Life Success Counseling: Relationship Counseling Cincinnati
Relationship counseling, also known as couples therapy, is a type oftherapy that can help couples improve communication, resolve conflict, andstrengthen the relationship. It can be helpful for couples who are struggling with any of the following:
Communication problems
Conflict resolution
Stress
Sexual problems
Financial problems
Parenting issues
Infidelity
Grief
Mental health issues
Substance abuse
Relationship counseling can help couples learn how to communicate more effectively, listen to each other without judgment, and resolve conflict in a healthy way. It can also help couples identify and address any underlying issues that may be contributing to problems.
If you are thinking about seeking relationship counseling, there are a few things you should keep in mind:
Find a therapist who is experienced in working with couples.
Be prepared to do the work. Relationship counseling is not a quick fix. It takes time and effort to make lasting changes.
Be open to new ideas and perspectives. I may challenge you to think about your relationship in new ways.
Be patient. It takes time to see results in relationship counseling.
If you are committed to making your relationship work, relationship counseling can be a valuable tool. It can help you and your partner
communicate better, resolve conflict more effectively, and strengthen your relationship.
Here are some additional benefits of relationship counseling:
Couples counseling can help you and your partner understand each other better.
It can help you develop new communication skills.
It can help you learn how to resolve conflict in a healthy way.
It can help you identify and address any underlying issues that may be contributing to your problems.
It can help you reconnect with your partner and rebuild your relationship.
If you are thinking about seeking relationship counseling, I encourage you to do so. It can be a valuable tool for couples who are committed to making their relationship work.
Couples Therapy Cincinnati
In Cincinnati couples therapy, I believe that there is “no one one size fits all.” Every couple is unique and as one of the Cincinnati marriage counselors, I believe that your story is beautiful and is its own. In couple’s counseling, I will meet you wherever you are in the relationship, and set goals from there. Once goals are met, therapy can be used as needed.
Some more specific topics we will address in counseling are:
Start to understand the power of emotion in the relationship
Since emotions play a pivotal role in your life together as a couple, we will start to move towards trusting emotion.
Identifying positive and negative emotions is a key part of understanding the role of emotions in the relationship.
These negative emotions are not necessarily consciously created—often they are an automatic response. For instance, if your typical response is to get overly anxious, to avoid emotion, or hastily react to your emotions, this usually pushes your partner (or anyone away). Further, this typically happens without us realizing what we are doing.
Organizing that emotional world
Emotions are greater than just feelings.
Emotions are made of three key ingredients:
Affect—A person’s immediate emotional response
Feelings—The physiological, or physical sensations, that move you into action (i.e. sweaty palms, shaking, sweating)
Emotions—How you communicate to others affect and feelings
In this step, we identify the trigger, the feeling, the meaning, and the action that took place—which helps to discover each person’s process of emotion.
Most importantly, here is identifying triggers of both partners. Most of the time, triggers are subtle and challenging to discover.Distinguishing the difference between primary, or gut emotions, and secondary emotions, or what you feel after ‘gut reactions’
During this step we will use exercises to identify affect and feelings triggered by situations that have been causing relational conflicts. Exercises primarily, in this step, are practices of mindfulness, or remaining present—in order to get to the culprit of the challenge.
Identify patterns of conflict
To understand when someone is attacking, and when the corresponding partner is silent.
Further, to identify negative emotional patterns within the relationship.
And finally, the most important part of conflict is to discover where the negative feelings are coming from—to get to the core of the challenge and to attempt to free your relational future from that conflict.
Discovery of the common roles each partner plays in conflict
This requires looking into relationship histories, or what your parents have taught you about relationships.
Through this discovery, we will remember who was there for you in the past.
We will talk about each partners’ history
Work towards less fighting, and feeling better moving forward
During each session, we will discuss priornpatterns and roles so that we can measure the success since beginning relationship counseling.
Discovery of renewed vulnerability in the relationship
We will continue to talk about patterns of conflict.
We will continue ]to move away from conflict and toward each other—we will create a safe space to ‘make it two against the pattern’
We will get a sense of why a partner may withdraw from the relationship/and/or why another partner may be working to pursue the relationship.
We will face any fears and learn to embrace each other instead
We will identify common blocks within the relationship
Shame
Broken trust
We will deal with any infidelity faced during the relationship
This is a complex step but there is hope to move past infidelity.
This requires healing from injuries, walking through conflict, recovering hope, forgiveness and risking trust, amongst many other factors.
All in all, we will find new solutions to old patterns and problems.
Secure your relational future with your partner
Here, we will identify what makes up the characteristics of a secure and exciting relationship
The above outline is a brief discussion of points we will most likely encounter during relationship counseling. Again, as stated before, there is no “one size fits all” in relational therapy, therefore, we will use many modalities, centered around many of the key points stated here.
Challenges feel much more obtrusive and intricate than they may actually be. For instance, if you feel angry every time you go for a short business trip and it causes conflict with your partner, to identify what causes the physiological feeling of being overwhelmed and whatever other feelings (i.e. sweating, defensive, yelling/argumentative) you may feel may lead to a much simpler explanation. An exercise for this sort of client may be to focus on the immediate feeling to identify the underlying feeling, instead of continuing the pattern of conflict, to sit with one’s thoughts. The outcome may be a feeling of fear of abandoning family instead of anger towards the partner. This feeling is a primary—which is authentic and can be worked with. Inevitably, this will help to conclude fighting with one’s partner before those short business trips. This is an example of how couples counseling works.
Intake Session And More
To start relationship counseling, it is important to identify goals, and to visit the “honeymoon phase” of the relationship, even if that was decades ago. In most cases, the honeymoon feeling is obtainable again, over time and through therapy. I have found that this feeling of attraction and happiness is typically a goal for clients.
Further, during the onset of therapy, the couple will identify what success will look like in order to realize when therapy is complete.
As a couples therapist, I typically begin assisting couples with simple homework assignments and/or tools for the here and now. This occurs during the intake session and throughout therapy (These homework assignments and tools are exciting and fun.)
Conclusion Of Successful Therapy
As the couple sees success with the tools or homework given, then we move to find the core of the challenge, for lasting results. Some examples of things that take place in marriage counseling in Cincinnati, are: we will look at transferences from other points of time, we will peel back layers to heal the past, we will identify subconscious thoughts and feelings to bring them into consciousness, etc. All in all, we will use many modalities in figuring out the core of the issue, and getting rid of that challenge, in order to be happier and healthier with our partner.
How will you know when therapy is complete? Together, we will identify that your counseling goals are met, and that you are thriving with your partner, and with more knowledge on how to overcome future relational obstacles.
Many clients are looking for couples therapy near me
