Why Consider Couples Therapy?

Couples may experience a need for some assistance in helping them understand why areas of their relationship are so painful or frustrating. Some couples may want to take a longer time to explore specific emotional areas of their relationship that have been unfulfilling and hurtful. Yet other couples may want to improve their relationship in order to feel more connected and fulfilled.

Concerns couples frequently express:

• Mutual distrust
• Partner is overly critical
• Feeling misunderstood by partner
• Disappointment with partner
• Partners can't connect; feel like there is a wall between them
• Relationship is too close or too demanding - one or both need some space
• Relationship lacks safety

The aim for Couples Therapy:

• To create a safe space in which couples can connect to each other
• To free couples from their power struggles
• To teach communication skills (we call this "the Couples Dialogue") which will assist each partner to better understand the other
• To coach each partner in the "art of containment and listening" in order to create a safe context for connection
• To teach and put into practice the skill of converting frustrations that have led to power struggles into mutual understanding of partner's needs; to learn how to respond with appropriate healing behaviors in order to meet those needs
• To explore the origins of frustrations and to understand how these patterns are producing similar frustrations within the current relationship
• To help partners look inward and discover the qualities in themselves that they dislike and are projecting onto their partner; and to learn to recognize and acknowledge them as their own
• To encourage couples to move beyond their power struggles and to learn to accept their partner as a whole person desiring to grow and heal emotional injuries from their past