When Love Hurts ─ A Woman's Guide to Understanding Abuse in Relationships

What do you do when the one you love lets you down?

In abusive relationships, asking the tough questions can be difficult. Summoning the courage to gain control of your life can seem daunting?or even impossible.

Written by two women with firsthand experience with abuse victims, When Love Hurts introduces exercises and resources to help you make sense of your relationship, addressing all forms of abuse including verbal, emotional, financial, sexual and physical.

Filled with stories from women who have been in the same position of feeling powerless and confused, this practical guidebook is a supportive and non-judgmental friend to women who don’t know where to turn.

By drawing on your own wisdom and that of the many women who’ve shared your experience, When Love Hurts can help you find the answers you’ve been looking for.

Jill Cory began working with women in abusive relationships at the Calgary Women’s Emergency Shelter in the early 1980s. After moving to Vancouver, she researched women’s experiences in leaving abusive relationships. For the following seven years she developed and facilitated counseling programs for women and their abusive partners. Jill currently works at B.C. Women’s Hospital and Health Centre supporting staff who respond to women experiencing abuse. Jill lives with David, her partner of twenty-four years, and their two children, Becky and Ben.

Karen McAndless-Davis’s desire to help women living with abuse was kindled by the support and encouragement that she received in a group counseling program that she participated in while working on her own relationship with her then abusive husband, Bruce. After several years of hard work Bruce changed his abusive behavior and the beliefs underlying his actions. Karen and Bruce have now been happily married in a relationship of trust and respect for over ten years. They have two children, Luke and Isaac. For many years now, she has provided individual and group counseling to women in various communities. She also travels widely to provide training on the women-centered approach presented in When Love Hurts.