ABSTRACT
The size and quality of the relationship web in which we live out our lives are continuously in flux. Although a few relationships endure for a lifetime, most die. When we look in our relational rear-view mirrors, most of us see stretching back over the road of time a series of dead or moribund relationships with co-workers, teachers and mentors, neighbors, friends, and lovers—and, for some, spouses and children. Sometimes fate ended the relationship—taking away our beloved partner through death, an illness such as Alzheimer’s disease, or involuntary and insurmountable geographical separation. Other times the relationship simply withered away without either ourselves or our partners caring or even noticing its demise. Sometimes the relationship was dissolved by mutual consent, other times we ended it, and still other times it was our partner who decided to do so. If the relationship was an important one, it is likely that neither we nor our partner let the relationship die without putting up a fight, one that may have included the services of a relationship therapist.
