Couples Therapy
Have challenges in your relationship left you feeling that you are spending more time arguing than connecting with your partner?
- Do you feel dissatisfied with, stuck in and frustrated by ineffective, ongoing behavior patterns between you and your partner?
- Does it feel like your relationship with your partner is one of the biggest challenges of your life?
- Are you out of sync with your partner and wondering how things got so bad?
- Do you long to reconnect with your partner and enjoy a deep and satisfying intimacy and connection?
Whether you are in a dating relationship, engagement, co-habitation or marriage, communication challenges, sexual concerns or other difficulties can create unease and tension in your relationship. You may disagree with your partner about how to handle finances, maintain a household or raise your children. Larger issues like parenting, religion and politics can leave you feeling like you aren’t on the same page with your significant other. As a result, your communication can suffer, and smaller, day-to-day disagreements can quickly turn into larger conflicts.
Unresolved conflict may leave you and your partner feeling stuck, talking in circles and never agreeing on a solution. You may constantly be thinking about the next thing you are going to say to your partner, yet you don’t feel like you are emotionally attuned to each other anymore.
Do you wish you and your partner could find a way to truly understand and empathize with each other’s emotions and needs?
Questions? Contact me
Almost every couple bumps up against challenges at some point in their relationship
Almost all of us carry wounds from our childhoods and from past relationships into our current partnership. We repeatedly play out dysfunctional patterns of coping and/or responding until we are able to understand what underlies these patterns and heal from these harmful behaviors. Couples face challenges for a wide variety of reasons – these harmful behaviors. Couples face challenges for a wide variety of reasons – such as disagreements over home organization, politics, finances, spirituality/religion, socializing, childrearing, chores, getting along with other family members, etc. When faced with these and other struggles, it’s not uncommon to wonder if your relationship can – or even should – be saved.
But, there’s good news! Couples therapy can help you and your partner discover where your negative, harmful patterns come from, why dysfunctional patterns show up in your relationship and how to work through them.
Couples therapy and marriage counseling with me at Soul Wisdom Therapy can help you heal and strengthen your relationship
Many of the challenges you’re facing in your relationship may have you feeling like your best efforts just aren’t working. Patterns of destructive communication and unresolved conflict may be creating tension or distance when all you really want is to be heard and valued by your partner. If this sounds familiar, I can help you break through harmful cycles and rebuild trust and intimacy with your partner. With guidance and support, you will begin to see the meaning behind your conflict, establish better communication skills and build a stronger, healthier foundation.
What to expect
In couples therapy sessions, our work will begin by identifying and exploring your truth and what your deepest self wants in your relationship. If you are tidy and your partner is messy, or if you are airtight with your money but your partner is more of a spender, drawn out and unresolved conflict over these kinds of issues can make you question if you are with the right person. However, when you are drawn to someone with traits that oppose yours, your soul may be trying to tell you that it is okay to relax or be more flexible in these areas. When you understand what it is you truly want in a relationship, it becomes easier to identify and work through the challenges you are facing.
Recognizing your own deeper needs and desires in a relationship is an important first step in healing and strengthening your relationship. But without clear and open communication, you may fall back out of rhythm with your partner. By remaining honest and accountable in your communication, you and your partner can feel confident that your needs are being understood and respected. When you know you are in sync with your partner, you can become more tolerant and flexible with one another, giving your love room to grow.
I will help you work through unproductive and dysfunctional relationship patterns using a variety of tried and true communication techniques. You, your partner and I can develop relationship goals appropriate for you and your relationship’s unique challenges, which can help you discover and share what you both want and need to feel supported and deeply loved. You can understand how you and your partner’s emotions and past experiences influence the way you interact with each other. You can learn practical techniques that instill compassion and understanding in your communication, rather than reacting by being defensive or placing blame. You can begin turning toward your partner in times of conflict, rather than turning away. Additionally, I can help you navigate any sexual concerns or problems that you may be experiencing or that impact your relationship.
For over 30 years of offering couples counseling, I have been helping couples work through relationship challenges. In addition to traditional couples therapy, I offer services for pre-marital counseling and communication challenges. These days I mostly use a therapy model called Emotionally Focused Therapy that targets the root emotional disturbances in your relationship and how to heal these. disturbances in your relationship and how to heal these. I also use elements of the Gottman Technique, Nonviolent Communication (NVC) skills, Harville Hendrix techniques, and my training in mediation to help couples resolve their differences and thrive.
I love working with couples of all gender and sexual orientations.
But you may still have questions or concerns about couples therapy…
My partner refuses to join me in couples therapy.
It isn’t uncommon for one partner to be hesitant about couples therapy – or therapy in general. Whether it is a fear of how therapy is perceived, a desire to avoid emotions or the concern that their partner and the therapist may gang up on him or her, pushing your partner too hard to come in may yield the opposite of your intended effect. If this is the case, you may want to consider engaging in your own individual therapy, which can help you explore what it is you want for – and bring to – your relationship. When your partner sees the progress you are making, they may become more open to couples therapy.
If we need couples therapy, our relationship must be nearly over anyway.
Couples therapy is an opportunity to work through relationship challenges in a safe, compassionate environment. But that doesn’t mean it won’t be difficult or even painful, and it is natural to worry that something may come up in therapy that will lead to separation or divorce. It is important to remember that you are engaging in therapy because you both want to heal and strengthen your relationship. And, if you or your partner is looking to leave the relationship, I can help you understand the reasons you want to be with each other, what you need that you are not receiving and whether you would both be best served by saving your relationship or letting it go.
We don’t have the money for counseling right now.
In many cases therapy is an investment, taking time and money that are already in short supply. But what is more important than building a healthy, loving relationship where both you and your partner are getting what you need from each other? I will work with you to develop a program that meets your needs and teach you useful strategies and skills to continue healing and strengthening your relationship.
Your relationship deserves to be nurtured and healed, if that is possible. I will walk with you both side by side as we determine exactly what it needs. I have the tools and experience to help your partnership grow and develop into its full potential.
You can create meaningful, lasting change in your relationship
If you are ready to start healing and strengthening the bond you share with your partner, or if you have additional questions about couples therapy, I invite you to schedule a free 15 to 20-minute phone consultation.
Start Your Journey to Soul Wisdom Today—
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