Sales rep struggles with retrogressions (8)
I believe the answer is:
relapses
'retrogressions' is the definition.
The answer and definition can be both acts as well as being plural nouns.
Perhaps there's a link between them I don't understand?
'sales rep struggles' is the wordplay.
'struggles' indicates anagramming the letters.
'sales'+'rep'='salesrep'
'salesrep' is an anagram of 'RELAPSES'.
'with' is the link.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for relapses that I've seen before include "Falls back to former condition, perhaps of illness" , "Deteriorates like pleasers" , "Backslides like pleasers" , "becomes ill again" , "Regresses" .)