Individual Relationship Counseling 

For those who want to save, or revive, their relationships, working with a counselor together with your partner is almost always the best way to go. However, sometimes, you just can’t get your partner to participate in counseling. Does that mean you just give up? For many years, couples therapists took the firm position that they simply would not work on the relationship unless both people came in. Then therapists like Michelle Weiner-Davis, MSW, began to write about their success doing couples work with just one partner.

We realized that even if there are a wide range of problems you might find in your partner, you never had control over their behavior anyway. The only person you have control over is you. Over the years, it was found that remarkably effective work can be done healing the ruptures in a couple by helping just one of the partners change their own behavior in the relationship. Of course, if you have been feeling frustrated and angry for a long time in your relationship, it may be very hard to wrap your mind around the expectation that you should let go of changing your partner and adjusting your own behavior. The happy findings, however, have been that for a large number of couples in distress, if one partner changes his or her behavior, the other will begin to change in very positive, supportive ways.

The purpose of our work will be to help you:

• Find ways to lower your level of hurt, anger and distress over the relationship.
• Explore how you can better communicate your needs to your partner and help him/her do the same to you.
• Identify the changes in your own behavior that you can make which will encourage the positive changes in your partner which you are seeking.
• Discover avenues of personal satisfaction and support that will strengthen you during this task.
• Heal old wounds which may affect the way you respond to your partner.

Finally, you may begin counseling unsure of whether you wish to continue in this present relationship. We will explore in a safe and supportive environment your questions and help move to a resolution about the direction you will take – and how you will engage in this journey, regardless of your decision, in a spirit of compassion and integrity.