Endings & Repair
What people say they learned
Accounts from people looking back on relationships that ended converge on a small number of observations.
Endings & Repair
Breakups, divorce, reconciliation and what comes after.
Endings & Repair
Starting again, with what you know now
A short account of what the evidence across this whole subject actually supports, for anyone beginning again.
Endings & Repair
Recovering, and what actually helps
The research on adjustment after separation is unglamorous and reasonably clear about what makes a difference.
Endings & Repair
The conversation that ends it
Ending a long relationship in person is one of the harder things people do, and there is a form that reduces the damage.
Endings & Repair
Grief in a couple
Two people grieving the same loss frequently do it differently, and the difference is experienced as a failure of the relationship.
Endings & Repair
The second time around
People entering a serious relationship after a previous one ended carry patterns that are worth identifying deliberately.
Endings & Repair
Staying friends, and when it works
A common intention with a poor success rate, and the cases where it works have identifiable features.
Endings & Repair
The post-separation period, practically
Most advice addresses the emotional side. The practical side is what determines how bad the first year is.
Endings & Repair
Deciding whether to stay
The decision resists the usual methods, and a few questions are more informative than any amount of listing pros and cons.
Endings & Repair
How relationships end without anyone deciding
Most long relationships do not end in a crisis. They end through a gradual withdrawal that neither person names until it is finished.
Endings & Repair
Trust after it has been broken
Rebuilding is possible and it is slower and more specific than the general advice suggests.
Endings & Repair
Breaking up without doing unnecessary damage
The decision is one problem and the execution is another, and the execution is where avoidable harm gets done.