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  • I Wanna Hold Your Hand — Romance
  • Creative Etiquette Solutions

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I Wanna Hold Your Hand — Romance
I love seeing other couples holding hands, but I feel self-conscious initiating it myself. My experience is that guys don’t like being seen holding hands. When I’ve brushed my hand against my fiancé’s to signal that I want him to take my hand, he doesn’t respond. He’s just not interested.

       I’ve always been into the romance of holding hands. In the car, across the table in a restaurant, walking down the street, at a concert, or watching a movie in bed at night. When I take my fiancé’s hand in mine he tolerates it for a few seconds and withdraws it too quickly. I’m worried my hands are clammy or maybe it makes him think I’m too needy. Which, by the way, I’m not.
 

–Name Withheld

Talking about romance and hand holding.
      Should your fiancé be one of those lucky kids whose parent took him by the hand and walked him to school every day from preschool through third grade, he may feel you’re acting too parental — too maternal.
 
      If he can’t handle your clammy hands, think about what else he can’t handle? 
 
      Hand-holding capability doesn’t have to be gauged by a relationship barometer. Holding hands while walking down your street might work for twenty seconds until he realizes it makes him self-conscious. 
  • Try holding hands when you’re alone. Carry tissues and wipe your hands first. See how long you can gently hold his hand in a darkened movie theatre. Your fiancé will be less likely to feel paranoid when he knows nobody is watching. 
  • Should he pull away and say he really doesn’t like holding hands, wouldn’t that be a relief. Then you’d know for sure.
  • Perhaps you may find he’s happier putting his hand on your leg or putting his arm around you.
  • Tease him about hand-holding being a portable hug. 
  • Many feel intimacy is in the elbow creases, so try linking arms.
  • Work on finding a symbol of connectivity, your own private love language — a sweet and small sign of intimacy — a kiss on the hand, an arm hug,
      The Power of Touch
  • Our brain gives a disproportionate amount of attention to the fingers and hands, as compared to the rest of the body.
      The Beatles celebrated the romance of love language singing these lines:
 
Yeah, I’ll tell you something
I think you’ll understand
When I say that something
I want to hold your hand
 
I want to hold your hand
I want to hold your hand
 
 (John Lennon and Paul McCartney).

~Didi

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