Just going to quietly scream into the sun that there are other ways to measure a relationship (romantic, sexual, familial, platonic) as successful than "one or both of us has shed our mortal coil before the relationship ended".
Speaking as a person with a partner who is in fact no longer alive: lots of successful relationships end voluntarily and in many ways, this is better?
Can you say things like:
- I learned a lot from that person and our connection
- I departed from that connection with love left in my heart for this person even though we should not persist in relationship together
- I wish that person well and I hope good things flow into their life
- I am a different and maybe even better person than I was before meeting this person
All of these are signs of a highly successful relationship, even if that connection could not have remained healthy or wise in the long run!
Goddamn.