Summer holidays come with an awful lot of expectations. They’re expensive, precious and often represent the one chance to spend uninterrupted time together.

We imagine we’ll reconnect, have meaningful conversations, enjoy great sex and come home feeling closer than ever.

But holidays can also be surprisingly stressful for couples. I often hear from clients who are filled with dread at the prospect of a holiday. Not because they’re worried about flying or packing, but because they don’t want to spend that amount of time with their partner.

If you’re already feeling turned off by them, irritated by them, or simply desperate for space, the thought of being together for ten days or two weeks can feel unbearable.

When you know deep down that your relationship isn’t working, a holiday can make that impossible to ignore. In fact, I see a lot of separations happen either in the weeks leading up to a holiday or immediately afterwards.

That’s because for much of the year, work, routines, children, separate social lives and everyday distractions mask what’s really going on between you. Then suddenly you’re together round the clock. The forced intimacy can leave people re-evaluating their marriage.

And yes, sometimes when couples feel stuck, they might need professional help, but the role of therapy is not to trap people in relationships that aren’t working. If clients really feel averse to spending any time with their partner, they sometimes come to therapy for permission to walk away, and that’s OK.

But if you’re not ready to call time on your relationship – and don’t want to ditch your two weeks in the sun – here are some of the biggest holiday flashpoints I see in the therapy room – and how you can avoid them...

Sex and relationship therapist Natasha Silverman says she often speaks with clients who dread going on holiday with their partner

Natasha says spending a little time apart on holiday can be healthy and help couples fulfil their own needs

One wants to trek... one fly and flop

This is one of the most common holiday arguments I encounter.

I see couples place a lot of weight on having the perfect break, but the difficulty is that ‘perfect’ can mean something very different to each partner.

One of you wants adventure, activity and novelty. The other wants a sun lounger, a book and absolutely no obligations.

The mistake couples make is thinking they’re arguing about the destination. What they’re really talking about is how their needs can be met in the relationship.

I see more burnout than ever before. Many clients spend their lives giving, working and coping. The thought of a hike up to a hilltop village feels like yet another task. Others spend all year behind a desk and desperately need stimulation and excitement to unwind.

Solution: No matter how compatible a couple is, we are individuals with our own needs, desires, dislikes and boundaries. We will never match up completely – nor should we. Before you go away, think about what you expect and want from the trip. Think about previous holidays too. What worked? What didn’t? Where did resentment creep in? Then talk honestly.

I encourage clients to avoid criticism and instead focus on communicating their feelings and needs. I also suggest giving themselves permission to spend at least 20 per cent of the time meeting their own needs separately and guilt-free. That might look like a hot-stone massage while their partner enjoys a hike.

They’re glued to their phone

Many couples hope a holiday will finally provide quality time together. Then one partner spends the entire time scrolling, answering emails, disappearing into work or their social media.

When somebody is always on their device, I wonder what function that behaviour serves. It can be a sign of a dysregulated nervous system, where they use their phone to numb or soothe themselves, or to avoid being present.

If somebody continually chooses their phone over being present with you, it can leave you feeling lonely even when you’re together, says Natasha

Sometimes work becomes an excuse. They tell themselves it’s important – and perhaps some of it genuinely is – but to the partner sitting beside them, it can feel incredibly rejecting. If somebody continually chooses their phone over being present with you, it can leave you feeling lonely even when you’re together.

Solution: I often ask couples: ‘When you get home from your holiday, what would make you say you got exactly what you needed?’ That’s a useful question to prepare for a trip, especially if this issue has come up before.

It’s usually easier to discuss these things before you go, rather than being perceived as ‘nagging’ on holiday. Maybe suggest times you can be phone-free, and other times when you can check in on emails, if that’s truly necessary.

They don’t pull their weight

One child’s having a tantrum over ice cream, the other needs their armbands blown up. Their father? On a sun lounger, headphones on, buried in a thriller.

I hear this complaint constantly, particularly from women: ‘He did not help me with the kids at all. He was useless.’

Often, they had convinced themselves their partner’s lack of involvement at home was because work was demanding. Then they go away together and realise it isn’t that they’re busy. It’s that they don’t want to share parenting. For some, that realisation becomes the straw that breaks the camel’s back.

He may say he didn’t notice or ‘I thought you were managing fine without me’, but the fact a partner can see you’re struggling and you feel he doesn’t care enough to help can be deeply hurtful.

Solution: Rather than say, ‘You never help with the children’, try, ‘When I’m managing everything with the children on holiday, I feel unseen, overwhelmed and like I’m doing it by myself.’

It’s also important to be specific. Tell your partner exactly what you need from them. Many people resist this because they think, ‘Why should I have to spell it out? I’m not their parent.’ But sometimes that’s exactly what you need to do. You can also discuss booking a kids’ club, or a babysitter if you’d both like a break.

Couples who navigate holidays successfully are usually the ones who can communicate effectively both beforehand and on holiday, and work out ways to ensure both partners feel considered.

You feel lonely in paradise

The air is soft, the night is young, and you’ve been chatting away to your partner. Their response? ‘Sorry, did you say something?’

One of the most painful complaints I hear is from people who feel their partner has very little interest in what they have to say.

They won’t maintain eye contact when talking about feelings and seem uninterested in their partner’s inner world.

It’s natural to hope that with time alone together in a beautiful place, things will be different. But with an avoidant, disconnected partner, that’s not likely.

Even harder is when that same partner suddenly becomes highly engaged when they want sex. For many, that combination is a relationship killer.

Solution: If you come home feeling just as lonely, unseen, rejected or disconnected as when you left, only with a great tan, it’s likely the problem isn’t the holiday at all, but the relationship.

Counselling can help but only if both parties are willing to do the work.

Holiday sex becomes a battleground

For one partner, holiday sex might seem like the perfect way to let go and relax without life’s pressures getting in the way. For the other, it might seem like yet more caretaking – the very thing they are trying to escape.

The expectation of intimacy can act as a wet flannel on desire.

One partner may resentfully give in to duty sex, while the higher-desire partner, who thought sun, sea and sangria would allow sex to flourish, feels deeply rejected. At this point couples start to realise, ‘It’s not our routine, is it? It’s us’ – and this can feel really destabilising.

Solution: One of the most effective things couples can do is remove the expectation entirely.

Touch your partner simply to be close to them. Stroke their hair. Hold their hand. Tell them, ‘This isn’t going anywhere. I just want to be close to you.’

Research tells us that people who have new experiences together have a better sex life.

When somebody no longer feels pressured, they have space to ask themselves what they want. And relaxed, tanned, with a cocktail in their hand, that may well be sex.

Friends and family always come first

There’s nothing wrong with group holidays or wanting family around. The question is whether friends and family are a strategy to avoid spending time alone as a couple. Wanting couple time is healthy, but if the idea of your partner wanting others there makes you feel rejected, or like you aren’t ‘enough’, that may be worth paying attention to.

Solution: There’s plenty of room for compromise here. Discuss how you can both get your needs met, even in small moments. For example, if his family are coming along, can you go for dinner alone one or two nights?

You might suggest booking another break with just the two of you, or a weekend away with friends. However, if only one person consistently gets what they want, the power dynamic isn’t equal. If you find yourself giving in and repressing your feelings, don’t ignore that.

As told to Leah Hardy