Making the Relationship Work
Couples don’t always find it easy to talk to each other. Sometimes people only make the first appointment to see a therapist after years of unhappiness and exhausting striving, often making themselves do more and more of the very things that aren’t working - or even driving their partners further away.
It can be very difficult to initiate change, however deeply you are suffering, and making the first move to come and see a couples therapist may not be easy. But once you have taken this step, couples therapy can provide a safe and supportive space to help you make the most of your relationship, and make the right choices about it.
In couples therapy, you come together to sessions. There is an opportunity to explore your relationship in a safe and thoughtful setting, to express your concerns and frustrations about the relationship and to constructively address the expectations, beliefs and entrenched patterns of relating that each of you may, without realizing it, be bringing to it.
In the supportive, unjudging atmosphere offered by the therapist you can learn to listen to each other more constructively, see things better from each other’s point of view and rediscover intimacy and fulfilment.
Couples therapy can help you
- communicate more effectively
- learn how to listen to each other, and to hear the unspoken messages beneath the words
- understand and improve the way you deal with each other’s emotions
- increase intimacy at all levels, including sexually
- learn how to manage conflicts productively
- have more fun together
- repair the damage that jealousy, resentment and insecurity can cause
- learn how to talk about difficult subjects
- get more of what you want and less of what you don’t want
- build trust and closeness
Ending the Relationship
Sometimes, one or both of a couple will come to the decision - either before entering therapy or during the course of it - that it will be best to end the relationship.
In these circumstances, the therapy provides a safe, thoughtful relationship in which the difficulties and painful feelings arising from relationship breakdown can be held and processed.
In this space, difficult situations and decisions, including those involving children, finances and other matters, can be faced and resolved, giving separating partners the confidence to rebuild their lives.
How Couples Therapy Works
In the first session there will be an opportunity for you each to outline the difficulties as you see them and for us to begin to think about how to address them most effectively, in a way that will work for both of you.
If we agree to continue, we will decide whether to meet for a fixed number of sessions, or for open ended therapy. There will be room in subsequent sessions for each of you to talk about your feelings, need and frustrations and what has brought you to this point, and to be really heard.
The intitial assessment session lasts for up to 90 minutes and costs £75. Subsequent sessions last for one hour, and cost £65.
Couples therapy is confidential.
You do not have to be married or living together to come for couples therapy, and I see both heterosexual and gay couples.
I am sorry that I have no vacancies at the moment. My waiting list is also now full, and so temporarily closed
