Tagged: marriage counselor

marriage therapist, get your marriage back

December 7, 2018

Does marriage counseling actually work?

marriage therapist, get your marriage back

“Does marriage counseling work? My wife and I have tried seeing a marriage counselor for the past few weeks, but it doesn’t seem like it’s doing anything… What am I doing wrong?”

If you’re like many of the lost and confused husbands in the 21st century, then you have already tried the most commonly prescribed solution to any marriage problem, i.e. marriage counseling.

I don’t know when it became such common practice, but somehow the go-to solution for any and all problems that could plague a marriage (separation, loss of passion, divorce, infidelity, lack of communication, etc.), the most prominent and widely advice that you’re going to get is “have you tried marriage counseling?”

You would think that such a booming and reputable industry would be so highly recommended because of its high success rate, right? In other words, marriage counseling is so popular because it has a history of legitimately fixing the marriage problems that plague so many relationships these days, right?

Wrong!

Did you know that…

Marriage Counseling has the Highest Failure Rate of Any Therapy

Yup, marriage counseling, and marriage counselors have the lowest success rate of any other counseling or therapy-related field.

So, does marriage counseling work? I would say ‘not even close’.

* Drug addicts in rehab have a higher success rate than marriage counselors

* Alcoholics in AA have a higher success rate than marriage counselors

* Anger management therapy has a higher success rate than marriage counselors

* Even the prison counseling programs for murderers, rapists, and other criminals have a higher success rate than marriage counseling

You would think that for up to $200 per hour there’d be some sort of guarantee that you’d see results in your marriage, but this is absolutely not the case. Marriage counseling DOES NOT WORK for most couples, and marriage counseling success rates are surprisingly low (less than 25%).

There is a type of couple that can benefit from marriage and family counseling, but it is the exception, not the rule. Most marriage counselors don’t effectively address the true issues that are leaving you and your wife ‘unfulfilled in our marriage’.

Does Marriage Counseling Work? Do We Have the Highest Divorce Rates, Ever?

Admittedly, according to recent statistics, the divorce rate in America has finally come to somewhat of a plateau in the past couple of years because fewer people are getting married, so there are fewer couples to divorce.

But still, in the past 10 – 25 years divorce rates have skyrocketed, and I want you to really think about this for a minute… Doesn’t it seem strange that the rise in divorce rates correlates almost directly with the thriving marriage counseling industry? Some might argue that this makes sense because more divorces need more marriage counseling, but what if the true source of the problem wasn’t actually divorce, but the total ineffectiveness, even counter-productivity, of marriage counseling?

I’ll tell you an example of this – My own parents are divorced. They were married for over 20 years, and they tried everything in the book to save their marriage. They tried not one, not two, not three, not four, but FIVE different marriage counselors over the course of 10 YEARS, and not a single one of them did anything to save their marriage.

In fact, the marriage only ever got worse because my parents became frustrated with their lack of progress, and that frustration led to even more problems in the marriage.

In other words, marriage counseling added fuel to the fire, and it poisoned my parents’ marriage.

Now, I’m not saying that all marriage counselors are complete quacks, but a surprising amount of them are. Their marriage counseling methods and techniques are based on theory, conjecture and textbooks, not actual romantic or human experience or even on successful marriages.

Many Marriage Therapists Lack Proven or Relevant Experience

This could probably be said about many therapy-related fields, but I feel that it is especially true in marriage counseling. I know of multiple marriage counselors who have actually gone through a divorce but continue to teach others how to fix their marriage. Clearly, these people have no idea what actually works if they can’t even save their own marriage, so why would you trust them to save yours?

Again, I don’t want to make any overly broad generalizations here, but I do feel like the marriage counseling field has become equivalent to divorce attorneys… It’s just one more cog in the machine leading to the simultaneous degradation and capitalization of marriage in America. I mean, from a price standpoint they’re both expensive… It will run you about $400 for an hour to talk on the phone with a divorce attorney, and a single marriage counseling session will usually cost you at least $100, and more for a ‘good’ one.

These are people that know you’re desperate and are willing to take advantage of that are their own gain.

Think about it, if you were truly passionate about helping people and saving marriages, would you demand $300 per session for something that you haven’t even seen consistently yield results? I’m not saying it’s morally wrong to charge a lot of money for your services, but when there’s so much money involved it’s only natural to question true motives, especially without results to justify a high price.

Think about it, most marriage counselors recommend at least 10 sessions to see results in your marriage, which means you’re dropping $1,000 to $2,000 on totally unproven techniques and strategies.

