People call me to ask for help to save or improve their marriages. That, then is my job.
I am teaching people HOW to make it work, not how to throw in the towel.
If couples have no children and things aren’t going well, they can declare a fender bender and move on and out of the marriage. However, if there are children, they must think about the children first.
Couples may not need the family but children do. When the adults break the promise to the children to be together and raise them, the children become damaged in terms of trust in relationships. They have trouble after that believing that any one loves the other enough to stay. They may wind up repeating their parent’s patterns.
So I am teaching people how to do it right—not how to live in misery.
Unfortunately, far too many therapists direct people to divorce. Often those therapists are also divorced—or possibly never married.
I knew a minister once who was getting divorced. Interestingly, many of his couple clients got divorced that year.
The most powerful messages in the room are subtle and often indirect. This minister was guiding his clients toward divorce by how he responded to them.
People in my office get into better relationships with each other, not divorced because I am not recommending it!
I know of some therapists who boast of giving new clients a test to see if they should be married! There are therapists who say, « why do you put up with this « rather than helping people find a solution. There are therapists who promote leaving marriages because they can’t and therapists who don’t know what skills to teach nor how to teach them.
Yes, far too many therapists break up marriages directly or indirectly.
I would add here that no one should live with abuse, addiction, or child endangerment.
However, in such cases separation is better than divorce as it leaves room for help for the problem.
Can One Person Do Marriage Counseling?
Absolutely! It may well take longer. However, if one person can change it will change everything. It is possible to teach one spouse how to respond differently—more gently, without anger, and or to seek information rather than blame.
The idea is to paint yourself into the spot in the relationship of the absent person rather than to align with the person in the room. Much good therapy is done with only half the couple in the room
Does Marriage Counseling Lead To Divorce?
It can! It has been said by Dr. Frank Pittman in his article, A Buyer’s Guide to Psychotherapy, bad therapy is worse than no therapy! I have seen situations where, fortunately, people left a therapy environment where they were getting bad or no advice. They left BEFORE the therapy split them.
Good marriage counseling gives people the tools to get together. It doesn’t pull them apart.
