Couples Therapy Experience: Building Stronger Relationships

As a couples therapist, I have the privilege of working with couples a myriad of backgrounds, each bringing their own unique experiences and challenges. While there are common themes that many couples seek help for, every relationship is different, and it’s important to understand both the individual backgrounds and shared experiences that contribute to each couple’s dynamic.

When asked what draws me to work with couples, I often share that my passion comes from helping to improve the quality of their relationships. Research has shown that the quality of our relationships is one of the biggest factors in overall well-being.

The Power of Relationships: What the Research Says

The Harvard Study of Adult Development (Lineo, 2017) found one of the most important factors influencing an individual’s well-being is the quality of their relationships.

‘…our relationships and how happy we are in our relationships has a powerful influence on our health,” said Robert Waldinger, director of the study, a psychiatrist at Massachusetts General Hospital and a professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School. 

We understand the importance of investing time and effort in our physical health through exercise, good nutrition, and sleep. Many of us invest in our careers and education to build a better future. But one of the most impactful ways to enhance our long-term health is by nurturing our relationships.

When our relationships are strong, we feel more supported, secure, and connected to the world around us. This doesn’t just make life more enjoyable—it contributes to better mental and physical health.

Esther Perel, renowned relationship therapist explains:

‘Remember: it is the quality of our relationships that determines the quality of our lives.’ 

Common Reasons Couples Seek Therapy

So, what are some of the issues that bring couples to therapy? From my experience, here are some common themes:

  • Healing from a Betrayal or Difficult Incident: Whether it’s infidelity or another breach of trust, many couples come seeking help to rebuild their connection.
  • Parenting Differences: Couples with children sometimes find themselves bringing different views about how to parent or whether their approaches are aligned.
  • Desire for a Deeper Emotional Connection: Some couples feel disconnected and seek ways to strengthen their emotional bond.
  • Cultural Differences: In a diverse country like Singapore, couples from different cultural backgrounds may face challenges around family dynamics, traditions, and interpersonal expectations.
  • Neurodivergence: Some couples seek help when one or both partners, or family members, experience neurodivergence. Particularly with the increase in adult diagnosis of autism and ADHD, I see more couples seeking support to help navigate this experience.
  • Intimacy Issues: Whether emotional or physical, intimacy is a key area for many couples to explore.
  • Life-cycle Transitions: Major life changes, like a new job, becoming parents, moving internationally, becoming empty-nesters, can impact a couple’s routine and cause stress in their relationship.
  • Trauma and Its Impact: One or both partners may have experienced trauma in their background. Exploring the personal and relational impact of trauma is beneficial for couples who have encountered distressing experiences.
  • Communication Issues: Many couples seek support for communication challenges. Through thorough assessment, underlying issues which impact communication patterns often emerge.
  • Family of Origin Dynamics: Multi-generational patterns can be helpful to explore to help partners understand how they were influenced by their wider family/community experience.

The Therapy Process: What to Expect

  • Couples Therapy begins with a thorough assessment, during which I initially meet with the couple together to hear their presenting issues and desire for change.
  • Next, I meet with each partner individually to gain a deeper understanding of their unique experience and perspectives.
  • We then clarify goals, hopes for outcomes, and a path forward to achieve stated goals.
  • We check in periodically throughout the process to assess how our work is progressing toward stated goals.

Treatment Approaches: Tailored to Your Relationship

I approach therapy from a systemic perspective, which means I consider the broader context of the relationship—such as cultural, religious, educational, gender norms, and other family influences. Every individual comes with their own set of experiences, beliefs, and expectations, which can affect how they interact with their partner.

In therapy, I draw from several modalities to support the couple’s work, including:

  • Emotionally Focused Therapy (EFT): Understanding attachment styles, emotions and how they influence our action, and mapping out the cycles of interaction that may lead to disconnection.
  • Structural Therapy: Helping couples establish, or renegotiate, clear rules and boundaries. An example is how parents make decisions for their families, ensuring that partners prioritize time together to ensure they are aligned with decision-making.
  • Narrative Therapy: Exploring the stories we tell ourselves about our lives and relationships. Learning to minimize less helpful stories and amplify stories of strength and personal agency is part of the narrative process.
  • Gottman Method: Using evidence-based tools to improve communication and strengthen the bond between partners.
  • Strength-Based Therapy: Focusing on what’s going well and encouraging the couple to build on those positives.

Strategies:

-Exploring patterns of interaction – patterns have typically evolved over years of interaction and it can take time to restructure more helpful patterns.

-Understanding what triggers each partner and leads to feeling disconnected.

-When we are triggered, we can feel dysregulated and outside our ‘Window of Tolerance’ (Siegel, 1999), our optimal zone of comfort, which helps us to engage with others effectively.

-Strategies for returning to a state of calm include by self-regulation and co-regulation.

Stephen Porges explains, ‘Our bodies evolved to expect co-regulation and reciprocity from others.’ Co-regulation entails turning to our loved on to seek support to resume a state of calm or regulation.

The Collaborative Nature of Therapy

Couples therapy is a collaborative process. My goal is to create a space where both partners feel heard and supported. Throughout therapy, I seek feedback to make sure the process is resonating with the couple and that they’re feeling supported. We make adjustments along the way.

Frequency and Homework: Getting the Most Out of Therapy

In terms of frequency, I find that couples who attend sessions regularly—especially in the beginning—tend to have the most success. Weekly or fortnightly sessions are ideal in the early stages of therapy, after which we can space them out as progress is made.

Additionally, couples who complete “homework” between sessions tend to benefit the most. This can include reflective journaling, conversations, or exercises to practice what’s been reviewed during sessions. Homework encourages partners to actively engage with each other and apply new strategies outside of the therapy room.

The Change Process

Ultimately, couples therapy is about helping people build stronger, more fulfilling relationships. It’s about creating a safe space where both partners can grow, learn, and reconnect.

If you or someone you know is struggling with their relationship, feel free to reach out to The Other Clinic.

References:

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