What is Couple Counselling?
Couples counselling is a type of therapy that focuses on helping couples navigate challenges in their relationships, improve communication, resolve conflicts, and enhance their overall connection. Specific themes I work with are:
Guiding couples and families through significant life transitions:
- embarking on marriage
- experiencing the arrival of a new or subsequent baby
- undergoing separation and divorce
- navigating family and stepfamily dynamics
- LGBTQI+ relationships
Helping couples support each other through individual challenges:
- the devasting impacts of PTSD
- childhood scars and the echoes of past traumas
- the grasp of addiction
- sexuality transitions
Working through sensitive issues impacting the relationship:
Affairs and infidelity:
Navigating the rocky terrain of infidelity and affairs can be an incredibly challenging journey. I understand the complex emotions, shattered trust, and confusion that come with it. Infidelity doesn't have to signal the end of a relationship. It can be an opportunity for growth, understanding, and renewed commitment.
Intimacy and sexuality:
In addition, intimacy and sexuality are integral aspects of a fulfilling relationship. However, challenges in these areas can lead to emotional distance and frustration. I will guide you to learn techniques and tools from the discipline of sexology to enhance and address intimacy challenges for couples.
Don't let intimacy and sexuality issues continue to strain your relationship. It is possible to reconnect with your partner and enjoy intimacy that evolves with your relationship.
What can I expect in sessions?
The first session begins with a timeline of your relationship, current strengths and challenges and what you both hope to achieve.
In between the first and second session you will complete an online assessment which will help to provide a comprehensive picture of what is happening in your relationship.
The second session will be an individual session with each partner to discuss family history, possible impact of past relationships, challenges in your current relationship from an individual perspective and what you would like to achieve.
We then come back together, and I share insights about your unique dynamic. We then agree on a tailored plan to address your specific challenges and expectations to navigate us through subsequent sessions.
Why do we complete an assessment?
A quote from Andy Greendorfer sums up the concept of couple assessment brilliantly "Driving faster won't get you there any quicker if you don't know where you are going". Applying a cookie cutter approach to couple counselling does not do the complex nature of relationships justice.
The Gottman Relationship Checkup is completed online to generate unique summary reports for the couple. It has been developed and refined with over 40 years of research and is used globally.
The assessment tool focuses on the key conditions and behaviors that lead relationships to succeed or fail and provides a tailored roadmap to ensure the correct challenges are being addressed.