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In this chapter, we turn our attention from general relationship development and maintenance to some of the most important relationships in our lives: intimate relationships. Intimate relationships are deeply personal bonds we have with other individuals that are accompanied by affective communication and a sense of belongingness. Perhaps more than any other type of relationship, the intimate associations we form with others significantly impact both the development and quality of our lives. The first relationship we ever form is the intimate bond with our parents or caregivers when we are born, and this bond later grows to include the relationship with our entire family. Beginning in childhood we develop close friendships, and, for some, these friendships are among the most important connections. Later in life we also create intimate bonds with partners, wives, husbands, and perhaps children of our own. These relationships are complicated in nature and impacted by culture, but they are all held together through communication. In this chapter, we explore the basic tenets of intimate relationships by first explaining the fundamental characteristics these types of associations contain. We will begin by turning our attention to the characteristics of romantic relationships and discuss how these bonds are formed, developed, and potentially dissolved through communication. We will then examine families and how communication turns these connections into cherished relationships in our lives. Next, we will turn our attention to the unique nature of friendships. Finally, we will discuss how you can use dialogue to create and maintain constructive and rewarding intimate relationships with other people. Not every relationship we form is intimate and, in fact, most are not. Think about how many different people you come into contact with every day. Now try to remember how many of them whose name you recall. It's probably not that many, and you can probably not remember details about even more. That's because those people, the people we know and recall a great deal about, are those with whom we formed intimate relationships. The reasons why we choose to form an intimate relationship with one person and not another are myriad, but the characteristics of the communication we use in those close associa­tions is consistent. In this section we will explain five basic qualities shared by communica­tion in intimate relationships. When we buy a cup of coffee or have a conversation with the cashier while buying grocer­ies, we typically do so without thinking about the future of the relationship and accept we may not talk to the person again. There are other individuals that we interact with often at school, work, the gym, or in our communities we might talk to on a regular basis, and even socialize with from time to time, but with whom we have a casual social relationship rather than a deep personal connection. Everyday interactions with acquaintances and even casual friends are important in that they often help us to accomplish tasks and provide com­panionship and a sense of community as we live our lives, but those social relationships are fleeting and usually end if one of the parties moves to a new geographic location or if the activities that brought you together end. When we have an intimate relationship with someone, however, we want to positively con­nect with the person over and over again in the future, hope to have that desire reciprocated, and work toward facilitating future conversations and activities with that person, even if geographic distance or schedule changes become obstacles to doing so. This is the quality of commitment, or the desire to do whatever we can to stay in the relationship regardless of what happens. The commitment is a promise we make to ourselves and the other person that the relationship will not only continue, but will continue to be strong. Commitments in intimate relationships take many forms, and can even be codified legally through marriage contracts, birth certificates, or adoption certificates. We might make financial commitments to a partner or family. Ultimately, though, the deep commitment of intimate relationships is an emotional and chronemic commitment whereby we value the feelings of the other person and seek to spend a great deal of time with them. This emo­tional connection is deep and comes with a sense of responsibility for the other person's well-being and the well-being of the relationship. Regardless of the difficulties, arguments, challenges, or problems in a relationship, there is an ongoing promise to work through it and preserve the connection. One quality that makes intimate relationships so unique and powerful is that the depth of the commitment and connection to the other person creates a high level of interde­pendence between the relational partners. This means that what affects one person in the relationship affects the others. This can sometimes be said of casual acquain­tances as well, but the level at which the interdependence exists in intimate relation­ships is what distinguishes it from casual acquaintances. Think of it as prioritizing, since we would likely put the needs and desires of our partners or family above those of coworkers. In one sense, the intimate relationships we form with others make the other person an extension of oneself. Intimate others become part of how we identify ourselves; for instance, in some situations, you might begin to introduce yourself as the partner, spouse, daughter, brother, parent, or close friend of someone with whom you have an intimate relationship. Our intimate relationship partners are the first people with whom we share important parts of our lives, just as they share important parts of their lives with us first. Both parties become part of the other, joined in one category of family, siblings, partners, couples, spouses, or even close friends. Recall the concept of Social Exchange Theory from the chapter on relationship maintenance. Just like when we manage elements of our daily lives, we choose to invest different quanti­ties of time, effort, emotion, and attention to different relationships. What we expect to get in return is based on what we believe we put into the relationship. In intimate relationships, we invest a significant portion of our resources and hope that it is returned by the other party. The degree of investment is also ongoing. Investment is not a matter of spending one day a week or month with the other person, but instead choosing every day to tend to the relation­ship. Intimate relationships have a consistent quality to the investment we put in them, and we expect the other party to be similarly invested. All relationships have beginnings, middles, and ends, and they fluctuate in intensity during different periods. For this reason, it is important to understand that relationships are not simply static things, but rather processes you undergo or travel through. As we discussed a moment ago, what happens to one person affects the other, and we all experience dif­ferent things that affect our moods, attentions, emotional states, and perceptions of our surroundings all the time. Sometimes the effect is barely noticeable; at other times it is dra­matic and results in a fundamental change in the way we see the world around us. Since we are constantly influenced by our surroundings, so too is the relationship between our­selves and our partners or families influenced and adjusted based on those events. As a result, intimate relationships are fluid and ever changing. The external experiences that influence relationships and leave them in a constant state of flux also can create tensions that the parties must manage in order to maintain their relationship over time. As we learned in the chapter on relationship maintenance, relation­ships are filled with dialectical tensions, or challenges that come from having several sets of essential, but at times oppositional, needs or desires. For example, there are times when we want and need our family's communication to change. Children get older and their relationships with their parents must be revised. The move into adolescence can be the most challenging to negotiate for children and parents. The children are becoming more independent and want to be spoken to in increasingly more mature ways. Parents sometimes struggle with these changes, because they don't want to see their children grow up. The changes are necessary, however, to reach a "new normal," though that new normal will change again in later years.