How Can I Talk to my Spouse About Therapy?

When couples experience marital problems, the thought of counseling is typically not mutual. Problems occur in marriages when two people fail to see eye-to-eye for an extended period of time, like on questions of having or adopting a child, which can even have them disagreeing about the existence of problems. Since troubles are often recognized by one partner before the other, the couples that do seek counseling will often do so at the urging of the first partner. If you've come to recognize troubles in your marriage, you'll need to bring the idea of counseling to your spouse.

Ignoring problems within a marriage can have grievous consequences if they're not properly remedied. Allowing these troubles to get out of hand can be especially tragic when one of you sees the warning signs long beforehand. You'd never want to hurt your spouse, but sometimes you just cannot afford to walk on eggshells either. Therefore, you'll need to lay your feelings on the line and inform your spouse that you sense major trouble ahead if you don't both go into counseling together.

Approaching the Topic of Therapy

People often tell us what they think we want to hear, which can sometimes be less than honest. When there are troubles in our lives that are readily apparent, our friends and loved ones will often try to sugarcoat matters for us. Couples with marital problems will not often receive critical input from their families, because most relatives don't want to admit when there's a looming potential for divorce within their family. That is why counselors can help repair things in ways that your relatives cannot, because behavior experts with no prior involvement in your life can see things more objectively. Free from the biases of your friends or the emotions of your parents, counselors can help you apply proven strategies for rebuilding a marriage.

As you work up the courage to suggest counseling to your spouse, you might consider starting out with separate therapists. If each of you sees separate counselors for a time, you'll both have the chance to open up and unload in ways that you've never done before. Even if one of you has had experiences with therapy, this whole warm up process can be very beneficial if the other of you hasn't. Some people give themselves well to therapy while others are uncomfortable with the idea, but a key goal behind therapy is to conquer your discomforts on the path towards better communication.

Breaking the Ice on Counseling

Entering into therapy for the first time can seem uncomfortable to people who've never even considered the idea before. This can be especially true for people who harbor certain stigmas towards therapy. If you're trying to get your spouse into a marriage counseling program, you might soften your proposal by allowing your spouse to choose the therapist. If your spouse is just easing up to the idea of therapy, he or she might find it more comforting if they can choose based on the gender, religion or philosophy of a given therapist.

Therapists come from various backgrounds, with some practicing Freudian theories and others espousing Jungian notions. Counselors will also feature on talk shows whenever marital problems are being discussed, with some of them giving practical advice and others offering New Age theories. With various styles of therapy being offered, you and your spouse should do some research beforehand to see which methods best correlate to your values. The purpose of therapy is to make your life better, which needs to be mutual when you and your spouse enter into couple therapy together.

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