The act of deserting or forsaking; abandonment of a service, a cause, a party, a friend, or any post of duty; the quitting of one's duties willfully and without right; esp., an absconding from military or naval service.
Abandonment by God; spiritual despondency.
To abandon without reason and with no intention of returning, like spouse abandonment.
The culpable abandonment of a state, of a stable situation, the obligations of which one had freely accepted.
withdrawing support or help despite allegiance or responsibility; "his abandonment of his wife and children left them penniless"
One spouse voluntarily leaves the other (without justification or consent from their spouse) for an uninterrupted period of time and with no intentions of returning.
(law), in the law of domestic relations, abandonment or renunciation of marital relations and obligations by either spouse, with intent not to resume relations, and without the consent or wrongful conduct of the other. In most of the U.S., willful desertion is a legal cause for divorce. Following desertion, the period of time necessary before proceedings can be instituted varies from one to five years. In some states, a husband's continued financial support of the wife whom he has willfully abandoned is no bar to an action for divorce on her part.
When a spouse leaves the marital home for more than a year, without prior agreement between the spouses, without paying support, and not as a result of actions of remaining spouse. Desertion is one of several grounds for a fault divorce in many states.
