Celebrate #InternationalWomensDay with The Healing Power of Girlfriends

 Some of my most important and long-term relationships are with my girlfriends. Whether you’re on top of the world or in the depths of despair (or somewhere in between), there’s something about spending time with another woman who really gets you that can’t be replaced by a spouse, partner, child, parent, or coworker.

When Deborah Olson first contacted me about the book she was writing, detailing these special relationships and how healing they can be for women, I was excited to learn more. Today, that book is available for your reading pleasure: The Healing Power of Girlfriends: How to Create Your Best Life Through Female Connection. I can’t think of a better way to celebrate International Women’s Day 2019 than to add this book to your personal library.

Women and Friendship

When Deborah and I first spoke, she shared that as a women’s emotional health specialist she often hears the same types of things from her clients, including:

• the importance of having a close friend to confide in,
• how hurt they are when a friend turns out to be anything but,
• the frustration of trying to make time for girlfriends while juggling work and home life,
• confusion over the mixed signals they sometime get from other women, and
• uncertainty about where to find like-minded women who are also looking for new friends.

These are just a few of the myriad topics Deborah covers in her new book, The Healing Power of Girlfriends: How to Create Your Best Life Through Female Connection, available now in paperback and for Kindle.

“Packed with inspiration, insights, and personal stories, this book captures the nuances and uniqueness of the bonds that only exist within friendships between women.” —Allison Abrams, LCSW-R, psychotherapist, author, and contributing expert for Psychology Today and The Huffington Post

Don’t Try to Stop a Passionate Writer

Deborah and I have worked together on this book for months, taking it from concept to publication. As for many writers, publishing a book has always been dream for her, and she really went for it, learning all she could about publishing and marketing a book while she continued writing and revising her manuscript.  Oh, and that’s while she dealt with a few personal challenges, like helping her daughter whose home was destroyed in Hurricane Harvey in August, 2017, and facing her husband’s serious health challenges over much of 2018.

Through it all, Deborah worked on this book with a goal to make it a go-to source for inspiration, insights, and personal stories based on her years of clinical experience, scientific research, questionnaire responses, and personal anecdotes. 

The Olson Friendship Framework

In addition, the book introduces a unique paradigm for understanding the interdependence of the five levels of friendship and explains:

• why connection, communication, and intimacy are the three pillars of healthy friendships,
• how friendship between women leads to longevity, health, happiness, and well-being,
• why some friendships are only for a specific “season or reason,”
• how the Olson Friendship Framework can help you understand the levels of all your friendships from casual to intimate, plus
• tips for nurturing your current friendships and creating new ones.

Each chapter also includes a list of thought-provoking discussion questions that will help you further examine the heart and soul of your own friendships with women.

The Healing Power of Friendship will help you avoid toxic friendships, understand the role that expectations play in women’s friendships, and learn how power dynamics can hurt or heal these special relationships. It’s a book I can’t wait to share with my own girlfriends!

Being a good friend is being a good person: making time for others, really listening to them, keeping their secrets. In The Healing Power of Girlfriends, Deborah Olson will inspire you to nurture those relationships—and be a better friend to yourself in the process. —Maureen Anderson, host of the Doing What Works nationally syndicated radio talk show

One of my favorite stories from the book, which Deborah also wrote a blog about, is about a surprise gift she received from a friend. Today you can be that type of special friend by gifting a copy of The Healing Power of Friendship to a woman who is important in your life—and be sure to grab a copy for yourself too. Available now at Amazon and Barnes and Noble.

Deborah A. Olson, RN, MA, LPC, a women’s emotional health specialist, has provided counseling services for nearly two decades in the greater Houston, Texas, area. She offers life enrichment seminars and retreats and provides hands-on solutions to enhance life in meaningful, purposeful, and emotionally healthy ways. Learn more at GalleriaCounseling.com.

Candace Johnson is a professional freelance editor, proofreader, writer,  and writing coach who has worked with traditional publishers, self-published authors, and independent book packagers on nonfiction subjects ranging from memoirs to alternative medical treatments to self-help, and on fiction ranging from romance to paranormal. As an editorial specialist, Candace is passionate about offering her clients the opportunity to take their work to the next level. She believes in maintaining the author’s unique voice while helping them create and polish every sentence to make it the best it can be. Learn more here.

For more great writing and publishing information, follow  Change It Up Editing and Writing Services on Facebook, where I share interesting articles and links about writing and publishing. And let’s connect on Twitter and LinkedIn too!