One of the most common questions I get in regular life when people find out that I’m a Houston relationship counselor is how you can convince your spouse to go to therapy for your relationship.
I have a very simple answer, but it’s probably not the one you want to hear: you can’t.
If you’ve spoken with your spouse about your desire to seek marriage help from a counselor and he or she doesn’t want to have anything to do with it, there’s nothing you can do to make them go. Some people think that causing a fight or giving an ultimatum will give them what they want, but this is absolutely the wrong way to go. Someone who is only going to therapy because they “have” to go is far less likely to get anything useful out of it, and it will probably make your time there less comfortable as well.
What can you do? Go by yourself.
Houston Relationship Counselor: Marriage Therapy for One
Ideally, both partners should attend marriage counseling so that they can both receive the benefits of the sessions. However, there are plenty of personal and relationship benefits that you can get from one-on-one sessions with a marriage counselor, too.
How so? Well, one of the most important things to learn about relationships is that what one person does will affect that other one. Even if you seek marriage help alone, you’ll be gaining insights into your own behavior and learning useful techniques that will allow you to diffuse situations with your partner much easier.
When You Change, Your Partner Changes, Says Houston Relationship Counselor
Some people hate this idea because they see it as them being forced to change while their partner “gets away with it” – whatever it is – but nothing could be farther from the truth. Because so much of the way we act in relationships involves interdependence, when one person starts acting differently, it will eventually bring about change in the other person as well.
In layman’s terms, if you learn how to control your emotions and treat your partner more positively, they will react to that positivity and return it. No one is saying that this will happen overnight or that your relationship will magically become perfect, but it should improve. At the very least you’ll feel better about yourself. If you’d like to learn more about one-on-one marriage therapy, call the Houston relationship counselor today!
