Couple therapy is also known as marriage therapy, marital therapy, couple counseling, and marriage counseling. The target of the therapy is a couple of two partners.
Marital therapy is the specialized form of group therapy where more than one client is treated.
Who conducts marital therapy?
This therapy is conducted by therapists or counselors who have their specialization in marriage or family therapy, clinical psychology, counseling psychology or social work. These therapists use a variety of therapeutic techniques based on the Cognitive-behavioural model, psychoanalytic model or humanistic model.
Therefore, it is advised to choose a therapist with vast background experience before planning to take therapy. In this way, it is assured that the couple has the right therapist to fulfill their needs.
Why is marital therapy important?
Like other relations, marital relations are sometimes hard to handle. Every relation has to face some challenges in life. When things go out of control one cannot manage the stress and is unable to understand their partner’s point of view. At this point, the couple thinks that there is no solution to their problem except to end the marriage. Instead of facing the problems and trying some alternate ways they just assume that things can’t work now.
Marital therapy is needed at this time. A marital therapist will listen to both sides of the story, locate where the problem is and how they can resolve their conflicts in a productive way. Problems in marital relationships can be of different types either they can be related to sexual health, money, internet or drug addictions or anger management, etc.
Most people don’t like to talk about their sexual life with any friend or a family member for help. So marital therapy is the best option for such people.
It is easy to talk with a professional person who is accustomed to talking about such topics without even judging you. They will involve your partner in the therapy and help both of you to overcome such issues productively.
Benefits of martial therapy:
Out of so many proven benefits of couple therapy, we will describe a few of them here.
- Learning to resolve conflicts:
The main reason for the conflicts is the lack of communication skills. Marital therapy solves this issue effectively. During the therapy, both of the spouses listen to each other’s opinions calmly and understand their point of view under the guidance of the counselor.
- Learning to share wants without being offensive:
Most conflicts are the outcomes of the loss of understanding among the couple. They don’t understand the demands or wants of the other spouse. It leads to the expression of offensive arguments among the two. In marital therapy, the couple learns to express their wants in a calm way.
- Learning to work on unresolved issues:
Marital therapy provides a platform for couples to talk about what makes them feel unhappy. In this way, one can openly share their feelings and the response of their spouse makes it clear whether they are going to take some necessary steps to make this marriage work? If one finds out that their spouse is unwilling to do the effort then it makes things clear to end the marriage without having any guilts as one has given their best effort.
- Learning to work through a crisis:
Crises such as the death of a beloved or accidents often come to anybody’s life. In these critical situations, one needs the support and affection of their spouse. The couple therapy teaches the ways to be a more supportive and affectionate spouse to help your spouse to overcome the critical situations in life.
- Learning to accept and forgiveness:
In marital therapy the couple is taught to have a better understanding of each other. They are advised to accept each other with their flaws as no human being is perfect. They are taught to find their similarities and work on them instead of focusing on negative things. Also, the couple is advised to forgive their spouse for anything wrong they have done in the past. Without forgiveness, they cannot move on.
When does marital therapy won’t work?
Just going to the therapist and taking sessions does not solve your issues. Therapy is not magic. Without putting your efforts suggested by the therapist you can get no benefits from marital therapy.
The following are some reasons when therapy won’t work for a couple.
- One or both of the partners are not willing to discuss with the therapist about the personal details of the problem they are experiencing. Although it is up to the therapist how he works to reveal the hidden aspects of the problems. But sometimes any of the spouses is too rigid to share anything personal which hinders the effectiveness of the therapy.
- Despite attending the sessions of the therapy, one or two of the spouses do not change their behavioral patterns or anything suggested by the therapist. It also affects the outcome of the therapy.
- One of the spouses is not willing to work for the relationship and has already made up their mind to end the marriage. They are forced to attend the therapy session but have no effect on their decision.
- Sometimes, the therapist has been using the wrong approach for the client which is not matching with his/her situation. Therefore, the outcome of this type of therapy is not fruitful.
- The couple or the therapist is unable to define the clear goal of the therapy. They do not understand why the couple should take the therapy. This also has no effective results at the end.
Marital therapy is proved to be effective for couples to get back on their track and resolve their issues. Even if it is late to seek marital counseling it is not always too late to go for it. Because it may save you from making such a mistake in life that you will regret later. If you are thinking about divorce, give your relationship the last chance and go for couple therapy. You may find some good reasons to keep going in your marriage with some different efforts that both of you and your spouse will put in your relationship.
However, if the couple is not interested in working on their relationship then this therapy alone won’t work for them.