Couples Enhancement
I see couples that have just met and are starting their relationship, married couples and couples who have been together for 30 years, raised a family, and find themselves not knowing who they’re married to anymore. Whatever your circumstances, couple’s counseling can assist you in identifying problem areas and help you to move forward as partners, or make the decisions you need to make regarding ending a relationship that is no longer serving you.
When I see any configuration of people, whether its a couple committed to monogamous companionship, those thinking about opening their relationship to a third party (i.e. having a child, or considering including other partners in their dynamic), or poly groups looking for systemic tweaks, I remind myself that when people come together, they come from different family systems that they bring with them. Each person brings into a relationship their own expectations and assumptions of what an “ideal” relationship is to them. Unspoken expectations and assumptions can be a pitfall in any relationship…whether its a friendship turned friends with benefits, a long-term partnership, or a second, third, fourth, or fifteenth marriage.
Exploring expectations and assumptions, communications styles, family of origin dynamics, learning to identify and address “normal marital sadism,” fighting fair, and learning how to hold oneself and the other in inclusive compassion after a disagreement are some of the crucial areas that couple’s counseling can help with.
I am committed to seeing any challenges you face in your relationships from a systemic perspective. I work in session to guide you in enactments that will shift unintentional coercion to conscious consent, create experiences that will allow you and your partner to learn to give and receive nurturing support, and invite your inner children and inner healers to lovingly encounter each other.
