Couples Therapy
Relationships are where we often seek the fulfillment of our deepest needs, hopes, and longings. They also often bring our deepest wounds and patterns to the surface, and can cause great hurt.
Even when couples care deeply for each other, it’s easy to get into destructive cycles of relating to one another that push the connection and need fulfillment that both partners seek further and further away.
In couples therapy, we’ll work to end the destructive cycles that may have created painful distance or persistent conflict in your relationship. In turn, we’ll work to develop greater understanding, safety, emotional connection, and mutual need fulfillment.
Even if your relationship is a often in pretty good place but has some rough spots here and there, couples therapy can support your relationship to navigate challenges with greater ease and deepen your connection.
My approach to couples therapy is based primarily on Emotionally Focused Therapy (EFT).
My work with couples involves helping both partners:
Understand how their experiences in early life, as well as their relationship history, shape how they feel and act in the current relationship.
Own the part they play in unhelpful conflict cycles. This means helping each partner see clearly how certain habitual perceptions and actions play into cycles that create hurt, push connection away, and make it less likely their needs will be met in the relationship.
Learn ways to break out of dysfunctional cycles and work to rebuild emotional safety and security in the relationship, if these have been compromised.
Help each other feel seen for the deeper needs that exist underneath surface-level reactions and the cycles of conflict.
For example, the need to feel safe, to feel like your partner will be there for you when you need them, to feel understood and accepted in your authentic emotional experience, and to feel valued.
Build the capacity and care to better meet each other’s needs and find more contentment, harmony, and emotional closeness in the relationship.
Grow in ways that help you resolve wounds and unhelpful patterns from the past and embrace new ways of feeling and acting toward yourself and your partner.
Relationships are one of the most important parts of life.
A healthy and connected relationship can create the security and contentment that makes everything easier. It can fulfill some of our deepest needs and create a base from which to live a rich and meaningful life.
In contrast, a relationship that has descended into stuck patterns of destructive conflict, misunderstanding, emotional aloneness, and wounding can make everything harder.
If you’re feeling stuck, or are just looking to improve the closeness and collaboration in your relationship, please reach out. Getting outside help can be a big relief and can create shifts that are much harder to make on your own.