When I met Sasha, I didn’t even believe myself that such a person existed, that he could be in my life. It seemed to me that we coincided in everything: as children we read the same books, we agreed in our views on all the significant things that “came up” in our conversations, it was very easy for us to laugh at each other’s jokes. We talked for hours and couldn't stop talking. We always wanted to be close to each other, to do everything together. I miss these times so much, because it seems to me that now there is a completely different person nearby: it’s as if he has become a stranger, I don’t understand him well, and he doesn’t understand me, I often want to take a break from him, to be alone. I'm not even sure I still love this man. Probably, these words of my “collective client” may seem familiar to many of us. Almost all couples go through a period in their relationship when the dizzying feeling of love and intimacy is replaced by a seeming alienation and significant cooling, sometimes even doubts about the presence of mutual feelings. It is clear that it is precisely at this phase that a rather large threat of breaking the relationship arises. And many couples (as well as their individual representatives) who still want to maintain contact, find themselves in a psychologist’s office at this very moment. “The good news” here is that this is, in fact, a completely normal and natural way of developing relationships with a significant person. When everything just begins, we are “sharpened” to protect and strengthen the emerging emotional attachment. Therefore, all our actions and thoughts are aimed at our partner, at communicating with him. We automatically focus on the similarities between us; the inevitable differences are simply not noticed, ignored. In emerging conflicts, we easily give in, because it is very important for us to help such a valuable emotional connection take root. And it is clear that such an “idyll” cannot last forever. Next comes the phase of differentiation, in which we remember to ourselves about the importance of our own needs, our own boundaries. We feel the need to give them time and attention. It's like "finding yourself" again. And it is during this process that our eyes seem to “open” to our partner, we finally notice not the similarities, but the differences between us, shortcomings, annoying traits and habits that no longer seem “harmless” and “cute”. Often in this process, the partner falls with a roar from the pedestal on which we ourselves so recently and so willingly placed him. Is there a chance to overcome these difficulties? Of course, there is, if both partners are ready to look for ways to restore emotional intimacy, moving along the path of finding a fragile balance between having a connection with a partner and recognizing their own worth. The journey in which we learn to cope with the fear of merging with another person and discover that it is possible to be intimate without losing ourselves.