As the research progressed (ethnographic fieldwork lasted over several years), it was clear that in most cases in which a family member was convicted of a serious crime, one female family member, usually a wife or mother, was assuming primary responsibility for the offender and his/her needs while dealing with the various consequences of what the offender had done. The women described feelings of grief and loss that they compared to bereavement. The sense of loss they described included the losses of relationship with the offender or free contact with him/her following imprisonment; of their hopes and dreams for the offender; of other family members who wanted nothing to do with the offender; and of the loss of the victim if the offense involved homicide against a family member. For many, life gradually improved as they found ways of coping, and many progressed to the point of reaching out to help others in similar situations. The coping involved dealing not only with changed financial and family responsibilities but also with their own internal psychological states as well as those of other family members. In addition to the interviews with the 32 women relatives of serious offenders, the study also consisted of interviews with those who worked with offenders' families, as well as participant observation in a visitors' center at a prison. 7 notes and 73 references