The American Medical Association defines marriage counseling as a “type of psychotherapy for a married couple, or established partners, that tries to resolve problems in the relationship. Typically, two people attend counseling sessions together to discuss specific issues.”
- Marriage counselors are trained in psychotherapy with a focus on family systems;
- The counselor attempts to understand a couples symptoms, and seeks to understand how their communication style contributes to problems in the relationship;
- Marriage counseling can be a short term therapeutic process, but in many cases the couple must be committed to a process that will take as long as it takes;
- The mental health counselor may ask questions about the couple’s roles, patterns, rules, goals, and beliefs;
- The therapeutic process often begins by analyzing the good and bad aspects of the relationship;
- The counselor helps the couple understand that absent an underlying pathology in one partner, generally they are both responsible for the direction the relationship has taken;
- From there the couple learns to interact in ways that foster satisfaction in the relationship for both persons. This is facilitated greatly by learning new forms of communication;
- Ideally, each person would bring to the therapeutic process a willingness to be open and honest; a willingness to engage in self reflection and analysis; and a willingness to concentrate on the things each individual can control in themselves, rather seeking to control the other.