What to Expect During Your First Couples Therapy Session?

Marriage counseling aims to improve your relationships by strengthening your connection and helping you work on yourself. Couples therapy in Wake Forest will also equip you with practical communication skills and empower you to make healthier decisions.

Whether your goal is to rebuild your relationship or end it on good terms, marriage counseling in Raleigh can be a safe place to work on your issues.

However, many people are reluctant to seek therapy because they don’t know what to expect during their sessions.

So, let’s discuss what you can expect during your first couples therapy session.

How Couples Therapy Differs from Individual Counseling?

What makes couples counseling different from individual psychotherapy is the dynamic during the session. Whether it is face-to-face or online, couples therapy involves interaction between three people. So, interpersonal and communication dynamic is different.

But it is also different because, unlike individual therapy, where the person is my client, the relationship is my client in marriage therapy. Couples therapy in Wake Forest usually includes both partners. However, sometimes one partner can choose to work with me alone, so the specific treatment plan of your marriage counseling depends on your relationship situation.

A couples therapist is a neutral person who doesn’t take sides or says who is right and who is wrong but instead advocates on behalf of your relationship.

So, during the first couples therapy sessions, the therapist prefers doing the individual session to cover the basics.

After some housekeeping stuff, such as the paperwork (the consent form, the cancellation policy, the confidentiality limits), we will discuss the “no secrets policy,” which means that I do not keep secrets when I do couples therapy.

In other words, if a client tells me something during the individual session (about your relationship, about something that you did, etc.), you will have to bring it up, or I would help you raise that topic during the couples session.

Unless my clients don’t want certain content to be discussed in a couples therapy format, I encourage them not to bring it up at all.

The main aim of the “no secrets policy” is to ensure safety between all parties involved. It can also boost productivity and honesty. 

From the therapist’s standpoint, the first couples therapy session is about getting to know you. So, you may expect me to want to learn as much as possible about you as individuals and as a couple to assess your situation better.

The intake session is usually pretty structured so that it may involve many questions about you, your history, your life, and your major relationship issues.

We will also discuss your goals for couples therapy and sensitive topics such as possible past traumatic experiences.

Although you may feel uncomfortable answering such questions, keep in mind that the more you reveal, the more your potential therapist will be able to do their job successfully.

The Structure of Couples Therapy

In terms of the structure of couples therapy, it is usually different depending on your therapist’s orientation. Since I am trained in EFT (emotionally focused couples therapy), all of us will meet together to discuss our therapy goals, needs, and so on during the first session. The second and third sessions would be individual.

So, in the fourth session, we usually come back together again and discuss things brought up during the individual sessions.

We will be talking about the cycle – what is that you do when you feel uncomfortable; what does your partner do when they feel uncomfortable, how does that look on the outside, how does it feel inside, how do you repair after conflicts, and how do you impact each other in your partnership?

We will probably be going to talk about your attachment style or coping strategies. Different people react and cope differently when they are hurt and uncomfortable. While some people burst out, yell, and “become bigger,” others withdraw and shut down.

In my marriage retreat sessions with couples, we often discuss whether this coping strategy depends on the situation or a behavior pattern.

Summary

Marriage counseling aims to help you really hear each other and be accessible for each other’s emotional needs to reconnect and feel safe.

I hope this information helps you learn more about love and intimacy in your relationship and regain neglected passion in your relationship.

If you have any questions, do not hesitate to call at (703)-347-3200 for your free-of-charge 15-min consultation and to schedule an appointment in my Wake Forest office or online.