Couples Therapy: Is it Right for You?

by Dr. Diana Maatouk

When marriages and other forms of committed relationships suffer and struggle, people have to decide if the bond they share is worth fighting for. It’s rarely a yes-or-no question, but when people struggle to decide on how to move forward together, couples therapy is often at the top of the list of solutions.?

While a tremendous tool in the right circumstances, couples therapy should not be thought of as a cure-all or a guaranteed solution to anyone’s relationship problems. In fact, before relationship partners even sit down with a therapist and start telling their side of the story in hopes of finding some common ground, they need to figure out the most important question of the entire process: Is couples therapy right for us?

While counselors have the natural desire to want to help as many individuals as possible succeed with overcoming life’s issues and struggles, counseling two people at the same time is another story.

It requires both parties being ready, willing, and able to enter into a trusting environment where everyone is respected and things said in therapy are not used as ammunition outside of the session.

Circumstances Where Couples Therapy Won’t Work

Before considering therapy with your partner, review the following statements to see if any of them are true, which could make therapy ineffective.

There is emotional or physical abuse from your partner

This is the ultimate deal-breaker. If one person is being victimized by the other, couples therapy is not a good idea, Since it’s extremely unlikely that either partner will admit that the abuse is going on, the therapist won’t be able to accurately gauge the relationship. Moreover, abuse of any kind involves one person holding power over the other. If the person being abused is revealing transparent, personal thoughts and emotions in a therapy session, the likelihood of the abuser using that information in a negative way skyrockets.

No relationship is worth any sort of abuse.?

The desire to attend counseling is only one person’s idea

Communication is brought up a lot in couples’ counseling, but if you don’t at least get agreement from your partner to commit to it, they are unlikely to give it their whole effort. Many partners only agree to go to counseling as a way to placate the other person or to keep the relationship afloat a while longer. We can compare this to trying to ride a two-person bike up a mountain, but only one person is pedaling. The odds of them reaching the top are terribly low.

You Aren’t Willing to Change

You refer to either person here. If you are going to therapy thinking the other person is the one who has to get better, you’re right, but you’re also wrong. Going to couples therapy means committing to working together to understand each other better and make the necessary changes to continue the evolution of the relationship so that both partners’ needs are being met. It’s not a one-way street.

You Have Secrets You Won’t Share?

Therapists go to great lengths to make therapy sessions into safe environments where both partners can share their feelings and thoughts without judgement or retribution. If both people are committed, this allows progress to be made. If they aren’t, the change stagnates. The nature of the secret itself - be it an addiction, an affair, resentment towards the other partner, distrust, etc. - isn’t nearly as important as the ability to come clean about it.?

Circumstances Where Therapy Can Work

On the other side of the equation, there are plenty of life circumstances where couples therapy can work.? These include, but are not limited to the following:

An Unexpected Life Change: People struggle to adjust to big changes, especially if they’ve been in a relationship for a while. Changes in careers, a move, the kids heading off into the real world, or someone getting sick all qualify as events that can foment disagreements that lead to couples struggling.

A Lack of Trust: Trust is a fragile thing- so easy to break, so hard to rebuild. Whether it’s an affair, a secret credit card, a discovered lie, or something else that has come out and damaged the trust between two people, if they both want to restore it, a therapist can help them build that bridge.?

Frequent Arguments: If more and more discussions and decisions are turning into arguments that leave one or both parties wanting to win the point rather than solve the problem, you’ve got trouble. Every little thing starts to feel more like ammunition for a future fight rather than the ups and downs of daily life. When both partners recognize this, the ability to reset and find new ways to communicate exists.

Final Thoughts

It’s never easy to be in a relationship. To put someone else’s needs above our own goes against a lot of our most basic survival instincts. When times get a little tough, couples therapy can offer a unique form of support that helps both partners find common ground, but they have to be committed to the process and honest with themselves about what they are bringing to the session.