“We all have a handful of issues with the particular power to make us feel bad. These issues typically originate during childhood, and we carry them into our adult relationships.
“For instance, you have been picked on as a child, and so you continue to feel vulnerable whenever someone tries to tease you. It affects you to this day. Or as a child, you were told you were ugly or stupid, and now you still feel you are less attractive or intelligent than others. Perhaps someone in your early childhood always had to be right, and by default always made you seem wrong. Today you continue to feel sensitive to right/wrong issues.
“How many such issues does each of us actually have? Do they number in the tens? Or even more? Partners often are under the illusion that they have a vast storehouse of personal issues with which they have to deal. In my experience as a clinician, however, this is generally untrue. If we really boil our issues down to their essence, I’m willing to be most of us will be able to identify only three or four with the power to make us feel bad. I believe most of us are disturbed by the same three or four vulnerabilities throughout our life.” – Stan Tatkin, Psy.D. in Wired for Love
Our personal issues do affect couple’s relationship. It is understanding our own issues so that we can share them and manage them in a healthy way that is necessary. Our vulnerabilities do tell us more of our needs so we can share them with our partner.
Wives of Sex Addicts Therapy blog 