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Areas › Your marriage › Affection and touch
Move toward the pain, not away. A hand, a nearness, a steady I am here.
God says He made spouses so that you would find rest with one another, and put love and kindness between you. Being the person your spouse comes to when they are hurting is what that rest actually looks like on a hard day.
الروم
وَمِنۡ ءَايَٰتِهِۦٓ أَنۡ خَلَقَ لَكُم مِّنۡ أَنفُسِكُمۡ أَزۡوَٰجࣰ ا لِّتَسۡكُنُوٓاْ إِلَيۡهَا وَجَعَلَ بَيۡنَكُم مَّوَدَّةࣰ وَرَحۡمَةًۚ إِنَّ فِي ذَٰلِكَ لَأٓيَٰتࣲ لِّقَوۡمࣲ يَتَفَكَّرُونَ
Another of His signs is that He created spouses from among yourselves for you to live with in tranquillity: He ordained love and kindness between you. There truly are signs in this for those who reflect
Qur’an 30:21read it in the library
الأعراف
۞هُوَ ٱلَّذِي خَلَقَكُم مِّن نَّفۡسࣲ وَٰحِدَةࣲ وَجَعَلَ مِنۡهَا زَوۡجَهَا لِيَسۡكُنَ إِلَيۡهَاۖ فَلَمَّا تَغَشَّىٰهَا حَمَلَتۡ حَمۡلًا خَفِيفࣰ ا فَمَرَّتۡ بِهِۦۖ فَلَمَّآ أَثۡقَلَت دَّعَوَا ٱللَّهَ رَبَّهُمَا لَئِنۡ ءَاتَيۡتَنَا صَٰلِحࣰ ا لَّنَكُونَنَّ مِنَ ٱلشَّٰكِرِينَ
It is He who created you all from one soul, and from it made its mate so that he might find comfort in her: when one [of them] lies with his wife and she conceives a light burden, going about freely, then grows heavy, they both pray to God, their Lord, ‘If You give us a good child we shall certainly be grateful,’
Qur’an 7:189read it in the library
Translation: M.A.S. Abdel Haleem, The Qur'an, Oxford University Press, 2004.
Emotionally focused therapy treats a partner as an attachment figure, the person you go to when something hurts. Turning towards your spouse's pain and simply staying near does more for the bond than solving the problem, because it answers whether they can count on you being there.
Susan M. Johnson (2019). Attachment Theory in Practice: EFT with Individuals, Couples, and Families. Guilford
The attachment frame. Johnson holds that adult partners function as attachment figures, a safe haven in distress and a secure base to go out from, and that distress is best read as a protest at the loss of that connection rather than as a skills deficit.
Coan, J.; Schaefer, H.; Davidson, R. (2006). Lending a Hand. Psychological Science doi
Spousal handholding attenuated neural threat response; effect tracked marital quality.
Strength of evidence: seen more than once. Replicated observational or longitudinal work, not tested against a control.
Being a reliable safe haven in distress is the heart of a secure bond.
Where this sits: EFT, attachment frame: the partner as a safe haven in distress.