“The first duty of love is to listen.” – Paul Tillich
Being in a relationship can be really painful. Many of the couples I work with have gotten into a tight spot, pointing fingers at each other, due to issues like infidelity, being taken for granted, feeling neglected and uncared for. This cycle can make it difficult to remember the love that brought you together in the first place, and make you doubt your future as a couple.
Couples Therapy
In couples therapy, I set out to understand each partner’s emotional state and what has informed it. Are you hopeful, or about to give up? What are your expectations for a lifelong relationship? How do your family backgrounds inform this? Do these underlying assumptions create much friction? We’ll work to understand the injuries and dynamics that cause problems for your relationship and find ways to bring in some hope and healing.
Couples often fight as a response to feelings of disconnection and lack of appreciation. I can help identify and understand these patterns, guiding you to understand each other more deeply, and to build up your ability to hold your partner in mind. I will help you to cultivate an attitude of love and respect, helping you to maintain healthy boundaries while being available for feeling more connected and solve the problems that come up more quickly.
Safe for Men
Many men dread the prospect of being dragged into therapy. The fear is that the therapist will join forces with the more “emotional” female partner and then blame him for all the problems. This can be stressful and forestall the therapy.
In working with men, I bring a broad perspective, a non-judgmental stance, and a bit of humor. I’ll help you to improve your relationship and see more clearly what you are doing (and not doing) that affects your relationship. You’ll both have an ally here, but I’ll talk straight with you if I think your behavior is causing trouble in your relationship.
I can help you to:
- Stop fights from escalating
- Identify and change the underlying patterns that cause them
- Become more aware of each other’s emotional needs
- Find a path forward to greater safety
In couples therapy, you can learn to:
- Build respect and trust for each other
- Increase your ability to manage strong emotions
- Communicate with clarity and honesty
- Turn disagreements into opportunities for growth
- Have a more satisfying sex life
- Collaborate together to meet your individual and joint needs
Premarital Counseling
In addition to couples therapy I also offer premarital counseling based on the Prepare/Enrich approach. Couples who are thinking about getting married often find the breadth of this survey to be a solid grounding for heading into a lifelong commitment.
Thinking about Divorce
Sometimes the agenda is a little different in that couples are looking to decide whether or not to continue a relationship. I can help step you through a process in which you can decide a way forward, informed by the “Discernment Counseling” method.