By: Jan Yager

"When Friendship Hurts: How to Deal with Friends Who Betray, Abandon, or Wound You" is friendship expert Jan Yager's exploration of 21 types of potentially negative friends as well as how to deal with negative friends, seeking out positive friends, including friendship at work.

This book is published by Simon & Schuster, Inc./Fireside Books.

"When Friendship Hurts" has been translated into 17 foreign languages with three more in preparation.

Detailed Information

Here is a short video about Jan Yager's author tour of Australia and New Zealand on behalf of the 18th foreign edition of When Friendship Hurts, published in Sydney in June 2008.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VVohEC9gl8U

 

 

About the Author

Jan Yager

Jan Yager, Ph.D. (the former J.L./Janet Barkas) is a writer, sociologist, consultant, professional speaker, artist, and publishing entrepreneur whose areas of expertise include relationships and business issues including time management and work relationships. Jan's first book published by Hannacroix Creek Books, Inc., Friendshifts®, based on fifteen years of original friendship research, led to interviews on The Oprah Winfrey Show, The Today Show, The View , National Public Radio, and other programs. Other books include When Friendship Hurts (published by Simon & Schuster, Inc.) as well as two career books by Facts on File, Inc. A prolific writer of fiction as well as nonfiction whose books have been translated into 14 languages, she is co-author of two suspense thrillers, Untimely Death and Just Your Everyday People. For more information, go to: www.drjanyager.com.

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WHEN FRIENDSHIP HURTS

How to Deal With Friends Who Betray, Abandon, or Wound You

Jan Yager, Ph.D.

 

            There are positive, wonderful friendships that are mutually beneficial to both friends and that can last a lifetime. But there are other friendships that are negative, destructive, or unhealthy. In WHEN FRIENDSHIP HURTS: How to Deal with Friends who Betray, Abandon, or Wound You (A Fireside Original/Simon & Schuster Trade Paperbacks; July 2002, 5^th printing, May 2007 $14.00).  Jan Yager, Ph.D. gives readers the tools to detect and cope with friendships that are harmful, provides insight into why certain friendships have ended or should end, and suggests ways for choosing friends who will enrich your life.

            Dr. Yager is a sociologist and an internationally known expert on friendship.  In WHEN FRIENDSHIP HURTS she divides the term friend into three categories.  A Casual Friend is “a giant step above acquaintance.” Although less intimate than close or best friendships, a sense of trust and liking each other that is genuine and shared should be present in a healthy and positive casual friendship.  A Close Friend is someone that you are comfortable talking to about your deepest, intimate, thoughts or secrets.  A Best Friend will have all the criteria of a close friend, with the additional distinction of being the premiere friend. Trust, Empathy, Honesty, Confidentiality, and Commonality are all important friendship qualities.

            However, WHEN FRIENDSHIP HURTS identifies the 21 Types of Potentially Negative Friends, including The Promise Breaker (constantly disappoints you or breaks promises), The Cheat (lies or steals your romantic partner), The Discloser (betrays your confidence), The Interloper (overly involved in your life), and The Rival (wants whatever you have and may try to take it from you). WHEN FRIENDSHIP HURTS also addresses false or “pseudo friends” which fall into two basic categories: fair weather and foul weather friends.  The fair weather friend is the most common type of destructive or harmful friend – one who is there for you when all is well, but who vanishes when times get tough.  Even more insidious is the less well-known but potentially more damaging foul-weather friend.  This friend needs for you to have problems, especially if you met and became friends at a problematic time in your life. A foul weather friend gives you clear and subtle messages that he/she will not be there for you when things are going well, and this friend may also directly or indirectly try and make your relationships or career go bad and try to set you up for personal or professional embarrassment. 

            A straightforward, highly prescriptive book, filled with numerous quizzes and dozens of illustrative examples, WHEN FRIENDSHIP HURTS addresses:

·         Detecting harmful people before they become your friends

·         The impact of early relationships with parents or siblings, and how these relationships affect friendship choices and interactions

·         Why betrayals or abandonment in friendships seem to hurt as much, or even more, than romantic relationships that don’t work out

·         Coping – Can this friendship be saved?  If not, Dr. Yager offers tips for when and how to end it

·         Steps for getting over a friendship if you don’t know why it ended (and what to do if you’re obsessing over it)

·         The traits of a positive friendship and how to go about cultivating positive friends in your life (or if you already have one, making time for that friendship)

 

