During the most wonderful time of the year, you might notice that your relationship is a little more strained than usual. As a couples therapist, I’ve gotten pretty familiar with the influx of couples requests I get at the beginning of November. More specifically, I’ve gotten familiar with the state most new couples’ relationships are...
If you and your partner perpetually fight after social events, this post is for you. A good portion of the couples I work with struggle with balancing time apart and time together when they’re out together. Here are a few of the common complaints I’ve heard, “You convinced me to go and then you just...
In part 1 I examined what I think makes Instagram uniquely qualified to cause strain in closed, committed relationships. As I mentioned, my view is that fights about Instagram are not necessarily the core problem, but more likely a symptom of something deeper in the relationship. So while I do think it’s important to understand...
Lately, it seems Instagram has been coming up in my office more in my work with couples. Initially, I found this unusual. I’m used to social media being brought up with individuals going through a break-up or struggling with self-worth. I didn’t really expect social media to impact couples’ relationships to the extent it has…or...
In a long-term relationship, couples are constantly faced with making decisions together. Some of them are big (where to live, when to have kids) and some of them are small (where to eat, what to do on a Saturday). How you make these decisions with your partner can be the difference between feeling more connected...
It may sound presumptuous for me, a therapist, to tell you why what great therapy looks like, but in addition to being a therapist, I also have my own therapist and have had to work through my own personal issues and create strategies for growth. This post is about what I’ve learned from my experience...
Each of these could be broken out into their own post, but I want to hit the high-level concepts that make the first year of marriage work. As with anything I write, my perspective is shaped by my experience with clients, training and my personal experiences. Every relationship is unique, which is why therapy is...
When going through a breakup, there are times you just want to hide. You don’t want to go to the places that remind you of your ex, you don’t want to be around the people that are going to ask you about your ex, and you sure as hell don’t want to risk running into...
At their most basic form, emotions are energy. This energy is there to signal something is up and to motivate us to take action. Centuries ago this action most likely would have been to escape a predator or to catch prey so of course, humans had to be quick to react. Now, however, the opposite...
Every January it’s easy to arbitrarily pick new goals and say we want to move towards them, but are we missing a core level of reflection? By about the week after Christmas, most of us start feeling like the stick figure in this comic. This makes it really tempting to pick nearsighted resolutions based on...
