Do We Have To?! When Talking About Painful Feelings in Couples Therapy Feels Pointless.

So you and your spouse took an important step and made the appointment to go see a couples counselor. You might have felt a range of different feelings, nervousness with not knowing what to expect or even excitement to have a counselor who will help you both stop feeling the pain you experience in your most important relationship.

Going into therapy you may have expected the counselor would give you the answer, a quick diagnosis of what's going wrong and the homework and tools to make the pain stop. But then your counselor seems to be doing the opposite, they keep bringing you both back to the hard emotions in session and you feel worse! You might feel confused, even frustrated thinking 'I'm paying you to give us solutions to get out of the pain, what's the point of going back into the hurt?! Get us out of this loop, stop bringing the conversation back to it!'

I hear you, and that frustration is so valid, because you are likely in a spot in your marriage or relationship where you feel the most amount of urgency to feel better. Any human being would want out of the pain! That's often what the moves in our negative emotional dance are trying to do for us in those moments too; to make the emotional discomfort stop and for things to feel better ASAP.

I want to help demystify the therapeutic process in couples work for you a little bit more in this blog. My perspective comes from a place of being heavily trained in emotionally focused couples therapy.

So, why would a couples therapist bring you back to the painful places?

1. On the other side of fear there is longing & desire:

   Interestingly, many times we don't even fully know what we need emotionally from our spouse or partner. Or what we are trying to soothe for ourselves when we ask for them to 'just listen' or 'help me out more.' This often leaves us floundering, trying to figure out how to reconnect and send a clear message of what we need emotionally and be heard (this goes deeper than just needing help with the dishes!). It may feel counter-intuitive, but to clearly understand our longing and desire, we need to recruit the insights that our pain and fear gives us. So when your counselor thoughtfully brings you back to the pain, the moments that feel the hardest, they are likely trying to help you build specific and clear language around your pain and fear so that you gain specific and clear language around what you need. This helps the both of you send clearer signals to each other, and over time, greatly minimize the need to utilize behaviors that unintentionally puts distance between the both of you in an effort to cope with the discomfort. We cannot fully understand our longings if we do not fully understand our fears.

   
   

2. Change happens when you have a new experience in the places that hurt:

   Lasting change in a relationship happens when we have new, supportive and loving experiences in the places that hurt the most for us. When two people get to a place to experience each other in a new way, trust is gained and intimacy grows. Knowing a lot of tools and skills is great. However, unless the skills you know shows up in those moments that are the hardest in a way that gives you both a new supportive experience, then that knowledge won't provide changes in the relationship in the places that really matter. That's why in couples therapy we unpack what is happening for you in the places of your pain together and practice sharing in session when the pain is alive so your therapist can help give support and clarity in the process, as well as help make sense of what blocks the both of you from being able to hear and share with each other in a way that soothes the discomfort. This work takes time and with good pacing to help couples get to a place where they feel confident they can show up for each other and reach for each other in their pain successfully. It can often feel messy and imperfect in the process of getting there, but getting there won't happen if the pain is never addressed. A couples counselor will help you pace in this process, to not go too far where it's too overwhelming, but will stretch you just enough so that progress can be made.

I hope this helps shed some light onto the purpose and intention of going to the hard emotions and pain in couples work. While a part of you may feel like it's pointless or makes things worse, it is done in therapy with incredible intention. If in your work you feel like an experience is too overwhelming, I would encourage you to share that with your counselor. A well trained couples therapist will know how to meet you in that place and tailor the work to what you feel like you can handle, while also still creating space for growth to happen in the places that hurt the most.

If you find your relationship needing marriage counseling and need help regaining intimacy in the places that hurt the most in your marriage or relationship, feel free to contact us. We would love to help you both grow together and restore connections.