Relationships and Its Challenges

Everyone wants to be in a harmonious relationship where no resentment exists, and each partner lives in awe-inspiring love, spared from distress and falling out. But this is not how genuine relationships function— often, these idyllic hopes for our most intimate and connected relationships come from what is known as the “honeymoon” phase. All relationships go through phases, which are never a one-size-fits-all thing. 

We are a constellation of our lived experiences, and it is commonplace for our biggest triggers to be activated within our partnerships.

This means one of two things: we can do deep healing and find tremendous growth and insight into our histories and pain. We can shift unhealthy, often learned behaviors or continue the toxic, abusive patterns many of us experienced growing up within our family systems. There is incredible work to be done within our relationships; if we are willing to do the work, we can find astonishing healing.

Most couples experience conflict. Conflict is a normal part of life. It can start from minor disagreements to more significant fights. In most cases, these go unresolved, mounting to different reasons for arguments that end up in frustration and anger. It becomes a frequent pattern that leads from one fight to another if it goes unsettled.

What are the common issues couples encounter?

Communication issues: Communication is one of the critical factors that cause relationship breakups. Healthier relationships often have couples spend more time together communicating and expressing their thoughts without resorting to anger and frustration. Open and healthy communication boosts relationship satisfaction and creates a more balanced relationship.

Physical Intimacy: One of the most frequent issues many couples face. Some couples would argue that their physical needs are not being met, while others express discontent with the frequency of their lovemaking. Many other factors include needs that are not met, different preferences, timing, and, in some cases, the other might feel harassed.

Infidelity: Is often cited as another factor in relationship breakups. It is commonly a critical turning point that leads to a relationship falling apart. Though Physical Intimacy and Communication may contribute to this, other factors such as personal issues and differences, commitment, and the environment can also lead to infidelity.

Money: This holds regarding differences of opinion on handling their finances. This can be about how one spends or saves money, hiding or withholding money, or financial struggle as a couple where one feels that they are providing more food. This is one of the most familiar causes of a couple’s conflict.

Toxic or Abusive Behavior: This is something that you cannot turn a blind eye to. It is deeply rooted in an individual that requires individual therapy to resolve past personal issues so one can maintain a healthier relationship with another in the future.

How Do You Resolve Couple Issues?

Couples Therapy is an excellent option for a couple that is having problems. This therapy helps you learn how to communicate better, work through your issues together, and keep the relationship healthy and happy. In Couples Therapy, partners can participate at their own pace and in whatever way works best for them. It's also an opportunity to get help if you feel things are getting worse or there are trust issues between you and your partner. It is a crucial way to get extra help with your relationship. Finally, it's a way for you and your partner to talk about how you're feeling, why you're feeling that way, and what you can do about it.

If you have trouble communicating with each other, couples therapy can help. You'll be able to work on things like:

• How much conflict happens in the relationship

• How often do you fight or disagree about something

• What makes you feel overwhelmed in your relationship

• Ways you can deepen the meaningful connection

Is Couples Therapy a good idea?

Most people want to make their relationship work. It is not something that you dismiss right away once you are confronted by specific issues that can be reconciled adeptly. Participating in Couples Therapy is a great way to resolve problems and conflicts between couples.

This can be a helpful support for couples who want to work on communication and conflict resolution, deepening quality intimacy and improving other areas of their relationship. Therapy for couples is also a great way for you to learn more about yourself and each other so that you can continue to grow together.

If you're in a relationship and considering therapy, you should know you aren't alone. In 2020,  roughly 41% of Americans will go to therapy at some point in their lives (1), and about 50% of couples that seek professional guidance for relationships every year find success (2).

What kinds of therapy are suitable for couples?

Several evidenced-based therapies are suggested for those wanting to engage in Couple Therapy. Below are a few:

• Imago: Developed by Dr. Harville Hendrix and Dr. Helen LaKelly Hunt in 1980, Imago Relationship Therapy is a form of relationship and couples therapy that focuses on relational counseling to transform conflict between couples into opportunities for healing and growth. The Latin word “imago”—meaning “image”—refers to the “unconscious image of familiar love.” We find that there is frequently a connection between frustrations in adult relationships and early childhood experiences. For example, individuals repeatedly criticized as a child will likely be highly sensitive to their partner’s criticism. Likewise, childhood feelings of abandonment, suppression, or neglect often arise in a marriage or committed relationship. When such “core issues” repeatedly come up with a partner, they can overshadow all that is good in a relationship and leave one to wonder whether they have chosen a suitable mate. Through Imago Relationship Therapy, couples can learn to understand each other’s feelings and “childhood wounds” more empathically, allowing them to heal themselves and their relationships so they can move toward a more “Conscious Relationship.” (3).

