5 Benefits of Marriage Counseling
You might scoff at the idea of going to marriage counseling. You might think you don’t need it because you love your spouse, and they love you. You think marriage counseling might mean that your relationship is irreparable. Your partner might ask you to go to therapy and you might be prone to push it aside believing you just need to spend more time together. Going to marriage counseling might seem like bad luck.
The truth is every relationship needs a tuneup sometimes. I don’t know if you know this but life is hard and the world is crazy out there. You don’t have control over all that happens and sometimes our stress exceeds our ability to cope well. When we don’t cope well or we feel overwhelmed by all that we have to deal with, sometimes it's our partner that suffers. It’s ok to struggle. It doesn’t mean you are a bad person or a bad partner. It means that life is really hard! Couples are impacted by trauma, and it leads to disconnection. Marriage counseling can help your relationship be better.
What is the purpose of marriage counseling?
You might be wondering what the purpose of going to marriage counseling is. Most people that haven’t been to therapy at all don’t even know what to expect from going. You might go into counseling expecting that the couples therapist will side with your partner and blame you for all the issues in the marriage. With me, that won’t happen. I believe every couple has its strengths, and I’m not trying to make you feel bad about how your relationship got into this position. I just want to help you gain insight into yourself, and your relationship, and help you improve in the areas that you need to improve. Working with a couples therapist can help you navigate difficult conversations and help you understand your reactions and experiences you might have with your spouse. The purpose of marriage counseling is also not to make you stay married if you aren’t interested in that. If you believe your relationship is too far gone, and you can’t imagine trying to work on it, I believe you. It’s not my job as the therapist to fix your relationship or force you to do things are resistant to. If you are ready to dig in and make your marriage last, marriage counseling can help you learn to communicate with your spouse in ways that will work.
What are the benefits of marriage counseling?
There are countless benefits of marriage counseling, and I couldn’t even begin to share all of them. Some of them are even unexpected to me but here are some of the common benefits couples gain from marriage counseling:
Healing from past hurt in the relationship
Many couples assume that in order to need to attend marriage counseling that something big has to have occurred. They believe infidelity or working to divorce are why people should seek marriage counseling but they don’t realize there are many things that have occurred in the marriage that might be injuring the relationship. As a couple you may have experienced, a miscarriage, sickness, or other trauma that has impacted your ability to be close as a couple. All of these things are significant, and while you may believe trying not to let it bother you is the approach to take, your brain has other plans. You don’t always get to decide if those experiences stick with you or not and fighting them all the time won’t help you or your marriage. Being with a marriage therapist can help you navigate these difficult conversations and how to effectively heal from them. By acknowledging these past experiences and how they have impacted you both you can have an even better relationship and be able to move forward with greater capacity than you did before. Brushing past experiences under the rug will only make them fester and have to be addressed later on to keep a relationship healthy.
Get an outside perspective from a relationship expert
I know that it feels vulnerable to go to marriage counseling and think of a professional going over your marriage with a fine tooth comb. It’s your most intimate relationship, and I totally get that is vulnerable for you. As a marriage therapist, I’m not going over your marriage looking for things you’re doing wrong. My goal is to help you in the areas that you might need to focus on to help improve your relationship. Every couple is doing something positive in their relationship and It’s not my job to act like I know better than you do. However, working with a marriage therapist can help you learn more about your relationship and why some things aren’t working for you as a couple. As a marriage and family therapist, I have spent years studying relationships and what contributes to positive and happy relationships, and what makes a relationship distant and strained. I’m eager and willing to help people that want help to implement more into their relationship to help them handle life better together as a couple.
Learn how to communicate more effectively
The reality is that you probably didn’t grow up naturally knowing how to be a stellar communicator. We often think we are better at communicating than we actually are but sometimes we expect people to read our thoughts or just know what we need. As a couple, you might approach your spouse in a way that is unhelpful and be confused by their response. Marriage counseling can help you learn to communicate effectively and to know what works. You can also learn how your spouse communicates and how they need you to communicate specifically with them. We all have preferences and experiences that influence how we communicate with each other. Working with a couples therapist to practice and implement more of these communication skills can take your relationship to the next level. When one partner learns to communicate in more helpful ways, you might be surprised you naturally get a better response from your spouse. Some of the ways that you can learn to communicate effectively are to learn how to listen well and to validate. Validating your spouse can go a long way. Being able to admit when you are wrong and not be adamant about sharing when you’re right can be a more meaningful way of communicating. Marriage counseling can teach you this and more.
