Are You In A Long-Term Relationship that Has Grown Distant Over time?

Do You And Your Partner Experience Frequent Conflict & Communication Challenges?

Is Your Relationship Too Hard to Stay Yet Too Good To Leave?

If you are a couple in distress, you are not alone!  Our relationship with an intimate partner or spouse is one of the closest connections we will have in our life.  Intimacy, trust, love, comfort and support are important needs we seek to fulfill in our intimate partner relationships.  The quest to have these important needs met, however, makes us vulnerable.  The risk of being hurt, exposed and rejected are all enhanced in an intimate partner relationship. 

Couple’s therapy is a form of psychotherapy that helps you and your partner work through relationship challenges you have been unable to resolve on your own.  At Counselling Associates, we work with romantic partners of all types to improve communication, resolve conflict and strengthen the intimate partnership.  

As all intimate partnerships experience periods of conflict and discontent, many couples are unsure when or if they should seek professional help. The issues that prompt couples to seek help often start small and become harder to manage over time.  Whether to resolve a long-standing issue or to prevent an emerging one from getting worse, it may be time to get help when one or both partners:

• Violated trust from infidelity an emotional affair, secrets

• Are fighting about the same issue, with no resolution

• Have difficulty communicating  feelings, needs and wants honestly

• Have fallen out of love; feel like roommates

• Are jealous; demanding, controlling;  suspicious

• Have become  distant and withdrawn

• Are sexually dissatisfied, incompatible, unfulfilled 

• Have threatened to end the relationship

• Are struggling with an addiction  (e.g. alcohol, porn, shopping, work)

• Allow in-laws or extended family interference, over-involvement 

• Are disrespectful, suspicious; defensive or hostile 

• Disagree on important matters  (e.g. finances, parenting, division of household duties)

Other forms of Relationship Counselling for couples include:

• Pre-marital Counselling

• Counselling for Separation

• Post-Divorce Counselling

• Counselling for Parallel parenting, custody arrangements

• Couples therapy for one

• Counselling for non-traditional relationships (e.g. polyamory)

• Discernment Counselling (e.g. mixed agenda - one wants out)

Once you and your partner come to therapy, you will meet with a Counselling Associates couple’s therapist who will assess your relationship, provide feedback, and collaborate with both of you to determine how therapy can be most helpful.

In couples counselling the relationship between you and your partner is the focus.  This means that your therapist will not take one partner’s side over the other.  He or she will instead work to identify what each partner needs to feel important, loved and respected in the relationship and show you healthy ways to make those needs known.

We are now offering couple’s therapy online as well. This means that you can get the same high-quality counseling from the comfort of your own home. Our online couples counseling services are confidential and convenient, and they allow you to get the help you need without having to take time off work or away from your family.

At Counselling Associates we utilize a highly effective approach to working with couples called Emotion Focused Therapy.  EFT takes into account the uniqueness of each couple and has proven beneficial for dating, engaged or married couples of all ages, religions, cultures, education levels and sexual orientations.

 With Emotion Focused Therapy you and your partner can:

• Find a shared vision for your relationship

• Increase respect, connection and closeness

• Rebuild safety and trust

• Improve communication skills

• Learn effective problem solving skills

• Renew your commitment to the relationship

Even if it is good now, couples therapy can make the most important relationship in your life better.  

Research shows that couples wait an average of 6 to 7 years from the time serious challenges start before they seek therapy.  Making an early commitment to work on your relationship can be hugely beneficial over the long term.  Your relationship is too important to wait for frustration and resentment to set in.  Asking for help is not a sign of shame but a commitment to getting your relationship back on track.  If you have recently found yourself looking up couples therapy near me, reach out today and begin the journey toward a happier and healthier partnership!  Time is your biggest asset.