News

Transformations and changes are showing up in my divorce support groups!

My divorce support groups that begin as eight-week series often evolve into groups of people who continue on by joining the next session, and then extend their participation with series after series. The reasons are varied, but most of them feel that getting to the next level of healing is right around the corner, and they are motivated to keep working toward that goal. In the past month I have been hearing so many...

Couples Therapy Groups produce transformations, both internally as well as within the couple relationship.

Being in a relationship can be incredibly healing. It can heal you in a complete turnabout from your family of origin issues. But it can also be challenging, stressful, and feel unharmonious at times when either member of the couple is struggling, or when there seems to be no camaraderie or “in-synch-ness” anymore. Sometimes we are in such different places from our partners.

People undergoing separation and divorce go through seven stages of grief. It’s important to understand the grief cycle and know what stage you are in so you can keep track of yourself emotionally and get the support you need while you are having logistical and decision-making conversations with your partner. Often, your partner will be in a different stage of the grief cycle. There are also two other emotion-related “feedback loops” going on, having to do with who initiated...

Divorce can be wrenching when kids are involved, but there’s a lot you can do to help children cope. If you’re a parent dealing with divorce, try to remember that your child needs you now more than ever. Offering reassurance, hope, and a sense of stability can help ease the effects of divorce on children of all ages.

Children Coping With Divorce

When children are free to love both of their parents without conflict of loyalty, to have access to them both without fear of losing...

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Do we make enough time for the two of us?
Often times, couples come to therapy and that’s the only conversation they have all week.

With so many obligations like work, taking care of the children, paying bills, maintaining the home, and social events, couples often don’t have time for each other or themselves. Stress becomes a very dominant theme in people’s lives and they feel like they don’t have enough quality connections with family or in their relationship.

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Everyone seems to think that relationships are things that just happen. Not so. Relationships need to be nurtured so they can develop into good relationships, or they become dysfunctional and fail.

Why do relationships fail? We may notice that we seem to continually get into patterns with lovers, friends, and family that don’t serve us or help us to grow. This brings us to a crossroads of deciding what to do next. One option is to decide not to have relationships for awhile and we throw...

We’ve been doing some really good work in the Couples Therapy group, learning how to build the foundations of emotional intimacy and discovering how to communicate better. The key points we’ve been focusing on are sensitivity to your partner, staying connected to your partner, and learning better methods of communication.

Sensitivity

Couples often have confusion about what messages each partner is sending, especially when the partner doesn’t truly understand their own...

In my previous blog posting, I talked about two of the three key points we’ve been focusing on in the Couples Therapy group – sensitivity to your partner, and staying connected to your partner. The topic of this posting is the third key point – learning better methods of communication.

Communication

There are different levels of communication, and different dynamics that occur in conversation. Sometimes when a person is speaking to their partner they tend to withdraw or act...

Going through divorce brings out so many raw feelings. One of the major ones is grief – the mental sorrowing over the loss of the dreams one had for the marriage, the painful regret over what you wished it had been. To move through grief, one has to acknowledge the feelings of loss and learn not only to cope with them, but to overcome them while reclaiming and reinventing your life.

There is another feeling that often comes up during a divorce that can block the grieving process –...