I shared the book with my boyfriend and we laughed so hard we nearly cried, because the book described our relationship SO EXACTLY it was scary.

The Couple Checkup: Find Your Relationship Strengths
– David Olson, Amy Olson-Sigg and Peter Larson.

“The advice is practical, down-to-earth, and can really make a difference in my marriage.”

“The coolest feature is the online Couple Checkup, which alone is worth the price of this book.”

“This is definitely a must read for everyone looking to find or build on their relationship's strengths.”

“There are lots of opinions about how to improve a relationship (dating, engaged, or married). But this one has solid science to back-up it's advice.”

“Want to know how to really have a better relationship? Do yourself a favor and read this book.”

“I've been a marriage educator and therapist for over 15 years and have followed the research behind this book--it cannot be surpassed. This book may put me out of business.”

“The advice is proven and practical. More than that, you get an online survey of your own relationship (an "x-ray") that allows you to build on your strengths (isn't it nice to know what's going well!) and identify what could be improved.”

“This is true-to-life couple enrichment.”

reviews from Amazon.com

The Couple CheckupThe Couple Checkup: Find Your Relationship Strengths is designed to help you and your partner build a more satisfying and intimate relationship. This is not so much a book to read but a checklist of things to do, questions to answer, answers to discuss and conversations to share.

Written by three relationship experts, this book will stimulate thoughts and attitudes about your relationship, help you activate dialogue and discovery, and deepen the quality of your relationship.

The book includes a voucher to obtain a free, online couple-friendly relationship inventory inspired by the scientifically validated PREPARE/ENRICH programme that draws on over 35 years of research and the responses of over 50,000 couples. You will receive a 15-20 page Computer Report, with your results broken down into relational categories. A Discussion Guide is also available to help you interpret the results.

Taking the online inventory will help you and your partner discover your strengths as a couple – and it will also help you identify issues that are threatening the vitality of your relationship and may need to be addressed.

The Couple Checkup will help you and your partner explore:

  • Communication: How you and your partner feel about the quality and quantity of communication in your relationship.
  • Conflict Resolution: Your ability to discuss and resolve differences.
  • Families of Origin: The emotional closeness you feel in your family and the ability of your family to adjust to changes in roles and leadership.
  • Financial Management: Your ability to reach agreement in financial and money matters.
  • Affection and Sexual Expectations: Your satisfaction with the level of emotional and physical closeness in your relationship
  • Marriage Expectations: Measures how realistic your expectations about love, marriage, and conflict are in your relationship.
  • Relationship Roles: Your expectations about how decision-making and responsibilities will be shared.
  • Couple Closeness & Flexibility: Your emotional closeness and your ability to adjust to changes in roles and leadership.

Each chapter of the book matches a category in the online profile. While the book stands on its own, using the Couple Checkup with the book provides the maximum benefit. In addition, each chapter contains couple exercises to help build couple strengths in a variety of areas. An excellent resource for any couple desiring to enrich their relationship.

About the Authors

David Olson is Professor Emeritus at the University of Minnesota, and founder and President of Life Innovations, developers of the internationally successful PREPARE-ENRICH program.
      Amy Olson-Sigg has co-authored several books and has served on the Minnesota Council on Family Relations. Peter Larson served as Clinical Director of the Smalley Relationship Counseling Center and
has co-authored several programs including
Marriage Mentor and Building Strong Families.