Couples Therapy
Our earlier relationships shape and inform how we experience our present ones. Our relationship with our partner is often the most intimate one in adulthood, so this relationship tends to be quite intense. Your early life experiences and how you learned to relate can be stirred up without you knowing how these connect to your current relationship difficulties. In therapy, you can gain clarity, learn skills to pave better communication pathways, and reroute toward more intimate, balanced, and trusting directions.
What I Can Support You With
Looking at how unresolved issues from your past are influencing your present difficulties
Feeling safe in your relationship, especially when you’re feeling vulnerable
Enhancing intimacy and connection while developing appropriate boundaries
Understanding the underlying meaning of your words and behaviours
Improving understanding and empathy for yourself and each other
Learning how to support each other through life transitions
Finding a way to accept and work with difference
Repairing, separating, or divorcing
Rebuilding trust after infidelity
The first step is to meet and discuss what you’re looking for from therapy. I usually ask what you know about the presenting issues and what you notice hasn’t worked. We’ll develop your vision for your relationship and how you may each take steps toward what you desire.
We’ll also explore your dynamic, helping you understand your roles in the problem. Developing insight into the issue is essential for awareness and understanding, but the most crucial element of couples therapy is changing the behavior that isn’t working. I’ll give you tasks to do together outside of therapy to practice relating to each other in ways that work better for you.
“We live in the shelter of each other.”
— Celtic saying
Frequently Asked Questions
+ Who is Couples Therapy For?
Couples therapy is beneficial for any kind of relationship, including
- Heterosexual or LGBTQ relationships
- Interracial relationships
- Couples with different cultural backgrounds
- Young teen or college relationships
- Relationships with a large age gap
- Relationships that are at any stage, including dating, engaged or married
+ How do I know when to come for couples therapy.
Sooner rather than later. The sooner you ask for help the easier it will be to resolve it and the fewer sessions you will need.
+ How do I know if its too late for us?
If the thread that binds you, however fine it may be, still holds, you can still try to save your relationship. Therapy will help you to clarify what is happening and to discover to what extent you are willing to move pieces to make changes.
+ What would we talk about?
A main focus in couples therapy is increasing your clarity about the kind of relationship and life you want to build together and the individual blocks to becoming the kind of partner you aspire to be.