Couples And Marriage Counseling
Do you feel that you are not being heard and understood in your relationship? Do you find yourself if repetitive arguments where the issues don’t get resolved but the hurt keeps getting deeper?
Do you feel your marriage is not what it used to be? That you and your partner are getting more distant and you’re starting to lose hope that anything will ever change? If you feel that you are ready for a change, our psychotherapists at Emergence Psychotherapy can help with building the foundations of a healthy relationship.
Why seek couples counseling?
There are many reasons to seek couple and marriage counseling. Below you can find some of the most common difficulties that cause couples to seek therapy:
- Difficulty in communicating with one another in a healthy manner
- Feeling dismissed and invalidated
- Issues with intimacy
- Difficulty navigating life transitions such as experiencing loss or immigration
- Arguments that escalate very quickly without ever reaching a resolution
- Problems with divisions of responsibilities
- Infidelity or betrayal
- Parenting or co-parenting challenges
- Navigating ethnic, religious, cultural, and racial differences in a relationship
- Problems with in-laws and boundary setting
- feelings of abandonment and emotional disconnection
How can couples therapy help?
Couples therapy can help people to de-escalate conflict and move towards problem-solving. In toxic relationships, partners often mistreat each other and engage in patterns of behavior that only exacerbate the existing emotional wounds. Couples therapy helps individuals become aware of dysfunctional patterns of their interactions that contribute to the maintenance of the cycle of hurt and disconnection.
Without change, these unhealthy patterns of behavior can gain momentum, leading partners to feel stuck in an unhealthy relationship that is draining them rather than being a source of love and safety for them. Couples/ marriage therapy can help partners to gain a better understanding of each other and learn new skills to meet each other’s needs in a way that doesn’t compromise their own self-care. Relationship counseling can also improve the mental health of individuals, as partners learn to be present for each other in the healing process.
Premarital Couples therapy and counseling
Premarital counseling is a form of therapy that can help you and your partner to prepare psychologically and emotionally for your marriage. If you are thinking of taking your relationship to the next step, it is a good idea to identify and discuss each partner’s values and expectations prior to committing to marriage or setting relationship goals. Premarital counseling can help you identify areas of potential conflict and assist you in equipping yourself with skills to work through them.
What types of therapy do we use in couples counseling?
At Emergence Psychotherapy, we offer one of the best couple counseling services in Toronto. We use different modalities to help you build healthy communication and manage stressors in your relationship. Some of these approaches include:
Gottman method: This approach involves addressing areas of conflict and assisting you and your partner to learn skills to solve problems without creating conflict. It focuses on improving the quality of your relationship and the level of intimacy between you and your partner.
Emotionally focused couple therapy: EFT helps you to improve the attachment and bond between you and your partner. The therapist focuses on understanding dysfunctional patterns of communication and altering them to create new patterns of behavior and communication.
Cognitive behavioral couple therapy: Also referred to as cognitive behavioral couples’ therapy (CBCT), this form of therapy involves identifying and changing patterns of thinking that negatively affect the way perceive and behave toward each other.
Imago relationship therapy: Imago aims to deepen relationships and turn conflict into an opportunity for empathy and growth. Imago Dialogue is designed to create a safe environment to communicate with each other.
Psychobiological approach to couples therapy (PACT): This approach focuses on what happens in our brain and our emotions when we fight. It helps you to understand your partner’s attachment style and recognize their triggers to create a securely attached relationship.
We know that it takes courage to seek help. Take the first step towards improving your relationship and book a 15-minute consultation with us.