tough-love
English
Verb
tough-love (third-person singular simple present tough-loves, present participle tough-loving, simple past and past participle tough-loved)
- To practice tough love; To treat someone with compassionate but stringent discipline in order to improve their behavior.
- 1999, Estella Conwill Majozo, Come Out the Wilderness: Memoir of a Black Woman Artist, page 239:
- The system's got some of our finest men being tough-loved to death!
- 2000, Malinda Teel, Fortitude: True Stories of True Grit, page 87:
- In time, the counselors at the program tough-loved me into acknowledging that I was using my disabilities as an excuse to drink and drug.
- 2002, John Cantwell Kiley, The Breakaway Pope, page 41:
- He must be tough-loved by the Church.
- 2004, Thomas Henderson, Frank Luksa, In Control: The Rebirth of an NFL Legend, page 87:
- He tough-loved the hell out of me without ever knowing what tough love meant.