Secure Relating

Experienced mental health professionals and hosts of the Therapist Uncensored podcast offer a groundbreaking new clinical perspective that integrates modern attachment theory, relational neuroscience, and current cultural context to create a hopeful framework for deeper and more permanent change, growth and connection in all types of relationships.

"This is the book to hand not just to your clients, but also to friends and family members, along with anyone who's interested in improving their relationships. Which is to say: everyone!" —Lori Gottlieb, New York Times bestselling author of Maybe You Should Talk To Someone and co-host of the Dear Therapists podcast

Secure Relating offers a refreshing and innovative approach to understanding and improving relationships in today's increasingly polarized world. Drawing on over thirty years of professional clinical experience, authors Ann Kelley, PhD and Sue Marriott, LCSW, CGP integrate modern attachment theory, relational neuroscience, and depth psychology into practical tools for deepening self-awareness and navigating closeness with strength in even the most challenging relationships.

Instead of the popular broad attachment categorizations, Secure Relating presents a nuanced understanding of attachment and interpersonal defensive patterns, allowing readers to delve into the complexities of their own experience and apply the specific skills they need.

Kelley and Marriott make complex concepts accessible and relatable, emphasizing the realistic capacity for neural change and psychological growth. They provide contemporary concepts and interactive tools such as the Modern Attachment Regulation Spectrum, a new framework that helps readers identify their unconscious defensive patterns, update and revise their personal narratives, and cultivate a secure state of mind amid chaos and adversity. 

Secure Relating delivers hope, connection, and empowerment amidst the many barriers to emotional closeness and provocations towards self-protection by offering a comprehensive approach to understanding and transforming all kinds of relationships into more secure and satisfying bonds.

Sue Marriott is a clinical social worker, educator, and podcaster who has worked with individuals and groups in private practice in Austin TX for over 30 years. Her passion is bridging the life-changing relational sciences to those who would otherwise not have access to it. In that spirit, she co-founded an organization that brings attachment and relational neurobiology to students, local therapists, and the public called Austin Interpersonal Neurobiology (IN) Connection and served on the Board of The Global Assn for Interpersonal Neurobiology Studies (GAINS). The top-rated podcast, Therapist Uncensored, is an outgrowth of this passion and a partnership with her wife, Dr. Ann Kelley. 

Ann Kelley, Ph.D. is a licensed psychologist who received her doctorate from the University of Texas at Austin. She runs her own psychotherapy practice specializing in relational work. Dr. Kelley is the co-founder and co-host of the internationally recognized Therapist Uncensored Podcast. She and her wife and co-author, Sue Marriott, live in Austin, Texas where they raised their three now-launched children. Her professional work and writing is motivated by her ongoing concern about the toxic strategies being used by media and political forces that provoke fear, anger and polarization. Her biggest hope for this book is to ignite an open resistance to this path and promote deep and wide conversations towards secure relating.