Couples Therapy Online

Couples therapy online – save your relationship while you still can.

A marriage is easier to repair when the lawyers haven’t been called yet.

If you are experiencing:

then couples therapy can help.

Communication is important in a relationship but it is not everything: what you need first and foremost is to get to know each other and (re)learn to live together.


The longer you delay, the more difficult you make it to resolve the situation.


Why online couples psychotherapy

Research shows that most couples seek help to resolve their problems only after 6-7 years have passed since the first problems occurred. Don’t be a part of this statistic and improve your relationship starting right now.

One of the goals of couples therapy is to improve the way you interact and communicate with your partner. The ultimate goal is to eliminate tensions between you, resolve conflicts and find an optimal way to live together.

Additional goals may include regaining trust, regaining passion, or changing harmful behaviors.

Couples therapy is useful when you want to:

  • find lost passion
  • avoid breakup or divorce
  • learn to live together
  • rediscover what brings you together

What do we mean when we say couple psychotherapy?

We talk about couple psychotherapy when we see me, you and your partner/partner. If the topic of discussion is the couple relationship but the partner is missing then we are talking about individual psychotherapy.

Who benefits from going to couples psychotherapy?

To couple psychotherapy usually come those couples who are at an impasse: communication is poor or even non-existent and compromises are no longer acceptable by the parties.

Sometimes the problem is strictly related to the relationship, other times to related issues that the couple can’t agree on: raising and educating children, relationship with in-laws, episodes of infidelity, health problems, money problems and so on.

Most people find it harder to go to couples therapy than to individual therapy. This reluctance can be explained in two ways:

  • the person fears that the therapist will take the other person’s side in the discussion
  • the person fears that honestly exposing thoughts and feelings in front of the partner (because, remember, couples therapy is conducted in the presence of both partners) might further aggravate existing tensions and conflicts in the relationship.

Couples who start therapy usually experience an immediate (even if sometimes temporary) improvement in their relationship, and this is because the simple fact that the other person is participating in couples therapy shows that they value the relationship and therefore the partner. Participating and, more importantly, engaging in the therapeutic process shows that they care about the relationship and saving it.

5 factors for successful couples therapy

Some American psychologists (L. Benson, M. McGinn and Andrew Christensen) published a review of 40 years of couples therapy research in 2012. As a result of this review they identified 5 factors crucial to the success of such therapy (Benson et al., 2012). Here are these factors for success in couples psychotherapy:

  1. Changing the way we look at the relationship: the therapist will try to get the partners to look at the relationship in a more objective way, to stop blaming the other and to notice how the relationship also depends on the context, not just on the input of the partners (e.g. in times of money shortage, the relationship can suffer without either partner having any particular input).
  2. Modifying dysfunctional behaviour: in addition to improving communication between the partners, the therapist should ensure as far as possible that the partners do not engage in activities that may cause them harm or cause harm to others (e.g. domestic violence).
  3. Reducing emotional avoidance: by avoiding honest expression of thoughts and feelings, the two partners create emotional and psychological distance between them. The therapist should encourage them to express all these inner feelings, with the aim of increasing the couple’s unity.
  4. Improving communication: without communication the partners cannot sustain the couple. During therapy, the two will (re)learn to express their desires or grievances without ridiculing the other, without being aggressive and without trying to manipulate the situation for their own benefit.
  5. Focusing on strengths: because so much of therapeutic discussion focuses on problems, it is easy to lose sight of the strengths of a relationship, i.e. the reason why these two people actually form a couple.

Do you need couples therapy?

Here are some pretty clear signs below that your relationship needs couples psychotherapy:

  • you keep repeating the same argument over and over again: same topic, same story, same excuses and same arguments
  • you hear the scream of loneliness in the couple: you don’t talk to each other anymore
  • you don’t have sex anymore: don’t even try to excuse it, there is no argument that stands up
  • you don’t like anything about each other anymore: you only see flaws and it drives you crazy every gesture, no matter how small
  • the relationship is going nowhere: you don’t fight but it’s like you’re flatmates not a couple
  • you’ve hit a problem as a couple that you don’t know how to overcome alone
  • you lead completely separate lives
  • when you’re both at home you’d rather stay in different rooms than together
  • you humiliate each other, either in private or in public
  • you consider the other your enemy

Below is a recording of me talking about couples therapy:

Useful resources:

Information on couples counselling https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relationship_counseling

Benefits of couples therapy http://www.talkspace.com/blog/2015/02/the-benefits-of-couples-therapy/

The 5 principles of effective couples therapy https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/fulfillment-any-age/201203/5-principles-effective-couples-therapy

psychotherapy online

If you’re struggling with relationship issues and need to talk, I’m here

You can setup an appointment for online therapy right now