Should We Sign Up for a Marriage Retreat in North Carolina if We Have Different Therapy Goals?

A marriage retreat is a day you spend with your therapist to learn about yourself, your partner, and your relationship, work on your issues, and improve or rekindle the connection. 

Marriage retreat in North Carolina is a seven-hour long session during which you and your partner put away your phones, find child care for your children and focus on each other with no distractions. 

How Does a Marriage Retreat in North Carolina Look Like?

I usually schedule marriage retreats with couples on Fridays. Our marriage retreat session can be in person or virtual. However, I encourage couples to find a neutral place where they can be while I am in my office (if we have a virtual marriage retreat session).

During this seven-hour-long marriage retreat in North Carolina, my clients and I do meditation and experiential exercises together designed to take the relationship to a deeper level really fast. Marriage Retreat in North Carolina is very flexible because it focuses on just one couple, completely tailored to your needs.

Marriage retreat can help you learn valuable skills that your whole family can benefit from, not just you and your spouse.

Namely, skills that you learn are something that stays with you long-term, but also something that most of us, unfortunately, were not taught how to do while growing up:

In marriage retreat, you will learn how to communicate, connect and attune, and heal your inner child when you get dysregulated and reactive.

These skills are valuable because you can transfer them to different situations and relationships with your children, parents, friends, and colleagues.

But before you decide to seek a marriage retreat, there is an important question we need to answer.

Should You Sign Up for a Marriage Retreat in North Carolina if You Have Different Therapy Goals?

Couples often ask me, “Should we still do this marriage retreat or intensive if one partner wants to stay in a relationship and work on it and the other partner feels ambivalent or doesn’t really want to work on a relationship?”

So, should you still do a marriage retreat in North Carolina? The answer is – no.

No, because you do need to be on the same page for your marriage therapy to be effective and helpful. And this goes to your marriage retreat in North Carolina and traditional weekly marriage counseling.

The structure, exercises, and the workbook in the marriage retreat are specific. Also, the goal is to understand each other, reconnect, and revive the spark in your relationship.

But if you know that this is not something you want to do or your partner knows that they are not open to it, a marriage retreat might not be a good option.

If there has been so much betrayal, hurt, and trauma, to the point where your partner is gone, or you are gone, then we don’t want to open you up to this and hurt you or your partner.

So, what are your options then? What you need in this case is discernment counseling or individual counseling with a relationship therapist who is an expert in couples therapy as well and can guide you and help you with whatever it is that you need.

A therapist can help you understand yourself and your patterns. For example, your desire to flee the relationship can be a part of a pattern. So, there is no judgment or agenda for you as a couple to break up or stay together.

As your couples therapist, my only goal is to help you both understand yourselves and your thrust, honor your thrust and decide what to do with that.

But before that, the primary goal is to understand yourself, your patterns, and where they are coming from – what are you repeating, and why are you doing it. When you become aware of your patterns and the reasons hiding behind them, then you can make decisions and communicate with your partner.

So, your marriage therapy should start with internal work – we first focus on inner or interwork and then move on to intra-work between you and your partner.

Summary

It is probably not a good idea to sign up for a marriage retreat in North Carolina or traditional couples counseling sessions if you have different therapy goals, meaning that you feel or your partner feels that they are already out.

If you have any questions or would like to schedule an appointment in my Wake Forest or virtual office, do not hesitate to book your free 15 min phone consultation online by clicking here.