Michelle Piper, MS, LMFT

Never do we learn as much about ourselves, as when we love and care for another. The people with whom we share our lives can be mirrors reflecting the best and worst within us, and at other times, windows into the joy, the pain, and the triumphs experienced by all humanity. Couples therapy can help partners meet each others' needs in a healthy, mutually supportive way; facilitate communication in the midst of a crisis; and provide a safe, neutral environment where unvoiced and unacknowledged hurts can be expressed and dealt with.

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When Should I Go To Marriage or Couples Counseling?

If you're asking this question, then you already know that something's not quite right in your relationship. You may have noticed certain topics the two of you just can't seem to talk about in a productive way. Or, you and your partner might be experiencing a loss of attraction toward one another. You may be asking yourself: what do we even have in common anymore? There may also be a feeling of distance, aggravated perhaps, by certain patterns or repititive behaviors that drive a wedge between the two of you. All of these circumstances are warning signs signaling a lost sense of partnerhsip and intimacy that you once enjoyed in your relationship. Communication has broken down, or ceased altogether with your spouse. If this sounds familiar, you're not alone.

Most couples wait too long to start marriage or couples counseling, which is unfortunate, because the tools available to you in therapy are simple to learn, and powerful once implemented. So often I hear couples express something along the lines of: "Wow…this stuff isn't that hard, and we are so much better now—why did we put it off?"

When I hear this sentiment, I explain that the communication and emotional management skills at play in a happy marriage are akin to flipping on a light switch for the first time: if you honestly had no idea that the gadget on the wall could make such a difference in a dark room, how would you ever know to use it? After you've aquired the skills and learned the techniques involved in sustaining an effective relationship, however, there's just no going back to the old way of doing things.

In ten-plus years of couples counseling, it's been my experience that couples who learn what an effective system of communication looks like in a relationship, learn the skills necessary to carry them through a variety of challenges in your life together; but without these skills, built on an understanding of how good communication actually works, it is natural for resentments and bad habits to build a wall between you and the person you were once excited to be with. The difference is literally night and day.

One interpretation of the word 'crisis' is CRISIS = DANGER + OPPORTUNITY. Nowhere perhaps, is this view more apt, than in the context of marital and relationship crisis. Because crisis arises from the need to change something in the relationship, or to adapt to the underlying aspects of one another's personalities that may have not been evident in the beginning stages of couplehood, tremendous growth becomes possible, more so than at any other period the two of you have so far shared. But the danger is also real, because at these times of crisis, the average person is at their least effective in terms of their ability to communicate with their partner, or even to deal with their own painful emotions, and so, too often, the opportunity for growth goes unrealized.

As a former High School humanities teacher, I often think what a shame it is that there are no required courses in the curriculum which would provide everyone with an understanding of how to form and build intimate, lasting relationships. Fortunately, as a therapist I am able to teach these skills rather quickly when one or both couples are motivated to learn.

One way I help couples learn these skills and get out of crisis is to encourage both of you to set a modest goal, such that the achievement of this goal has real and meaningful value to each of you. Working together on this kind of goal, we can typically see significant progress in as little as three sessions. At the conclusion of these three sessions, we evaluate how well the two of you have progressed on your relationship goal, and if, as a couple, you feel further counseling would be beneficial. In this way, no one feels "roped into" therapy, and the decision to press ahead, or to seek alternatives is mutual, and based real results.