A Marriage Therapist's Blog
Thoughts on Marriage Counseling
Once in a while I have a couple in marriage counseling who are so used to arguing with each other that they think they can just continue to fight while they are in my office. They’ll come in for their first session and while one of them is telling me his/her point of view, the other will interrupt to try and tell me the other side. Pretty soon they are no longer talking to me, but instead are arguing with one another, as if I weren’t even there. They must think that this is healthy, a good idea, and that I won’t mind.
Wrong.
I intervene pretty quickly and tell them that if they want to argue with one another, they can save a lot of money by doing it for free at home rather than paying me to listen to it. That usually gets their attention. Sometimes I have to repeat this process a few times before it really “sticks” with them, but eventually most couples learn that I’m not going to allow them to play the blame game while they are in my office. We then start working on healthy communication right away.
I’ve had a few couples who simply could not stop blaming one another during marriage counseling sessions, no matter how many times I intervened. When this happens, I stop seeing them together and start seeing them separately in individual sessions. We work on communication individually and get that down before we start meeting together again.
And no, I don’t give couples foam bats to hit each other with!
Tags: argument, Communication
This entry was posted on Sunday, June 8th, 2008 at 6:10 pm and is filed under About Marriage Therapy, Communication.
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