Marital & Couples Therapy

While the percentage of marriages ending in divorce seems to be decreasing, there are still many couples that are finding it difficult to maintain healthy intimate relationships that last a lifetime. Every relationship is different and each couple has a unique way of organizing their life together and expressing intimacy. There are times, however, when couples find themselves stuck and unable to resolve a conflict or problem. Typical problems for couples include difficulties with communication, sexual intimacy, money management, substance use by one or both partners, anger, infidelity and balancing the demands of work, extended family, friends, children, and self-care with their relationship.

Labyrinth Psychological Services works with couples to resolve problems as quickly and efficiently as possible. Couple’s therapy usually involves identifying shared goals, learning strategies for improving communication and intimacy, building trust, and developing mutually acceptable agreements for resolving conflicts. During couples therapy, many couples gain a deeper understanding of how their interactions are shaped by experiences with parents, early loss or trauma, individual, cultural or religious differences, or personal problems such as substance use or medical/mental health conditions. Couple’s therapy is often an effective way to move through conflicts and become more intimate and connected.

Sometimes it works best to for each partner to participate in individual therapy sessions to resolve any problems that are not related to the current relationship either before or in combination with the couple’s therapy. At Labyrinth, we have found that it is often more efficient when the same therapist provides both the couple and individual therapy. Sometimes it is necessary for each member of a couple to have their own individual therapist. If it is best for you to have separate individual and couple’s therapy, we will assist you in finding individual therapists who will collaborate with your couple’s therapist as members of your treatment team.

It is important to understand that successful couple’s therapy does not always result in an agreement to stay together. There are times when one or both members of a couple decide that they no longer wish to remain in the relationship. When this happens in couple’s therapy, the goal of the therapy is to help each member of the couple accept and plan for a healthy transition out of the relationship. This is especially important when there are children, pets or elderly parents who will be affected. Even if there has been a high level of conflict in a relationship, many couples separate and even divorce with compassion and respect. Each couple accomplishes this in their own unique way and your couple’s therapist will help you to work together to make the best possible transition.