Couples Therapy 

Strengthening Connection and Communication

Are you and your partner stuck in unhealthy patterns of communication? Do you long to feel understood and heard? Do you struggle with navigating competing needs? (E.g. one person needs to talk something through at the same time when the other person needs to take a break?) Perhaps you’re wondering if it’s possible to truly repair after yet another painful conflict.

By design, our nervous systems function to help us seek connection and seek safety. This is why during moments of tension or conflict, in our efforts to seek connection with our partners, may we find ourselves moving towards self protection (defensiveness, avoidance, explaining ourselves).

Connection and repair can happen when both partners are able to feel internally safe and settled enough to hear one another, and respond from a place of genuine curiosity and care.

My approach to helping couples navigate challenging moments is rooted in a trauma informed understanding of the nervous system, and attachment theory. I help couples gain understanding about nervous system activation and underlying attachment styles so that couples can create an environment of emotional safety and deepen their connection. I will help you and your partner to:

• Express your vulnerable emotions and make requests using the Gottman Method “soft start” - Track your internal experience of tension and stress so that you can communicate to your partner when you get triggered or need to take a break

• Develop self soothing strategies that you can practice when you experience tension and stress so that you can return to connecting with your partner

• Strengthen your listening skills, so that your partner will feel heard and know that you are right there with them

• Make what the John and Julie Gottman call “repair attempts” because we know from the research that all couples fight, but it’s the couples who know how to repair that have satisfying, long lasting relationships.