Help you feel more connected to your spouse
Emotional connection with your significant other comes through vulnerability and the exchange of emotions. When you have a full work schedule and are hustling your kids off to school and extracurricular activities sometimes it doesn’t feel like there's time to even talk or connect with your spouse. Things get in the way of your most important relationship, and throughout the time you become disconnected from your spouse. Things continue to happen and soon your relationship isn’t quite what you want it to be. At this point, it can be hard to know how to connect again. Marriage counseling can help you find out what has created disconnection and work toward connecting with each other through relationship skill building. A marriage therapist can help you figure out how to meet your partner's needs and how they can meet yours. The act of going to therapy together is vulnerable in and of itself, which can help you connect on a much deeper level.
It helps you grow as an individual
It might come as a surprise to you that marriage counseling can help you grow as an individual on top of growing as a couple. A big part of marriage counseling isn’t working on yourself as an individual. In order to have a healthy relationship, both partners need to be focusing on improving themselves and healing their past experiences that have contributed to how they react in a marriage. You’ll also be surprised to know that the skills you learn in marriage counseling can be applied to other relationships. You can learn to communicate with co-workers, your inlaws, and your children more effectively with what you will learn. Marriage counseling also helps you understand emotions and how to express them, which is universally useful in all relationships. Most importantly you will be able to understand yourself much better. When you understand yourself better you are able to react differently to your spouse. Marriage counseling will help you process through and think about things that you had never considered before.
Marriage Counseling in Utah can change your relationship
I know it’s not easy to go see a couples therapist and to feel like your marriage is on a chopping block. You don’t want to be judged or are scared that your marriage therapist will tell you that your relationship is just doomed. The reality is as a couples therapist, I am here to help you see the things you are doing well in your relationship and help you keep doing more of them. I am also here to help you develop more skills and better ways of communicating with each other. I also know there's a stigma that you only go to marriage counseling when you are on the brink of divorce but let me let you in on a little secret: I don’t work with couples who are on the verge of divorce. I work with couples who have a loving relationship but they need to heal past hurts in order to have a healthier relationship. I promise that it’s not as scary as it might seem. Marriage counseling really can help you.
Begin Marriage Counseling in Utah Today
You can heal the hurts that are in your relationship. You can feel the way you felt when you looked into the eyes of your significant other on your wedding day. Your relationship and love can be better than it’s ever been, and marriage counseling can help. This Utah Counseling Practice has a marriage therapist who specializes in marriage counseling. To begin marriage counseling follow the steps below:
Meet with a marriage therapist in Utah
Start working on your relationship
Online Marriage Counseling in Utah
I know it’s not convenient to schedule an appointment during the day and away from work and your kids. I understand it’s difficult to prioritize therapy but I also know how much prioritizing your marriage can have a huge payoff. I wouldn’t be doing marriage counseling if I didn’t think it would change people’s lives. I offer online therapy in Utah as a way to help save your travel time and to be more convenient for you in your busy schedule. Online marriage counseling is just as effective as in-person therapy.
I work with couples located in Logan, Heber City, Salt Lake City, St. George, Cedar City, Salt Lake City, and more.
Other mental health services provided by Marcus Hunt Therapy
Marriage counseling isn’t the only counseling service offered at this Utah Counseling Center. Other mental health services provided by Marcus Hunt Therapy include depression therapy, premarital counseling, LDS marriage counseling, anxiety therapy, EMDR therapy, PTSD treatment, and therapy for men in Utah.
About the Author
Marcus Hunt is an associate marriage and family therapist at Marcus Hunt Therapy in Utah. Marcus has a degree in behavioral science from Utah Valley University. He also has a master's degree in marriage and family therapy. Marcus enjoys working with couples who want to have better marriages and grow closer to each other. Marcus is the youngest child and was able to learn from his parent's and siblings' marriages, which inspired him to pursue an education in marriage and family therapy. He believes that when both couples are committed to working on their relationship they can have the type of marriage they want. When Marcus isn’t doing therapy, he’s exploring new restaurants in Utah County. The best pizza of all time can be found at The Pizza Cart in Cedar City.