Couples Counseling for All Relationships
Couples come in many forms and face challenges that can destroy relationships.
Are you living more like roommates rather than lovers?
Are date nights a thing of the past? Do you communicate more through texts and a shared calendar than over dinner? Are you more likely to know what your partner has been doing because of their posts on social media than spending time together? Do you still hold hands? Is intimacy only for birthdays and anniversaries?
Do you love each other and generally get along, but…
Fighting more than you want to or ever imagined? Have different ideas about your sex life and the role of intimacy in your relationship? Disagree about how to parent and raise the children? Disagree about how your mother-in-law and father-in-law determine your life together? Having difficulty adjusting to having children? Having difficulty with someone going back to work or school?
Do you love your partner and want to support them with the challenges of anxiety, depression, grief, loss, or past sexual or childhood abuse?
Learn how to support your partner. Understand that your partners reactions are often not specifically about what you are doing right now. For a person who has experienced trauma their reaction is an automatic response by their body trying to protect them from being hurt again. The response is a survival mechanism that all humans have. When people experience trauma, their body is often on high alert and is sensitive to any stimulus that could be associated with past trauma experiences. Trauma response can come even come when you lovingly and lightly touch your partner on a certain spot on their back. It’s important to remember that your partner’s body is reacting to a perceived danger which, most likely, has nothing to do with you in that moment.