Mature Friendships, Love, and Romance

Without close personal and family relationships, older people often experience loneliness and feelings of isolation. Physical and emotional health may suffer as well. Unfortunately, older adults make many of the same mistakes in their relationships as they did when they were younger-with much greater negative consequences. Yet friendship, love, and romance are attainable when approached in positive ways.

This insightful, research-driven book offers practical advice to older adults seeking new intimate relationships, lasting friendships, and better relationships with family members and children.

This insightful, research-driven book offers practical advice to older adults seeking new intimate relationships, lasting friendships, and better relationships with family members and children.

Written to appeal to men as well as women, Mature Friendships, Love, and Romance: A Practical Guide to Intimacy for Older Adults is a serious book about love, romance, intimacy, and sexuality, as well as friendship and family. It is about what happens when older adults lack close relationships and about practical ways to address that isolation and loneliness.

Through personal stories and vignettes, readers will see how notions of friendship, intimacy, and love change as we age, what mature love is, and what factors can make it challenging. Among the topics discussed are late-life divorces and breakups of long-term relationships; finding new and intimate friendships; resolving problems with adult children that can emerge when you enter a new, loving relationship; and choosing activities to increase your pool of potential friends and mates. Internet dating is addressed, as are the general thoughts and actions of happy people who agree life can start at 60.

• Presents powerful personal stories about mature love and intimacy
• Includes case studies of mature adults experiencing love and intimacy problems, offering explanations of the problems and effective and realistic solutions
• Discusses current research on love and intimacy problems of older adults