Most married couples on the rocks find themselves asking the universal question, can marriage counseling work?’ Read on to find out more about this specific counseling option and learn how to fix your troubled marriage through counseling.
Here’s What Marriage Counseling Does
Marriage counseling is designed to help relationships stabilize and return to normal. You can depend on the sessions to start rebuilding your marriage, or reach a decision whether it would be better if you resorted to separation or divorce. Either way, you can be sure that counseling will help you understand the things happening in your marriage and make better-informed and well thought out decisions about where the relationship is headed.
About Marriage Counseling
Also referred to as couples’ therapy, this specific counseling option helps couples understand and resolve any outstanding conflicts with a view to improve their relationship. Through counseling, the both of you will receive the tools you need to communicate better, solve problems, negotiate differences and argue in healthier ways.
How Long Does it Last?
The therapist will provide mental health services with a special focus on the relationship and the needs of each partner in the marriage. More often than not, the counseling period will be short term. A couple of sessions should help you resolve the problems in your marriage and save it from the drowning waters.
However, the length will depend on the extent to which the relationship has deteriorated. If you have been on the rocks for too long and there are too many issues to sort through, then you may both have to attend the sessions for a longer period of time.
Benefits of Marriage Counseling
1. Teaches Relationship Dynamics
Even as you sign up for marriage counseling, note that most relationships are not as perfect as people make them seem. A marriage is a partnership. As such, each partner brings their own personal history, opinions, values and ideas into the relationship. More often than not, these aspects of the individual do not always match the other partner’s, and vice versa.
2. Helps Couples Understand Each Other
However, these differences do not mean that the marriage will always be a war-zone. If you can learn to tolerate each other (as marriage counseling will teach you), then you will start noting the positive aspects of these peculiarities and differences. Additionally, counseling will help you respect, accept and understand opposing cultures and views.
3. Develops Strength of Character
Marriage counseling also strengthens the partners, both individually and as a couple. This way, when the relationship is tested, each partner will be strong enough to work in unison in the overcoming of these tests. Common tests include lack of sexual interest, extramarital affairs among others.
Overall, even as you look to fix your marriage through counseling, keep in mind that there is more to counseling than you may expect. For instance, marriage counseling helps couples strengthen their bonds and understand each other better- whether or not they are in a conflict. Therefore, even when there is no threat to the success of your marriage, you can also opt to go for counseling.