Does it feel like the feeling’s gone?
- Your partner isn’t the person you fell in love with.
- The communication gap between you widens every day.
- Your partner won’t talk about it.
- You’ve been unhappy for so long it feels like it’s too late.
- Your relationship feels dead.
Since you’re reading this article, it’s likely you still care enough about your partner and your relationship to want to help it — if you only knew how.
Most marriages should be given a chance to succeed.
Marriage counseling can help you restore the trust and intimacy your relationship once enjoyed so that you’ll both have a secure place to learn techniques and tools that can actually make a difference.
- Resolve past hurts and painful memories
- Put an end to endless arguments
- Overcome differences in parenting styles
- Improve your intimacy and sex life
- Heal from an affair
- Grow closer together
- Take an active, involved and interested role in the life you’ve created together
Behavioral research is often focused on the clinical effectiveness of couples therapy but the subject of couples therapy is in the out-loud American mainstream, too. Attention runs the gamut from on-line and print articles, to films like Couples Retreat, to playing supportive roles in television dramas like The Sopranos.
Most marriage counselors would agree that a couple’s motivation to make their relationship work is the single most important factor in determining the success of couples counseling. Beware the seduction of obtaining a promise from your partner to “work on the relationship” if one of their feet is out the door. Breaking up is hard to do, there’s enough hurt to go around, so sometimes one partner “buys time” by agreeing to couples counseling. Therapy also seems to be less successful for couples who wait too long before seeking help. Unfortunately, the average number of years a distressed couple waits before seeking help is 6 years.
If you and your partner are serious about creating the best relationship possible, marriage counseling is an excellent way to explore your relationship and help each of you uncover and overcome destructive relational patterns. Hopefully, before 6 years go by.
Kathe Skinner has been a Marriage & Family Therapist for 20 years. She specializes in couples work, especially with relationships where invisible disability is part of the mix. She and her husband David have been married for 29 years and together provide a Secular Couple Communication Workshop throughout the year. They live with their 2 hooligan cats in Colorado Springs.
Couples Who Talk 