If you ask the question, “Does counseling help unhappy marriages?” chances are your marriage has been unhappy for a while. Couples wait six years on average before you decide to pursue marriage counseling.
That’s a long time to wait – keep it having the same disagreementsbecoming increasingly disconnected…and building resentment.
However, even when couples enter counseling after a long wait, counseling can and does help unhappy marriages.
When you enter couples counseling, you can expect the counselor(s) to ask you to explain what makes your marriage unhappy. Your answers set the stage for how counseling will proceed. They will also ask you what you hope to achieve through counselling. Your answers to this question will determine the trajectory of counseling.
You have options when it comes to pursuing couples counseling.
Many couples choose to work with a counselor each week. Sessions usually last one hour. You can achieve a lot this way. However, there is a downside to weekly sessions. It usually takes a significant amount of time to achieve the desired progress – sometimes years – when you only opt for weekly counseling sessions.
Another option is to do private marriage counseling – ideally with 2 counselors (one female and one male) so that everyone feels like you have someone who can easily understand your perspective. This type of counseling also helps couples in unhappy marriages move on. The big difference between weekly couples therapy and a retreat is that the schedule is compressed. In just one retreat, it is possible to completely change your life.
No matter what type of counseling you choose to address your marriage challenges, as mentioned earlier, one of the first questions both counselors will ask is “What is making your marriage unhappy?”
Common answers to this question are:
- Infidelity
- On the verge of divorce
- You love each other, but you don’t get along
- Midlife crisis
- Empty nest
- Addiction
- Long for a deeper connection
- I just don’t know how to make marriage work
Only by understanding what each struggles with and what each would like to achieve can a counselor help your marriage.
Now that you know that counseling can help unhappy marriages and your options for marriage counseling, it’s time to determine if your marriage would benefit from counseling.
Several indicators can let you know that your marriage needs the support of marriage counseling. Ten of the most common are
- You want to know more about yourself and your partner.
- You want to understand how your relationship deteriorated.
- You want to repair, refocus, reshape and revitalize your relationship.
- You want to let go of anger, guilt, pain and resentment.
- You suffer from couple jealousy.
- You want to leave the past where it belongs – in the past – without sweeping it under the rug.
- You need an objective opinion and a fresh perspective.
- You want solutions, not endless discussions in circles.
- You want to work with someone who has the expertise to provide you with long-term solutions.
- You want a customized road map to move towards a better relationship.
However, this is not an exhaustive list. If you’re not sure if counseling will help your unhappy marriage, the best thing to do is ask a counselor you’re interested in working with. Most will be able to offer guidance on whether they think they can help you.
And yet, the truth is that it can take time to find a counselor or counselors you’re comfortable with. You’ll want to learn as much as you can about your potential consultants before you decide to engage them. You might want to explore their website, blog, and YouTube videos to get a feel for your compatibility.
However, just because you spend time finding the right counselors for you, that doesn’t mean the treatment itself will be easy. In fact, it will be difficult – at least sometimes.
Why is marriage counseling so difficult?
In short, starting marriage counseling takes courage and a lot of it, because vulnerability is necessary to get the most benefit. And many people struggle to find the necessary courage.
One of the hardest things counseling will ask you to be brave about is learning to trust each other again.
Trust is either eroded for couples over the years by things that are not great and incorporated into unhappiness or at a time when infidelity is discovered or exposed. This erosion of trust within the marriage is accompanied by the creation of defenses that favor disconnection.
If you and your spouse are brave enough, counseling can help you learn to trust each other with your truest selves again. From this point of vulnerability you can cultivate the intimacy necessary to make your marriage better.
However, this does not mean that marriage counseling is always successful. It doesn’t work for all couples. However, success is somewhat predictable.
The key predictor of marriage counseling success is that you both have a strong and determined desire to make your marriage work. Although most couples are brave enough to address their issues in counseling, unfortunately, not all are successful in healing their marriages.
And then some couples are not interested in making their marriages work. Instead, they enter marriage counseling to work well through the divorce.
So, as with anything else, the definition of success with counseling depends on each couple’s goals. Counseling can absolutely help unhappy marriages.
If you choose to get involved in marriage counseling, it can be one of the most difficult things you’ve ever done together. However, the reward for meeting the challenge could be living happily ever after.
Mary Ellen Goggin offers relationship coaching for individuals and collaborates with her partner Dr. Jerry Duberstein to offer private accommodations to couples. To learn more about working with Mary Ellen, contact her here.