This brings me to the implied second part of our original question… Does marriage counseling work, and why or why not?

And to me, this is what seems to be the reason most marriage counselors fail:

Most Marriage Counselors Have Been Trained To Analyze Problems, Not Create Solutions

This is what I really think it comes down to… Everything that your average marriage counselor has learned, and in turn everything they teach you, was very likely written by a psychologist.

All those things that your marriage counselor tells you…
* “Just keep working at it”…
* “Communication is the key”…
* “Be more open with each other”…
* “Start having intimacy time”…
* “Date nights are the answer”…
* “Make her feel loved”…

All of those things are written in some textbooks somewhere and that textbook was written by a psychologist. These are things that women think they want, and they do when everything is already perfect, but they will NOT save your marriage.

These are all things you should be doing when your marriage is thriving, more like characteristics of a successful marriage than actual techniques to fix a broken one.

But You Can Clearly See Their Train of Thought…

A good marriage has open communication, right? So it ‘makes sense’ that to fix a broken marriage you should develop open communication, right?

A good marriage has spouses who enjoy intimacy time with each other, right? So, it ‘makes sense’ to say that if you force intimacy time you’ll fix your marriage, right?

But marriage isn’t backward compatible like that… It doesn’t work because these logical solutions are NOT going to work when there are no feelings of attraction or emotional fondness behind them. So even if you’re going through the motions correctly, there is no guarantee that you will actually fix your marriage.

In fact, if anything you’re almost guaranteed to make it worse because you’ll remind your wife how bad things have to be that she can’t feel ANYTHING-even when you’re apparently trying so hard.

Remember, that attraction is the ONLY thing that will save your marriage. Without attraction, there is no emotional incentive driving your wife to come back to you… Logic, reason, counseling, courses, books, rational techniques and perseverance will not save your marriage. Feelings, emotion, and passion will.

So, does couples counseling work? Does marriage counseling work? I suppose I should let your own experiences give you the definitive answer, but from all of my own experience, I would say that you’re better off trying to fix things on your own than with a counselor.

If you still have any questions, I would like to encourage you to take a look at my free report.

– Jacob

Article Source: [http://EzineArticles.com/?Does-Marriage-Counseling-Actually-Make-a-Difference-When-Your-Wife-Is-Leaving?&id=7373310] Does Marriage Counseling Actually Make a Difference When Your Wife Is Leaving?

Marriage

September 11, 2015

by Aik

How to find agood marriage counselor

Have you ever asked yourself how you could locate a good marriage counselor to help you get your marriage back again?

If your answer is yes, then this article is for you.

If you just realize that things are no more the way they use to be; and that those moments of love, joy, and peace have been replaced with chaos, quarrels, disagreements and even fight and you are thinking of what to do.

My advice to you is to find a good marriage and family counselor, and I will show you how in a minute.

But here is what you must know.

All marriage counselors are not created equal. While some are very well trained in the work, others are not so experienced and can do more harm than good to your marriage.

How would you feel when you realized you are going farther apart from your partner instead of getting closer which is the very reason you visited the counselor in the first place?

Here’s what you’ll learn

In this article, you will learn how to locate a good marriage counselor without breaking a sweat, someone who knows his job well and who will not use your challenging marriage as a learning sample.

Just keep reading! : )

Who is a good marriage therapist?

This is someone who combines his or her education with knowledge of marital therapy.
Their main interest is to help the couple work through those challenging moments in their marriage, which includes stress, crisis; they also help people express their needs appropriately, establish good boundaries and also make compromises.

They should have genuine credentials like license and other necessary certificates which should be acceptable by your local government or any other authority.

Be careful

However, the credentials or the license is not a guarantee that he or she is the best counselor that is fit for your problems.

A recent survey shows that eighty-one (61%) of all the private marriage counselors can offer good marital counseling, the remaining 39% deals with other clinical works that are related to marital therapy.

This is why there is a need to identify a good counselor that will be more effective in what you want to achieve.

Aspire to get the best

To get the best from your prospective family therapist, you should try and have one or two interview sessions, where you can get to know him or her better; you should also be able to ask some questions to get some insights on how this marriage therapist can best work for your particular issues.

According to John Guttman, a marriage counseling session has four sessions of evaluation such as

4 Seasons with the counselor

Session 1 – Now you are here: This is your very first visit to the therapist and you have an opportunity to describe the reasons you are seeking the services of a counselor. You will also have the chance to tell your prospective therapist about the history of your marriage or relationship, how you knew each other, as well as how you have been dealing with your conflicts.