Dr. Yager emphasizes that readers should take the energy that they may have been pouring into ruminating over a betrayal or coping with negative friends, and use it to create or emphasize preexisting positive friendships. WHEN FRIENDSHIP HURTS demonstrates how, why, and when to let go of bad friends and develop the positive friendships that enrich our lives on every level.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

JAN YAGER, Ph.D. is a sociologist and author of Friendshifts®: The Power of Friendship and How It Shapes Our Lives.  Internationally recognized as an expert on friendship, she has been seen and heard on OPRAH®, The Today Show, Good Morning America, The View, The O’Reilly Factor, National Public Radio, CBS Radio, and numerous other national television and radio programs. For more information log onto: www.whenfriendshiphurts.com

 

WHEN FRIENDSHIP HURTS: How to Deal With Friends Who Betray, Abandon, or Wound You

Jan Yager, Ph.D.   July 2002  5^th printing, May 2007  0-7432-1145-6     $14.00

Foreign sales: French, Dutch (Holland and Belgium), Turkish, Italian, Hebrew, Spanish, Japanese, Chinese (simplified and complex), Indonesian, Korean, Greek, Arabic, Portuguese (Brazil), and German  (Slovenian, Croatian, and Polish in preparation) English reprints: India; Australia & New Zealand including author tour (June 2008)

LIBRARY JOURNAL

(May 2002)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Yager, Jan. When Friendship Hurts:

How to Deal with Friends Who Betray, Abandon, or Wound You.

    Fireside: S & S. Jul 2O02 c.256p. bibli-

    og. index. ISBN 0‑7431-1145‑6. pap.

    $13                                            PSYCH

Author, speaker, and sociologist Yager presents her second book on friendships (after Friendshifts), focusing here on identifying and dealing with its negative aspects, including betrayals, abandonment, and any other type of behavior that causes hurt. Yager identifies 21 types of inappro­priate behavior and helps readers to exam- ine their friendships in light of them. After looking at reasons for the behavior, she of­fers helpful coping skills to determine whether a relationship should be salvaged or ended The chapter on workplace friendships is particularly relevant to today's readers. Finally, Yager encourages readers to move past negative relationships and concentrate on building good ones in which friends can support each other in a healthy manner. Although there are myriad books on friendship, this one is somewhat different in focus and should appeal to a wide audience. Recommended for all public libraries.

Kay Brodie, Chesapeake Coll., Wye Mills, MD

 

 

 

 

Social Science

21 Types of Potentially Negative Friends

(from WHEN FRIENDSHIP HURTS by Jan Yager, Ph.D. /A Fireside Original

Simon & Schuster Trade Paperbacks July 2002/$13.00)

 

        There is no crystal ball to predict that a particular friend will turn out to be a reliable, positive relationship in your life or, by contrast, that a negative association will cause you emotional distress, or worse. Since destructive or negative friends are not always that easy to spot, WHEN FRIENDSHIP HURTS may help you to reevaluate your current friends, as well as to reassess past or potential friendships.

 

1. The Promise Breaker  Constantly disappoints you or breaks promises

 

2. The Taker Borrows and fails to return something precious or valuable to you.

 

3. The Double‑Crosser  Betrays you big time

 

4. The Risk Taker  Puts you in harm's way because of illegal or dangerous behavior

 

5. The Self‑Absorbed  Never has time to listen to you

 

6. The Cheat Lies, or steals your romantic partner

 

7. The Discloser  Betrays your confidence

 

8. The Competitor Excessively combative with you and wants what you have relationships, job, possessions

 

9. The One‑Upper Always one up on you

 

10. The Rival  Wants whatever you have and may try to take it from you

 

11. The Faultfinder Overly critical

 

12. The Downer  Always negative, critical, and sad, and makes you feel that way too.

 

13. The Rejecter Dislikes you and lets you know it

 

14. The Abuser Verbally, physically, or sexually abuses you

 

15. The Loner Would rather be alone than with a friend

 

16. The Blood Sucker Overly dependent

 

17. The Therapist Needs to analyze everything and give you advice

 

18. The Interloper Overly involved in your life

 

19. The Copy Cat Imitates you

 

20. The Controller Needs to dominate you or the friendship

 

21. The Caretaker Needs to be a friend's keeper, mother or nursemaid, rather than an equal.

           

 

 

 

About Jan Yager, sociologist and author, WHEN FRIENDSHIP HURTS

 

Jan Yager, Ph.D. has spent the last 25 years extensively studying relationships including friendship which was the subject of her sociology dissertation (The City University of New York, 1983) where she had a pre-doctoral fellowship in medical sociology through CUNY and Mt. Sinai Medical College from the National Science Foundation.

