Mr. Therapy sat back in his chair and smiled. "You know, " he said, "this is very interesting. I have been seeing similar situations with other couples of your generation."
"What do you mean," I asked.
"Well, your generation gets married later in life than previous generations. Your generation is more mobile; instead of marrying your high school sweetheart, you are marrying people from other parts of the country and the world that you are meeting in college, at work and on travels. Your generation is less "couply" than others; you tend to run in packs of friends, as opposed to pairing off and socializing exclusively with other pairs."
"What's that got to do with us?"
"Well, you don't have any in-depth knowledge of one another. Your interactions are framed by your social life, meaning you fell in love with each other in the context of a group, which is very different from intimate, personal relationships. In a group, you never have to be the one carrying the conversation or providing all of the attention or suggestions. In a couple, there is just the two of you. The dynamic is very different. Basically, you two didn't really know each other like you may have thought." He rubbed his hands together like a fly. "I wonder if anyone has ever written a paper about this. I'm sure it is becoming a common phenomenon amongst your age group."
"So, let me get this straight. We are sitting here thinking we had something great but we lost it. Are you saying that we never had it to begin with?" Mr. Therapy nodded his head.
Grasshopper and I looked at each other and smiled. Somehow, it made a psychological difference.
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