After this initial counseling session, you will then receive a questionnaire to fill out, which will help the therapist to understand more about the situation at hand better.
Just take some time and go through the questionnaire, before filling it out.
And try as much as you can too;

Be very open:

It is absolutely true you are dealing with someone trained to help you go through your marital problem, but remember also that he is not a mind reader; He will be more effective when you are open to him.

Be prepared:

You know exactly why you want to see the counselor, so be prepared to go through the process. Remember the outcome of it all depends on you, so get a note pad and write down those reasons you are seeking to find a counselor, and read them out to yourself often. This will help you to be sure of what you want.

Ask questions:

During these sessions, you are expected to ask some pressing questions to him or her. Though it may look a little bit rude to start asking questions, but remember you are simply looking to find not just a counselor, but someone who is keen on helping your marriage.
So you will need to ask some important questions and get the best ideas of what they are planning to do to help you.

Here are a few quick questions to ask.

– How do you plan to help us with this issue?
– Have you worked with other couples of our situation, background or age before?
– From all that we have told you, what will be your next move?

Obviously, asking these questions will help you understand if the counselor is a good one to work with or if he has a biased mind rather than seeing your work out of your marital challenges.

A well-trained marriage and family counselor must be straight forward and should not take side with anyone.

Interview more than one

It is more advisable to have an interview with more than one marriage therapist if possible, so you can make a good choice. Even when you have made a choice, you also have the power to make a change if you are not convinced with your first choice.

Have other sessions if possible

Session 2 & 3 Individual counseling: Just as the name implies, the individual partner will have individual time to share your feelings concerning your relationship. The counselor will also ask some other specific questions.

Session 4 Discoveries and feedbacks: In this session, both of you will visit the therapist once again to receive the results from the evaluations carried out by the counselor based on your private meeting with him or her as well as the questionnaires you filled out.

Then you should receive the results that will clearly show you about your strengths and weakness as couples; from there you will know the next step and plans before your other sessions.

Session 5 and more: From this moment on, it is counseling proper. A lot will be discussed at this point. So get your selves ready for the re-connection.

They also help you deal with other issues

Finding a good marriage counselor that can best help you deal with the issues in your marriage may not be that easy as you may think; you will have to do some little works and research to find one.

One good way to start is to think of your friends, relatives or family members who have used the services of a counselor before and ask for a recommendation from them.

Although this step may be embarrassing and perhaps bring up some issues you may not likely want to bring out in the public, I still think to get a recommendation from those of them who have passed through the road before you could be a very good start for you.

And remember you must always look for the well-educated, experienced and well-qualified counselor if you really want your marital issues dealt with in a more effective way.

Quick tips

Finding one locally: Finding a good marriage and family counselor closer to you could be a good decision to make, because it will be convenient for you to visit him or her at any time, unlike that which is miles away, this is because you will have to schedule several interview sessions before the time, and it may not be proper if you missed one of the sessions because of the distance.

Once you have fully made up your mind on which way to go, the next step should be for you to set up initial interview sessions where you will have more time to have a brief discussion with the marriage counselor which should be able to disclose to you about him /herself, and also how he planned to help you solve your marital issues.

Just make sure that whoever you are planning to work with should be able to value your opinion as to the same.
One question I always get form couples who are planning to through a marriage therapist is this;

How much would marriage counseling cost?

Couples are usually afraid of the cost of working with a counselor, without considering the joy that will come back to the relationship after the sessions.

Good and successful counseling should not be quantified with any amount of money if your relationship is truly important to you, it is a step you are taking to nurture what matters most to you so tell me what is better than spending your whole money and get your happiness back.

It’s better than divorce

However, when you compare the cost of going through a divorce, you will understand that enlisting the services of a good therapist is so much better.

So those couples who resolve to go through divorce instead of taking the steps to rebuild their relationship because they believed it is costly to seek a counselor will often spend more to end it.

It is not just about the money that is involved but about the value that returns to your relationship.

Rounding up:

You can rest assured to get your marriage back on its feet again if you plan properly before looking for a good marriage and family counselor.

There are no issues or circumstances in a marriage that cannot be saved; you should decide to go through it knowing that troubles are just another step to grow together as a family.

More so, taking a decision to see a marriage counselor or therapist will help you to get your marriage to normalcy. Just start the process today, and it will overwhelm you what results in you will get.

Take this article further by sharing it with your friends and loved once.

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