Hold Me Tight summary

Can you and your partner pass the sour milk test? It’s this simple: when milk goes bad in the fridge, a happy couple just buys new milk, while an unhappy couple begins the notorious blame game.

Often when couples begin arguing about insignificant household details, the fight balloons out of control as each partner tries to put all the responsibility on the other.

Some people have seriously thick skins. You can poke fun at just about anything they do and expect a mere laugh in return. But if you push the wrong buttons, say by making fun of that mole on their left cheek, they’ll suddenly erupt in a violent rage.

How come?

Some couples are expert at nipping arguments in the bud with a simple line like, “do we really need to fight about this?” But when life presents serious challenges, it can be difficult to act and communicate with such nonchalance.

After all, life always becomes more trying when we have to carry burdens like illness, depression or the loss of a job or loved one. It’s only logical that such difficulties also place an added burden on our relationships.

As couples learn to rebuild their intimacy, old traumas sometimes resurface and get in the way. So, when one partner repeatedly denies the other’s offering of love, it’s likely that a traumatic event is playing a hand.

Here’s a crash course on trauma in relationships.

It seems like the general unspoken consensus is that it’s standard for relationships to start off in a fiery burst of romance before gradually cooling down into a friendly partnership. Everyone wants to know how to stoke the flames of passion.

However, the strategies for doing so can be a bit misguided. Couples tend to think that their relationship problems stem, at least partially, from bad sex, but the reality is that bad sex is a product of their emotional challenges.

With endless wars, a stagnant economy and the ever-advancing threat of climate change, the world can be a seriously frightening place. These experiences are shared by people all over the world, and it should come as no surprise that such events inflict trauma on many of those they touch.

After all, the word trauma is derived from the Greek for “wound.” It’s the result of events that are so emotionally violent that they change a person’s outlook on the world.