What is Couple/Relationship Therapy?
Couple or relationship therapy is psychotherapy focused on helping romantic partners work through issues in their relationship. Relationships require maintenance just like anything else, and professional help can provide you with the skills to help nurture your relationship. Often romantic partners spend many unhappy years together before deciding to pursue couple therapy. While a couples at any stage in their relationship can benefit from therapy, either to improve their relationship or to decide whether ending the relationship is best, it is recommended to address relationship problems as early as they arise, particularly if communication is at the heart of the issue (which it often is). This will help to facilitate repair in the relationship and prevent further rupture. Your therapist will likely utilize a combination of therapeutic modalities, interventions and approaches to help tailor the treatment to your specific needs, including:
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Emotionally-Focused Therapy (EFT)
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Imago Relationship Therapy
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Meet with you together for most sessions, but may have some one-on-one sessions to better understand each partner's thoughts, feelings and history
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Help you to determine if you and your partner(s) have the same or different goals
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Assess for strengths and vulnerabilities of your relationship
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Assign homework activities (applying what you've learned outside of your sessions with structured exercises for reducing conflict, improving communication, and enhancing sexual intimacy)
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May at times, recommend individual therapy
What Concerns can we hope to address?
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Communication
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Conflict
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Infidelity
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Building trust
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Enhancing emotional intimacy
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Enhancing sexual intimacy
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Opening up
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Low sexual desire
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Desire discrepancies
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Navigating kinks & fetishes
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Performance anxiety
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Erectile dysfunction
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Premature ejaculation
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Delayed ejaculation or orgasm
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Anorgasmia (difficulty with orgasm)
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Fertility-related concerns
How often should we Attend?
We recommend couples start by attending weekly or bi-weekly 50 or 75-minute sessions, especially if they are in crisis and moving to maintenance sessions after the couple's primary goals have been met. We also recommend for couples to schedule a follow-up session a few months after their work is complete to consolidate their gains and fine-tune their skills. The first session is usually done with both partners present, and the next two are typically individual sessions with each partner to get to know each of you better.