You are leading a group with a predetermined date for termination. Three weeks before the group is to end, you remind the members of this fact and encourage them to begin taking care of any unfinished business they might have. You sense a great deal of hesitation to considering termination. They would like to keep the group going, and some of the statements made are:
· “It took us 13 weeks to reach this level of trust and now we have to quit! Why can’t we keep going?”
· “I don’t want to say goodbye. These people in here have become good friends and I don’t want to even think of having this group end.”
· “If I could keep working with this group, I am sure that I could get through some of the problems that have kept me in a stuck place for so long.”
What would you want to say to each of these members? What are some advantages of a time-limited group? Would you be willing to continue this group if members seemed to be getting something from the experience? Why or why not?