In addition to WHEN FRIENDSHIP HURTS (Simon and Schuster, 2002), Dr. Yager is the author of the highly-acclaimed Friendshifts®: The Power of Friendship and How It Shapes Our Lives, which has been translated into five foreign editions (Spanish, Chinese, Taiwanese, Japanese, in preparation, and Indian), as well as numerous other groundbreaking books Who’s That Sitting at My Desk? Workship, Friendship, or Foe?, including Single in America, The Vegetable Passion: A istory of the Vegetarian State of Mind, The Help Book, and Victims (published under her maiden name of J.L. (Janet Lee) Barkas).

Frequently interviewed by broadcast and print media, including The Oprah Winfrey Show, The Today Show, Good Morning America, The View, The Early Show, National Public Radio, CBS Radio, The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, Time, Reader's Digest, Seventeen, Redbook, etc., Dr. Yager has authored articles that have appeared in newspapers, magazines, and online publications including Parade, The New York Times, Woman's Day, Glamour, Modern Bride, American Baby, Harper's, and The Wall Street Journal's www.careerjournal.com, www.startupjournal.com, and others.

Dr. Yager delivers keynote addresses and conducts workshops to corporate, association, and government audiences on friendship and workplace issues including time management. She most recently has taught part-time in the Department of Sociology at the University of Connecticut; previously, she has taught at Temple University, Penn State, and The New School.

In addition to her doctoral dissertation, Dr. Yager's educational background includes a master’s degree in criminal justice and a year of graduate work in art therapy.

For more information about Dr. Jan Yager, as well as her friendship research, visit her web sites: www.janyager.com, www.janyager.com/friendship, and www.janyager.com/writing. The web site dedicated to WHEN FRIENDSHIP HURTS is: www.whenfriendshiphurts.com.

 

 

5 Steps to Try to Save a Friendship

(*from WHEN FRIENDSHIP HURTS by Jan Yager, Ph.D. /A Fireside Original

Simon & Schuster Trade Paperbacks July 2002/$13.00)

 

"1. Ask yourself, "Do I want to invest the time and energy to turn this around?"

 2. Assess whether your friend will also want to work through your conflict.

 3. Will you discuss the situation with your friend or let things ride for a while?

 4.  Try any or all of the following conflict resolution techniques:

• Strive to understand the words or actions that caused the conflict.

• Listen carefully and thoughtfully to each other.

• Agree to disagree. Remind each other that it's okay to have unique views.

• Validate your relationship. Let your friend know you want to stay friends.

• If appropriate, say, "I'm sorry." If your friend apologizes, accept it.

 5. If you save your friendship, avoid dwelling on the resolved rift."—Dr. Jan Yager

 

 

 

5 Steps For Getting Over a Friendship when

You Don’t Know Why It Ended

 (*developed by Dr. Jan Yager based on her book WHEN FRIENDSHIP HURTS A Fireside Original

Simon & Schuster Trade Paperbacks July 2002/$13.00)

 

“1. Accept that you may feel guilt, shame, and anger.

 

2. Try to learn about yourself from the friendship’s ending.  Was there a conflict or argument that might have been handled differently?

 

3. Think about the benefits to you if you find a way to forgive your former friend instead of harboring resentment, or thoughts about how to get even.

 

4. Explore your feelings by writing about it (journaling) or talking with someone you trust

 

5. Spend time with other friends, your mate, family, pet, hobbies, or in cultivating a new positive friendship”—Dr. Jan Yager

 

Suggested questions for Dr. Jan Yager, Author of 

WHEN FRIENDSHIP HURTS

 

1. What are the most common types of negative or positive friends?
2. You have spent the last twenty years researching friendship. Why? What changes have you noticed in that time period in how friendship is viewed by our society?
3. Why might someone maintain a friendship even if it’s no longer adding joy to his or her life or it’s become a destructive friendship?
4. How common is betrayal in friendship? jealousy in friendship?
5. Why is friendship so important to us?
6. What’s the impact of early relationships with parents or siblings on childhood or future friendship choices and interactions?
7. Do most friendships last forever, or is that a myth?
8. Why do betrayals or abandonment in friendships sometimes seem to hurt as much, or even more, than romantic relationships that don’t work out?
9. What are some examples of good or bad friendships in literature? Movies? TV shows? Entertainment? Politics?
10. You write in When Friendship Hurts: “There can be no present if all you have in common is your past.” What do you mean by that? What about going to class reunions? How do you know when reconnecting is in your best interest?
11. Who makes “better” friends – men or women?
12. What are three tips for testing out if a friendship will be good for you?