Even the happiest couples experience stress and conflict, and it’s important to learn how to deal with these issues constructively as you continue to build a life together. The goal of marriage counseling is to identify and address any areas of conflict in your relationship and teach partners effective strategies for communicating and resolving issues. It’s important to seek marriage counseling as soon as you recognize you are feeling stuck and having issues in your relationship.
Marriage counseling is also important if you have children. Children can be negatively affected by tension between two parents and can affect everyone in the household. Children can develop major issues if parents don’t seek help and address issues that stress the entire family unit.
Going to marriage counseling sessions can be intimidating at first if you don’t know what to expect. Marriages are hard work and marriage counseling requires effort, time and commitment.
Ask Questions
During the first sessions the therapist will go over the importance of confidentiality and the cancellation policy and make sure you are comfortable with the guidelines and policies. Find out the couple’s counselor’s hours of operations and if you and your partner can only meet in the evening or weekends make sure they are available during these times. People are also often curious about the frequency of counseling of couples counseling and typically how long couples usually stay in counseling.
Many couples like to get feedback and have a marriage therapist who is actively listening and engaged. Talk about goals and make sure your marriage counselor is experienced and has training in working with couples.
Couples may be concerned that the therapist may take sides. It’s very important that you and your partner feel comfortable and that the therapist provides a safe non-judgmental space. A marriage counselor has to be neutral and both you and your partner have to feel they are completely objective. Taking sides can hurt the relationship. So, rather than assign blame, the marriage counselor needs to encourage honesty, empathy, communication and balance.
Your first few sessions will be spent talking about what brought you to marriage counseling in the first place. Honesty and being direct with your partner and marriage counselor is important as you want to grow and make changes with your spouse.
Types of Marriage Counseling
You and your partner want to ask the couples counselor about the modalities the therapist will be using in their approach to the marriage counseling.
Emotional Focused Therapy (EFT,) Imago Relationship Therapy, and The Gottman Method are researched bases modalities and tend to yield good results.
Emotionally Focused Therapy, otherwise known as EFT, is a therapeutic approach specifically focused on relationships, developing deeper connections, and acceptance. Emotionally Focused Therapy (EFT) helps to develop emotional awareness, empathy and helps to create a more secure attachment and bond.
Imago Relationship Therapy is a type of relationship therapy that allows couples to strengthen their connection and heal deep wounds. By helping partners to be more present and empathetic in their conversations with one another, Imago Therapy gives couples an opportunity to navigate misunderstanding, reduce conflict, and re-establish trust.
The Gottman Method is based on many years of research on couples. The Gottman Method addresses a couple’s friendship and how they manage conflicts. You and your marriage counselor work on developing healthier communication patterns; increase intimacy, respect, and affection and create a heightened sense of empathy and understanding for the couple.
Rebuilding Your Connection
Marriage counseling can help you work through frustrating and hurtful patterns and dynamics with your spouse. Marriage counseling helps you learn how to communicate and process issues and emotions so you and your partner are not talking in circles and having the same fight over and over again.
In marriage counseling, you and your partner stop blaming each other and start understanding where the other is coming from. You can also find and practice new ways to communicate, to help you both feel heard when discussing sensitive issues. As you and your partner learn to be both more assertive and more vulnerable with one another, you can start to develop practical solutions and a new sense of closeness.
The goal of marriage counseling is to help you both gain insight into reactions and behaviors so you can transform the dynamics in your relationship. As dynamics shift and you start to experience your relationship differently, you develop greater physical and emotional intimacy.
As you discuss your deepest wants and needs, you might discover that it’s time to go your separate ways. Marriage counseling can help you make this decision in a thoughtful, compassionate way. You can end your relationship amicably, which is valuable for every couple, but especially those with children. You can learn ways to lessen the negative impact on other members of the family and co-parent and communicate in healthier ways.
If you are suffering from having the same fight over and over again and difficulty communicating with your spouse and are interested in starting marriage therapy, Contact us at HERE for a complimentary consultation.
The Relationship Suite
We are a group of skilled therapists specializing in couples and marriage counseling. We provide marriage counseling in New Jersey. To find out more about Relationship Counseling in New Jersey CLICK HERE.
