In this important and transformative guide, three experienced practitioners identify the widespread dysfunctional dynamic they call "irrelationship," a psychological defense system two people create together to protect themselves from the fear and anxiety of real intimacy in a relationship. Drawing on their wide clinical and life experience, the authors examine behavioral "song-and-dance routines" repeatedly performed by couples affected by irrelationship. Readers will find a valuable framework for understanding their challenges with action-oriented tools to help them navigate their way to fulfilling relationships.
"Irrelationship is an invaluable user's guide to the care and maintenance of adult relationships. It shines a light on challenges we often choose to ignore--the adoption of roles that limit us, the replaying of damaging patterns formed by our earliest experiences--and offers insightful and concrete advice on how to do the work necessary to build stronger and happier partnerships."
Carolyn Parkhurst, Author of The Dogs of Babel and The Nobodies Album
"Irrelationship crosses the frontier of 'self help' into a new area which the authors call self-other help." The DREAM Sequence used for recovery from irrelationship is designed for couples to work together and help them reconnect with the wonderful chemistry and emotional connections that initially drew them to one another."
Diana Kirschner, PhD, Bestselling author of Love in 90 Days
"The road to recovery is stated in user-friendly, self-help terms--discover the unrealistic song-and-dance both partners are playing, seek to repair it (by sharing responsibility for the problem), and thereby empowering each other to make changes (alternative ways of thinking and behaving) through a mutuality of experience that permits the expression of love in all its wonderful, vital, unpredicta
Martin Bloom, PhD, Professor Emeritus, University of Connecticut
