"I have bitten my tongue 8,000 times in the past three weeks," says Natasha. Her husband's office was across the street from the World Trade Center, so now he is working at home. "He's been so stressed out so I say, 'Fine, I'll do the laundry, that's fine.'"

Since the attacks on Sept, 11, many couples are reassessing their relationships -- and choosing their battles. For some, this means letting go, as in: "OK, I'll take out the trash," "No problem, you're running late" and "That's OK, it happens to a lot of guys; we can just cuddle."

"During crises, couples can put the mundane things aside and reconnect to get comfort," says Shirley Glass, a clinical psychologist in the Baltimore area. People are traumatized and it's not worth getting upset about certain things. They are more tolerant and understanding, thinking about what's really important.

"Everybody has been touched by and alerted by the fact that people in their last breath wanted to reach out and say, 'I love you,'" says Glass, referring to the many cellphone calls from passengers on the four hijacked planes and from people in their offices in the twin towers.

Natasha and her husband have been clinging to each other, she says. "We value each other."

Movies such as "Lorenzo's Oil," in which there's a gravely sick child, lead you to believe that tragedy and pain bring couples closer together. In the movie, Glass says, "the parents have a fabulous insight and everybody comes together." In fact, she notes, it's often the opposite. In real life there is a lot of divorce following the death of a child.

Problems in a relationship don't magically disappear no matter what the circumstance. Tragedy can exacerbate them. It causes stress. It highlights emotional differences, especially if couples have different ways of dealing with grief.

The emotional aftermath of these terrorist attacks presents a new challenge for therapists. Many of Glass' patients have been either hyperreactive -- obsessing about the attacks -- or totally numb, unable to deal with it.