If you’ve never attended couples therapy before, it can seem like a mysterious process. There’s often a shame or stigma attached to needing to go to couples therapy, so it’s rare that people talk about it with friends and family. At the same time, representations of couples therapy in films and TV are often exaggerated for dramatic effect, and convey little about what really goes on in the room.
Most people who show up to couples therapy are doing so because they are in a crisis of one kind or another, and are experiencing a lot of pain. This can look like one partner being at breaking point, ready to leave the relationship, or both partners reeling from the discovery of a betrayal. As such, they are hoping to repair their relationship, and couples therapy is often the last chance to salvage things, because all else has failed.
Once people manage to stabilize the relationship, they are then presented with the opportunity to make things better. In many cases people idealize an earlier time in the relationship, maybe when you were dating or before you had kids, and yearn to go back to this time. Unfortunately, we cannot go back in time. As such, you might like to instead think about upgrading the relationship from version 1.0 to version 2.0, creating something far superior to what you’ve ever had.
In order to get there, a significant investment is asked of you. On the surface this means investing your time, money and energy. But on a deeper level, it means a willingness to be vulnerable, the courage to express your deepest thoughts and feelings, and an openness to confronting your outdated habits and ways of being, before creating new ones.
Given that you’re making such a significant investment, I’d wager you wish to get the most out of that investment. Below are 3 steps you can take to ensure that you get the most out of your time in couples therapy. While there is no easy way to tell how long the process will take, in my experience couples who follow these steps not only have a better chance at succeeding, but also get there a lot quicker.
Step 1 - Define Clear, Positive and Achievable Goals
Since most people who attend couples therapy are in crisis mode, they often have one primary goal when beginning our work together: to stop the pain. They’ve had enough of the fighting, or feeling unloved, and just want the pain to go away. This makes complete sense given how important our relationships are to us, and how much we invest in our partner.
However, if people have spent so long enduring pain and discomfort in their relationship, they tend to only be able to see the negative side of the relationship, and their partner. They can find it very difficult to even imagine what it would look like if things improved, and couples therapy was a success. As with most endeavors, it’s important to have clear goals, otherwise you’re eventually going to feel like you’re directionless, with no clear end in sight. I encourage you to contemplate your goals for couples therapy, and to formulate goals that are clear, positive, and achievable.
A clear goal is one that could be explained to a random stranger who knows nothing about you or your relationship. Instead of “I want Dennis to stop that thing he does every morning because it drives me crazy”, something like “I want Dennis to greet me every morning when he wakes up”.
A positive goal is one that is framed in such a way that it conveys what you want to happen, rather than what you don’t want to happen. “I want Tracey to stop being so lazy and pig-headed”, try “I want Tracey and I to work better together as a team”.
When your goal is achievable, you’ll know when you’ve accomplished it, rather than feeling like it has no end point. Rather than “I want us to communicate better”, something like “I want us to sit down for an hour a week to discuss our relationship in a way that is constructive”.
You might not be able to tick all three boxes when formulating goals, but hopefully it gives you a place to start. If you’re struggling to think of something, consider asking yourself the following:
What hopes and dreams did you have coming into this relationship? In what way have these been fulfilled, or not?
If you are married, or were to get married, what vows did you or would you make to your partner? Most wedding vows allude to loving, honoring and respecting each other - is this what currently happens in your relationship?
If you could have everything you ever wanted in a relationship, what would that look like? Describe your ideal relationship in positive terms.
While no relationship is perfect, and there’s no guarantee that your relationship will be everything that you ever dreamed of, it’s worthwhile thinking about this to get closer to what your goals are for your relationship. In my experience couples often aim far too low when it comes to setting goals for our work together, and once the pain goes away they don’t really know what they’re aiming at anymore.
Step 2 - Take An Active Role In The Process
Most couples who come to couples therapy are facing significant challenges in their relationship, and as a result are experiencing a lot of pain, discomfort and disappointment. It's natural to hope that I, as a therapist, will be the one who has the magic solution to this, like a doctor who can cure you of an illness with a bottle of pills.
It is never easy to see someone in pain and discomfort, nor to watch two people who once loved each other now have nothing but contempt for one another. That said, no couples therapist keeps a stock of magic wands, love potions or genie lamps in their office. There's a saying that "couples therapy doesn't work; couples work". The spirit behind this is that I cannot do this work for you; I can never force anyone to do or say something they do not want to do, and cannot control what happens outside of our sessions.
