This book is about the two-tiered system and invisible imbalance that operates within the framework of the family. It is about the fantasy of the “happily-ever- after,” which the wedding industry promotes and Western society reinforces. Why are we hanging onto this faux happiness at the expense of our future well-being? Why don’t we wonder what happened after “they lived happily ever after” and if, in fact, they really do? What I hope to achieve by writing this book is to rattle the cage of young brides, about to embark on this journey, to talk about these issues with their future partners and to set the system up in a more equal way, so no one is caught off guard if and when things crumble. It will be difficult to achieve this task because no one wants to think about things falling apart before the marriage even begins, and most certainly it sours the sweetness of the fantasy of the “happily ever after,” as we know it. What we don’t realize is that there will be less bitterness and upset for the family, especially for the children, if we pursue this line of thinking. Isn’t that the real “happily-ever-after?”

Linda Rose Ennis, Ph.D, is a psychoanalytic therapist in private practice, a family mediator, an author, lecturer, affiliated with York University. Her education includes the following; a Ph.D. in Psychology and Education; a Masters in Education; a Diploma in Child Study and a teaching degree from the University of Toronto. She has written and spoken extensively on her research in her area of expertise, “On Combining Motherhood With Employment”, which was the first qualitative piece done in this area. She has written contributions in the Encyclopedia of Motherhood, discussing the “empty nest”, the “mommy track”, and has contributed a chapter entitled “Contract-Faculty Mothers: On The Track To Nowhere” in O’Brien Hallstein & O’Reilly’s book entitled Academic Motherhood in a Post-Second Wave Context (Demeter Press: 2012). Most recently, she has published her edited collection, Intensive Mothering: The Cultural Contradictions of Modern Motherhood (Demeter Press: 2014).

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