As Victoria Secunda shows in this provocative book, based on her original study, it is only when our parents die that we truly come into our own as adults. Some of Secunda’s landmark findings:

• Over 60 percent of Secunda’s respondents said they discovered their own strengths, or became mush more self-reliant, after their parents died.
• Nearly 75 percent reported a change in the relationship to a surviving parent; half these kinships changed for the better.
• Three-quarters said that their relationships to one or more siblings had altered; more than half grew closer.
• A number of respondents reported either changing careers, getting married, or having children as a direct consequence of their parents’ deaths.
• Approximately half of the married respondents said that their marriages had grown stronger; however, for many troubled marriages, the loss of a parent marked the final breaking point.