The Marriage Counseling Blog

While many couples need marriage counseling for chronic issues, some couples experience cyclical problems. This was the case of Sam and Theresa, who has just had their first baby together. Theresa had become increasingly

distant from Sam after their firstborn and Sam felt disconnected from his new family. Both had decided couples counseling was needed before the problem became worse.

As Theresa put it:

I thought giving birth was going to be the best thing that ever happened to us. I expected so much. But after Tara was born, I don’t know…I just wasn’t feeling it. Or I wasn’t feeling how I thought I would. Sam seemed like he resigned himself to “provider” role and didn’t seem like he wanted to spend much time with us. Suddenly, I felt all alone, with a child. I was scared. Later I found out I was having some hormonal issues as well, so I’m sure that played a part in it.

Sam felt as if Theresa had withdrawn from him as well. He felt that he couldn’t parent as well as she, so he suddenly felt unneeded. It took the aid of a professional marriage counselor to elicit these feelings from both partners, since neither had discussed them with one another.
Once they aired their feelings, both began to feel more like a team again.

In this case, the problems had occurred during a certain period in the couple’s development, since they both stated they were happy beforehand. Life circumstances can always come into play and its the job of a couples counselor to navigate those occasionally tricky waters.

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