It would make little sense to go to a personal trainer and expect them to do the workout for you. Even though it would save you the effort of having to run on a treadmill or lift heavy weights, it would mean you never get any closer to your goals.
The same logic applies to couples counseling. While a couples therapist is often a guide, teacher and confidant in the journey of improving your relationship, they cannot do the work for you. If you are hoping to come to couples therapy expecting the therapist to “do” something to you or to “fix” your partner for you, you’re setting yourself up for failure.
In addition, once you leave the room, the therapist has absolutely no power to influence your relationship, and no say in what you do, or do not do, with each other. As such, the burden of responsibility is on both of your shoulders outside of sessions to implement what you’ve learned, and do your homework. If you’re unsure of what you should be doing, or want homework, you’re always welcome to ask.
A therapist can only work with what is presented to them. It is far more productive to work with two people who are willing to be honest, vulnerable and take accountability for their part in the relationship, than it is to work with two people who are defensive, critical, and playing the victim. Carefully consider whether or not you’re choosing to take an active role in improving your relationship, as this attitude can have a dramatic impact on your success in couples therapy.
Step 3 - Noticing and Navigating Resistance
Nearly all couples that I’ve worked with found the process at some point to be a mixture of difficult, frustrating, scary, confusing or anxiety inducing. It’s a rare thing indeed for a couple to be excited about attending a session, and most of the time they’re absolutely dreading it.
Given that couples therapy is associated with so many negative emotions, it’s important to note that you will likely, at one time or another, feel some kind of resistance to attending a session or continuing the process. This can take many different forms, and may not at the time even feel like it’s related to couples therapy at all. Sometimes it can look like:
Believing the relationship is fine because you haven’t been fighting lately
Rescheduling or canceling appointments several weeks in a row due to work, kids, babysitters, illness, family commitments and a variety of other life circumstances
Wanting to move to fortnightly, monthly, or ‘drop in’ sessions early on in the process due to money, time, energy levels, or outside commitments
This isn’t to say that some of these aren’t legitimate reasons to not be able to attend couples therapy. I completely understand and sympathize with the fact that life happens; we get sick, kids get in the way, and babysitters are suddenly unavailable. What I’m hinting at is that there can be more to the story here.
Remember how I said earlier that couples often come to couples therapy to make the pain go away? What I’ve noticed over time is that, in the beginning stages, it’s the pain that’s motivating people to come. They hope that couples therapy will help them to get rid of the pain. And the good news is, that it often does! In the first 4-6 sessions most couples experience a noticeable decrease in their distress and discomfort levels in the relationship.
However, couples therapy often causes a level of distress and anxiety due to all of those feelings I mentioned. Showing up, talking about problems in your relationship, and being vulnerable, can feel really stressful. You might even reach a point where it feels like things are going so well that there’s no need to mess with a good thing, and opt to let sleeping dogs lie. This is all linked to resistance.
I’m intentionally being direct here because I want you to know that there is so much potential awaiting you beyond this resistance. If you are able to push past the resistance, show up, and do the work, you are setting yourself up for a much better relationship.
This links back to your goals. Rather than aiming for a mediocre relationship with less conflict that you used to have, I urge you to consider what it would look like if you had the relationship of your dreams. Think about how the investment you’re making today could pay off for you, not only in the short run, but in 5, 10, 20 years from now.
It’s normal and natural for the resistance to come up. If it does, notice it, flag it, and bring it up with your partner, or better yet, talk about it in couples therapy. Often these moments can be a tipping point into a deepening of the work in couples therapy, and only through entering into that space can you truly achieve the relationship you’re desiring.
Closing Thoughts
When I first meet a couple, I often ask them if they’ve ever received any kind of formal training or education on how to make a relationship work. The answer is almost always ‘no’. It’s rather bizarre that we receive no guidance on how to do any of this, especially when the human mind, and romantic relationships, are some of the most complex phenomena we know of. To complicate matters further, most of us are bringing into our relationships a set of patterns, beliefs and ideas about relationships which come from some pretty unreliable sources, whether that’s our family home, Hollywood, or social media.
Couples therapy, like most things in life, is subject to the principle that “you get out of it what you put in”. It is my hope that this article has given you some things to consider as you embark upon the journey of improving your relationship. Alongside helping you to ease the pain in your relationship, this process is really all about teaching you how to be in relationship. It’s about helping you to better understand yourself as a person, including your needs and wants, hopes and dreams, and why you do what you do. It’s also about helping you to better understand the stranger you’ve chosen to spend your life with. If you’re truly willing to give your all to this process, there is enormous potential awaiting you on the other side.
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