Smart Strategies for Dealing with People Who Are Really Hard to Love

Most of us have someone in our life that we care about, but who is really hard to love: a spouse or sibling with an addiction or anger problem, a parent whose actions frighten or frustrate you, an adult child whom you feel makes the wrong choices over and over, or a friend or other relative who can't get it together. Just because someone you love has a problem, though, doesn't mean you stop loving him or her. You don't want to let go of this person, but you do want to stop getting hurt.

It's So Hard to Love You—written by a brother-and-sister team—offers tools that will help you deal with the anguish of loving a difficult person while maintaining a sane relationship with him or her. Using the strategies in this book, you'll start to clearly recognize the negative effects your loved one's behavior is having on your life. You'll learn to accept that this person's actions may not ever change-but that your actions can. You'll find ways to shift your focus from changing the difficult person to changing your reactions to him or her. As you learn to deal with your difficult loved one on your own terms, you'll also learn techniques for managing the possible negative reactions that can arise from your changing relationship.