• Gottman Method: The approach involves a detailed assessment of a couple’s relationship. It applies researched-based interventions to help work through relationship problems. This method puts the ball in the couples’ court; it allows them to work on fixing their relationship rather than relying on the therapist. Especially since, as the therapist, I’m not the expert on their relationship; they are.”  Researchers suggest that therapists pay particular attention to this couples therapy method, with studies showing positive results in improving marital adjustment and couples’ intimacy. Here’s a Free Gottman Relationship Quiz. (4).

• Psychodynamic Couple Therapy: This approach to couples work utilizes psychoanalytic theory. It draws on the psychotherapist’s experience dealing with relationships in individual, group, and family therapy. Psychodynamic couple therapists relate in-depth and get firsthand exposure to couples’ defenses and anxieties, which they interpret to foster change. The complete version of psychodynamic therapy is object relations couple therapy, which uses transference and countertransference as central guidance mechanisms. Then the couple's therapist interprets based on emotional connection and not from a purely intellectual stance. Object relations couple therapy enables psychodynamic therapists to join with couples at the level of resonating unconscious processes to provide emotional holding and containment, with which the couple identifies. In this way, they enhance the therapeutic potential of the couple. From inside shared experience, the object relations couple therapist interprets anxiety that has previously overwhelmed the couple, which unblocks the partners’ capacity for generative coupling. (5).

• Accelerated Experiential Dynamic Psychotherapy (AEDP): In AEDP for Couples, safety must be established first between the therapist and the couple's members. When this safety extends between the couple members in the intersubjective field cultivated within sessions, the transformative states AEDP fosters become available for the couple to hold, experience, and share. Couple members learn to witness (Adler, 2002) each other in an increasingly somatically attuned way. This progressively growing embodied attunement creates the necessary safety to soften defenses and work through issues that predate coming together in ways that bring justice and peace to even the most mundane of daily interactions. When between couple sessions, for example, one partner washes the dishes with a spirit of loving empathy for his deeply fatigued partner, rather than showing accustomed resistance or resentful compliance or guilty submission, a deep-level change has occurred in the relationship. This experience of being seen, remembered, and responded to with the felt experience of love allows such empathic attunement to become the new atmospheric condition of the home. Moreover, when the partner’s reflective awareness also informs that attunement to their partner’s history of feeling like a “thing made to do things,” the home becomes infused with a quality of corrective healing through deep reception of the other. This construction of new meanings (Tronick, 2009) that transform the mundane and menial tasks of lived family life into expressions of love and surprise infuses each couple member with new strivings and re-enlivened eros that then potentiates and moves the next session forward. (6).

Why do people choose couples therapy?

The answer is simple: It works! Studies show that couples who attend counseling together have better communication, increased intimacy, and fewer arguments overall than those who don't.

At Phoenix Rising Centers, we believe in the power of couples to heal and grow, and we're here to help you do it. Whether you're going through a divorce, struggling with a relationship issue, or want extra guidance from your partner, our therapists are here for you every step.

Our therapists are trained to work with couples in a practical, supportive way but also respectful of your cultural and individual needs. We'll help you discover what's going on in your relationship, understand how it's affecting other areas of your life, and help you learn how to take care of yourself while learning how to be the best possible version of yourself… together.

References:

1. Mental health treatment or therapy among american adults 2002-2021 | Statista. [online] statista.com. Available at: https://www.statista.com/statistics/794027/mental-health-treatment-counseling-past-year-us-adults/ [Accessed 1 Jan. 1970].

2. Couples Therapy: Does It Really Work? | Psychology Today. [online] psychologytoday.com. Available at: https://www.psychologytoday.com/intl/blog/in-it-together/201712/couples-therapy-does-it-really-work [Accessed 1 Jan. 1970].

3. What is Imago? - Harville and Helen. [online] harvilleandhelen.com. Available at: https://harvilleandhelen.com/initiatives/what-is-imago/#:~:text=What%20is%20Imago%20Relationship%20Therapy,opportunities%20for%20healing%20and%20growth. [Accessed 1 Jan. 1970].

4. The Gottman Method - About | The Gottman Institute. [online] gottman.com. Available at: https://www.gottman.com/about/the-gottman-method/#:~:text=The%20goals%20of%20Gottman%20Method,the%20context%20of%20the%20relationship. [Accessed 1 Jan. 1970].

5. D & J Scharff - Intro to Psa Cpl Rx 2014.docx. [online] cpcpnyc.com. Available at: https://www.cpcpnyc.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/D-J-Scharff-Intro-to-Psa-Cpl-Rx-2014.pdf [Accessed 1 Jan. 1970].

6. AEDP for Couples - AEDP™ Institute. [online] aedpinstitute.org. Available at: https://aedpinstitute.org/transformance/aedp-for-couples/ [Accessed 1 Jan. 1970].