tough love
- a mixture of toughness and warmth used in a relationship, especially with an adolescent.
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Origin of tough love
First recorded in 1977; after Toughlove, a network of support groups
Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2018
Examples from the Web for tough love
Contemporary Examples of tough love
She maintains the tough-love attitude of a pioneer, when it comes to her protégés.
But they see themselves as something of a tough-love organization.
tough love
- the practice of taking a stern attitude towards a relative or friend suffering from an addiction, etc, to help the addict overcome the problem
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Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition
© William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins
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