The Bigger Roots to Smaller Problems in Couples Therapy
Many couples enter into counseling with seemingly manageable problems. The problems can include housecleaning issues (“I’m sick of picking up after him. I feel like his handmaid”) to conversational skills (“She never lets me get a word in edgewise.) Most of the time, the source of these problems runs deeper; such as control, fear and anger. The dirty sock on the floor is a psychological “lightning rod” for more complex underlying issues.
In turn, some couples learn that they after often not dealing with individual and personal issues of their own, so their anger or pain is misdirected toward the partner.
Let’s take Samuel for instance:
My job was making me deeply unhappy but I felt stuck there. With another kid on the way, what was I going to do, quit? The money anxiety really got to me. But every day, I’d go in there for 10 hours and leave, feeling like my soul had been sucked out of me. I was disrespected, underpaid and overworked.
So by the time I came home, the last thing I felt like hearing was my wife’s complaints. Sometimes she wasn’t even complaining. I just felt mad at her. Maybe I was really mad at myself; for withstanding such a job. So not only was this job affecting me, it was now affecting my marriage. I didn’t know how to talk to her about our marriage problems. I just felt like a volcano, waiting to erupt.
Just like a errant weed, problems often have roots. If you take the time, via couples counseling, to explore the real source of the problem, you are given the chance to genuinely address the problem – not the dirty sock!
Related Posts
- Couples Counseling – Looking at the Bigger Picture
- Releasing your Problems to a Couples Counselor
- Couples Counseling for the Silent Problems
- Individual Problems that Lead to Couples Counseling
- Couples Therapy Doesn’t Hold Back
