Yours, Mine, and Ours: How Families Change When Remarried Parents Have a Child Together - Hardcover

Published comments and reviews
"Bernstein... provides a needed book on mixed-family households. In a well-organized and admirably clear text, she combines material on her own home life with interviews with parents, step and half-siblings... Sustaining harmony in households made up of offspring of previous and current marriages can be a trial, notes Bernstein, whose empathetic counsel should prove helpful. Her graceful revelations of 'fragile and interchangeable families' will have wide appeal." - Publishers Weekly "Anne Bernstein's book provides a delightful journey through the process of family formation under challenging circumstances. She writes with a friendly, empathetic tone, yet also is a careful and thoughtful researcher. I think this is a book that will be of great help to both parents and children."
- Samuel Osherson, Ph.D. Research psychologist, Harvard University Health Services. Author of Finding Our Fathers
"Yours, Mine, and Ours " is the libretto of the stepfamily opera. Not only is each character in the stepfamily drama introduced and described but the complex interactions among them over time are reported with insight and understanding... (This is) the first book on stepfamilies to examine each stepfamily role in detail and to map how that role contributes to a family member's particular experience in the stepfamily. Stepfamily members will find these descriptions very familiar and validating. Professionals will find a wealth of information about normative development of stepfamily roles and behaviors."
- Jamie Kelem Keshet, Ed.D. Author of Love and Power in the Stepfamily
"Open any page and there are valuable insights on it for anyone considering an addition to their stepfamily. Beautifully written, this book is an important contribution and fills a long-neglected gap in information for remarried couples."
- Drs. Emily and John Visher Founders, Stepfamily Association of America Authors of Old Loyalties, New Ties
"Should be required reading for therapists, social scientists and parents alike. Based on interviews with fifty-five families, Anne Bernstein's book enlightens us as no one has before about the joys and sorrows, the gains and losses for each adult and child when a baby is born into a stepfamily. Engaging and exciting to read, Yours, Mine, and Ours gives us a profound insight into the possibilities of healthy growth and development outside the traditional nuclear family"
-Diane Ehrensaft, Ph.D. Author of Spoiling Childhood