Gifts Speak Volumes About Our Feelings : What you buy that special someone can say a lot about you as a couple. An O.C. psychologist says presents serve to ‘regulate closeness or distance.’

You’ve been together for a while now, and being with this person is like poetry. Except for one fault that’s about the size of the San Andreas: You haven’t gotten a decent gift yet.

Are you being too critical? Shouldn’t one measure of a good relationship be its ability to overcome lousy gifts? Will the current round of holidays exacerbate the problem, or will this be a turning point?

What you buy your spouse, boyfriend or girlfriend can say more about your relationship than you realize, psychologists say.

“There’s always a message there, and gifts can be a clear indication of many things,” says Bruce Parsons, a Laguna Hills psychologist who has directed couples workshops at UC Irvine and UCLA for 20 years.

These messages include gratitude, regret, manipulation and narcissism.

For example, the woman who buys an expensive watch for her husband and insists he wear it when they go out together has engaged in “narcissistic giving,” according to Parsons, who says the purchase boils down to “Look at him, look at the watch, look at me.”

Often, gifts in a relationship are a reflection of a need for either closeness or autonomy.

“All transactions between intimates are attempts to regulate this optimal closeness or distance,” Parsons says. “If I’m afraid you’re going to overwhelm me, I may withhold gift-giving to protect my sense of autonomy. But if I give you lots of gifts, I’m maneuvering you to be close to me. People with abandonment fears give many, many gifts.”

Some of those who have exchanged large or complex presents say it’s not as complicated as all that. Rather, it’s simply a way to show thoughtfulness or to surprise their mate.

When Diane Birnie Bock, 36, returned to her Balboa Island home after a business trip a few years ago, she found that her then-fiance had left “an array of romantic gifts going straight up the stairs: a big flower bouquet, a box of chocolates, expensive perfume, then a skimpy silk thing to wear. It was very creative, very romantic,” she said.

For another gift, he spent weeks videotaping interviews with 75 of her friends and family members to present her with a “this is your life” video.

When her fiance moved into a Newport Beach apartment, she in turn gathered and wrapped several products for an elaborate beach-theme housewarming gift: swim trunks, a beach chair, towel, a cooler and a body board.

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Some people specify the exact gift they want their spouse to give them, and even tell them where to find it in a particular store.

Still others see birthdays and holidays as the perfect time to buy gifts for themselves.

Jake Grubb of Laguna Niguel “tends to find and buy what he wants while he’s out shopping for Christmas,” says his wife, Mary Mayer. “It’s a way of ensuring he gets exactly what he wants.” Although she also sometimes buys for herself--such as a gold-banded Swatch watch last week for her 40th birthday--the two also buy for each other.

The urgency of the holidays, of course, can mean that a sense of obligation is what drives the gift purchase, or causes the purchase to be made hurriedly or anxiously.

The monthlong shopping experience also leaves couples fully exposed to the relentless and increasingly sophisticated proddings of marketers, who are only too eager to suggest ways in which gifts can ensure and prolong the perfect romance.

One of the most successful and longest-running ads targeted to couples is the diamond industry’s slogan “a diamond is forever”--meaning that a diamond, because of its great hardness, is the ideal symbol of a rock-solid relationship. Giving such a gem, in turn, supposedly symbolizes everlasting affection.

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Gifts do indeed serve as markers and symbols, but they often symbolize aspects of relationships that the diamond industry never intended (as when an estranged spouse hurls her full-carat engagement ring into the Pacific).

One woman, a 44-year-old writer who works in Laguna Beach, said the breakup of her marriage was symbolized by gifts--and the lack of them.

Her husband’s neglect, she said, was never more evident than the Christmas morning when, in front of many family members, he had to sheepishly admit that he’d failed to buy her a present.

“The next Christmas,” she said, “I said to hell with this, and just bought him a pair of jeans. By that time, though, he had realized he was going to lose me, and gave me an expensive camera. But it really meant nothing at that point.”

(She later lost the camera, which she believes was an unconscious act of symbolically dissolving the relationship.)

Even the most inspired present, of course, won’t save a doomed marriage, although a healthy relationship should be able to endure thoughtless gifts, says Loren O’Connor, a San Juan Capistrano marriage counselor.

“Bad gifts won’t make or break a relationship. The wife should be able to say: ‘I love you, but your gift is the pits.’ ”

O’Connor said that men’s hesitancy to give gifts is the result of their general inability to express themselves verbally in relationships.

“Gift-giving can help solve that, and men need to be a little more sensitive to it,” he said.

But he added that the reason some men don’t like to give gifts is that they fear women may want them only for their money.

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Whatever the item given or philosophy behind it, gifts tell a lot about a relationship.

They can suggest a need for change or affirm the suitability of the status quo.

Some longtime married couples, Parsons points out, are comfortable with regimented and predictable gift giving--”Here’s your robe for this year.” Others might not be, wanting instead to be surprised by what’s inside the wrapping.

He estimates that only 10% to 15% of gift-giving within a relationship is independent of all aspects of commercialization, ego and manipulation.

“If I’m a person who tends to withdraw, the greatest gift I can give is attention and time. The greatest gift (my partner) can give me is time to myself,” Parsons says.

Such gifts serve as a supportive gesture of the other person’s true self.

“These are true gifts,” Parsons says. “They’re altruistic.”