What can you do to improve the chances that couples therapy is worth the time and money you put into it? In other words, what makes marriage counseling work? Of course you need the help of a skilled marriage therapist, but there are several things you can do to help make your marriage counseling a success.
Have you ever had an argument with someone - a partner, spouse, close friend, child, parent or other relative, or a business associate - that started small and spiraled into an intense conflict? Have you ever scratched your head, wondering how it got so out of control? Let's take a look at what feeds the flames of anger and what diffuses it. Feeding the Flames of Anger
This summer we held our first Keeping Love Alive Marriage Retreat at The Cottage Clinic. It was one of the best experiences of my life. The experiential two and ½ day workshop was based on the best selling book, ‘Hold Me Tight: Seven Conversations for a Lifetime of Love,’ by Sue Johnson. The program presents a streamlined version of Emotionally Focused Couples therapy, an empirically proven approach to creating adult loving relationships – it has a 70-75% success rate for couples!
Dear Kim, You don't know me and I don't know you, but I felt compelled to write you this letter. I am a marriage therapist, and though you haven't asked for my input, I'd like to give it to you as a wedding gift. There's been a lot of buzz about your wedding. Kudos to you on both counts, by the way: one, from the glimpses I got flipping through the channels past ET and walking my cart through the grocery store, it looked beautiful. Of course with several million dollars worth of wedding contributions, it would be hard to screw that up!
If American Pie and Freaky Friday got drunk and haphazard one night and made a baby, it'd be The Change-Up. Check out the movie poster or trailer, and you know what happens. Mitch (Ryan Reynolds) is an underemployed actor and dude-about-town who's never met a skirt he wouldn't chase—or couldn't catch. Dave (Jason Bateman) is his best friend and complete opposite. He's an adult with all the trimmings: three kids, a beautiful wife (Leslie Mann) and an impressive career. And of course, neither is quite happy with his lot in life.
You have a unique, specifically crafted for you Design, Purpose and Evolutionary path that matches your life lessons. Yet…are you living the life that is not yours? Are you trying hard to fit yourself into the human puzzle that does not fit you? You are not alone! We all want to belong, to be like everyone else, and to be loved!
THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN LIFE COACHING & THERAPY: IS THERE ONE? And What is it? Many people ask: “what exactly is the difference between therapy and coaching?” Well, I feel rather well qualified to answer that question although, there are many styles of both therapy and coaching. A lot of LIfe Coaches like to assert with pride: “Coaching isn’t like Therapy”. I feel I’m also rather qualified to speak directly to that as well …
“You’ll never sleep again.” “You have no idea how tired you’ll be.” “Forget sex.” Expecting a baby? You’ve heard it all before. As a recent Wall Street Journal article put it, babies are “So Cute, So Hard on a Marriage.” According to the Relationship Research Institute in Seattle, about two-thirds of couples say that within three years of the birth of a child, conflict and hostility increased dramatically.
For many couples, the idea of bringing a third party into their intimate relationship is scary—or just plain out of the question. Luckily, the stigma associated with couples therapy is well on its way out. Healthy couples are enlisting counseling professionals to help work through sticky patches, large and small, and are the better for it.
How do you know when a marriage is past the point of saving? With the advent of no-fault divorces in the 1970s, it became especially easy for couples to escape their unhappy marriages, despite there being no clear breach of the marital contract. After all, who wants to languish in a loveless marriage when one's true love may still be out there, waiting? Poor communication? Lack of respect? Absence of support? Diminished intimacy? Why deal with it!? The thing is, that initial happy-go-lucky honeymoon period doesn't last forever, and problems with respect and intimacy can easily crop up, no matter how much you care for each other. Healthy relationships take work that most people don't expect. Despite what the Hollywood rom-coms would have us believe, love isn't necessarily easy.
You're not looking at your ring finger like you use to...
