery out of family obligations This new book guides readers to use their emotional resources and imagination to improve our family relationships and cooperation--to develop families that work.