The Secrets of Happy Families

I first met Bruce Feiler three years ago, when he was trying to rebound from a cancer diagnosis, grappling with the possibility of dying before his twin daughters Eden and Tybee grew up. Facing his own mortality... I could just feel my body sort of slipping away. He makes an extraordinary request. Will you help be their dad? Thankfully, Bruce and his family got through that. And today, Bruce has no evidence of cancer in his body. With all that behind him, he has resumed doing what he does best. Writing. His new book is called The Secrets of Happy Families. What inspired you to write this book? We were always on the defense. And that's what it's like to be a parent these days. We made a list of all the things that the kids have to do in the mornings. And then, and here's the key, they have to check off their own lists. And so a lot of what we are doing here is trying to kind of bring them into the process, be less top-down, be less kind of parental controlling them all the time, kind of enlist them wherever possible in their own upbringing. Are there ground rules? Are there things that can not be said, for example? No, you are allowed to criticize the parents. Just the other week, they were saying, you know, Dad, you were yelling too much. In fact, we have this iPad, and we recorded you yelling. Linda loved this, and she was like giving them a high five. And they said, yeah, Mom, but we got you cursing too. It turns out there's only 10 minutes of productive time in any meal. 10 minutes. The rest is taken up with take your elbows off the table and pass the ketchup. Research shows you can take that 10 minutes and put it at any time of the day and still have the benefits. So can't have family dinner? Have family breakfast. Meet for a bedtime snack. Should we play the game? Yeah! Okay. Suddenly, I'm a ballerina. Here's my favorite thing from The Secrets of Happy Families. Researchers at Emory gave kids a simple do-you-know test. Do you know where your grandparents were born? Do you know where your parents went to high school? If children understand that they are part of a larger narrative, then they are more capable of coping. So you should spend time telling and retelling the story of your family's positive moments and the negative moments and how you overcame them. Dr. Sanjay Gupta, CNN, reporting.