Couples Therapy: How effective is your relationship therapy?
For many of life’s problems, counseling or therapy isn’t necessary as human beings are resilient and able to overcome many obstacles. Yet when it seems like the right answers just won’t come to you and the problem just won’t go away or even gets worse, therapy is your helping hand. Most all of us can stand to have a little more happiness and that is what therapy is all about; to make your life better, happier, and more fulfilling.
Here you’ll learn how does couples therapy work (hvordan fungerer parterapi).
Most of the time relationship counseling is primarily focused on teaching communication and active listening skills while the therapist helps the couple remain calm. These skills can be extremely effective in solving a problem. But what happens when you are not sitting in an office with a therapist there coaching you through it? Generally, most people forget the difficult skills they learned in counseling and without the therapist present there is no one to soothe them, to make them feel calmer.
So you go home and eventually the inevitable day comes and you have a confrontation with your partner, both of you are angry and the tension between you is rising. You might think to yourself “Oh this is where I use validation and paraphrasing…but how is that done…and really I am so angry I don’t care!” This is what Gottman, a well renowned couple’s therapist, calls “emotional gymnastics.” Attempting to remember unnatural skills while in a state of high emotional arousal.
Probably the worst outcome with experiences like this is when couples begin to feel like they are incapable of working together. “If what we learned in counseling can’t help us than there is no hope for us.” The couple may give up or even try to give counseling another go only to end up having the same experience over again. It is certainly understandable how such feelings of failing would leave a couple without any hope for the future of their relationship. If you still want to know more about how does couples therapy work (hvordan fungerer parterapi), following the advice below.
Is there any hope for your relationship?
Yes, in fact there is. But it does not involve working on your communication skills. I hear so often, “we just can’t communicate with each other.” That is just not true. What about when you are not arguing or before your relationship went sour? Were you able to express your needs to your partner? Are you able to talk about things that are fun or pleasant?
If your answer is yes to any of these, than you do not have a problem communicating with your partner. If you cannot answer yes to any of these you may need to discuss emotional abuse with your therapist rather than lack of communication. So, what happens is that you both become so emotional and defensive when you are angry or feeling unheard that it feels like you are unable to communicate with each other.
You can get your point across, the problem is not with your or your partner’s ability to talk to each other, it is basically that you are trying to get it across to brick wall. It just does not happen when the one you are communicating with is not responsive to what you say, not to mention the fact, that you too are trying so hard to get your point across that you are not responsive to your partner.
Lasting and Happy relationships
There is hope for your relationship to not only last a long time, but in fact, to be happy. What I work on with couples is based on
It is never too late to create what it takes to have a long-lasting and happy relationship
Gottman’s theory of marriage counseling. His extensive research has shown that couples are happier in their relationship when they are able to sooth themselves and each other during arguments, they are able to influence each other, they are accepting of each other (even the traits they do not like), and rather than being able to effectively solve all their problems they are able to create a dialogue and talk to each other about the problem.