Help for “Troubled” Couples – Integrative Couples Therapy©

This is an example of couples therapy integrating several couples counseling modalities, which allows the therapist to switch gears quickly in order to best serve the clients' needs.

Mike and Laura (not their real names) came into my office anxiously — most couples do.  When I obtained their history, several patterns emerged.

Developmentally, they were stuck in differing stages.  Laura felt emotionally abandoned while Mike craved the freedom to get back to his life as it was before they met.  She was stuck at the beginning of the relationship, wanting the exclusive closeness couples share when they first fall in love.  He was out catching up with his friends and his hobbies, which he had ignored over the past 5 years.  She needed to take a step forward (seeing more of her friends) and he a step back (planning time for them to be together) so that they could do the work of individuation and define the relationship itself more clearly.  They also needed an effective “fight-style” to express and resolve differences without undue injury. 

By employing a Solution Focused approach I was able to help each party discover things they needed to do less of and things they needed to do more of, in order to improve their relationship.  Laura discovered that by sharing every little feeling she was damaging their relationship.  Mike discovered that by constantly declaring his feeling of lack of commitment he too was damaging their relationship.  They learned that they needed to talk less about “the relationship” and more about specific behavioral issues.

 After they took the Meyers-Brigs Personality Type Indicator they were able to see how their personalities were working for and against each other.  Both were extroverts, intuitive and perceptive.  However, Laura was a “feeler” and Mike was a “thinker.”  They developed greater understanding and sympathy for one another when they realized how they reacted to each others’ personality differences. 

 NLP (Neuro Linquistic Programming) was helpful in several ways.  The NLP orientation encouraged the viewpoint that the couple’s problems were a puzzle to be solved.  They learned about their Meta-program differences (these are filters created by belief clusters that bias perception).  Laura learned why it took Mike so long to say what he needed to say.  He was very “procedural”, and needed to tell how he came to think a certain way.  She communicated much quicker by listing her criteria – she was “optional”.   Also they were able to discover that they had very different styles of communicating and processing information.   She was an “auditory” and needed to “hear” more about his feelings for her rather than his process.  He was a “visual” and needed to “see” her positive feelings in action rather than understand her reasons for them.

This couple was helped dramatically by what they learned through Integrative Couples Therapy©.

Victoria Hoobyar, M.S. is an LMFT at Sequoia Counseling Services.  She specializes in working with both singles and couples with romantic relationship problems and can be reached at (650) 363-0249 ext. 115.