Couple and Relationship Therapy in Seattle Washington
Navigating the Complexities of Connection
Does your partner feel more like a roommate than your best friend? Or worse, someone you dread coming home to? When you are carrying the weight of the entire family or household, frustration is all that you see. Socks strewn about the house?: Frustration. Dirty dishes in the sink? Frustration. Living with someone who you feel emotionally distanced from, is an incredibly stressful experience. That feeling is only compounded when you are having undesirable sex or perhaps little to no sex at all. It feels like your relationship has turned into an ongoing conflict with no resolution or end in sight. What an overwhelming and exhausting place to be!
But I hear you. As a marriage and couples therapist in Washington state, I work with couples like these every day.
I have a number of approaches I have found to help alleviate the stress and get to the core of these issues.
First, as taught in Emotionally Focused Therapy (EFT), we will identify the cycle so the two of you are working together against the problem instead of against each other.
Grounded Pathways to Relational Change
We will learn communication skills that you can actually use. You think what you talk about is the problem. “My partner never wants to have difficult conversations.” or “ My partner picks fights constantly.” But there is often more to it than that. We will look at HOW and WHEN you discuss difficult topics with your partner. This can often be more important as to how the conversation is received than WHAT you are bringing up. This is good news because it means you can bring up difficult, but important, conversations with your partner. We will just carve out a new way to do it.
We will explore your deepest yearnings, so you can ask your partner for what really matters. And you can feel confident in your clarity rather than getting sidetracked by all the everyday issues.
Some key areas of focus when I work with couples:
What respect really means and how to get (and give it) in your relationship
How intent and impact play a role in your relationship
Balance a sense of connection with a sense of autonomy
To ensure we aren't just relying on opinions, I ground realistic expectations for your relationship in data and evidence. Next, we will identify your basic attachment needs so your partner can finally hear what it is that is missing from the relationship. From there, we can create a roadmap of action steps as well as ways of understanding each other that will help heal the connection between the two of you.
Ready to break the cycle?
Reclaiming a Fun and Deeply Connected Relationship
After working together, you can look forward to gaining a sense of clarity and harmony. You will walk away with a better understanding of what you need in a romantic relationship, how to communicate it to your partner, and how to show your partner how much you love and care about them in a way that makes them feel truly special.
Here are some outcomes you can expect from couples therapy:
A sense of feeling being on the same page as your partner
A feeling of partnership
A fun, pleasurable sex life
It may have been awhile but you can finally feel seen and heard, and understood by your partner. And relationship therapy can help get you there.