Marriage Counseling in Mesa, AZ

Marriage counseling is often called relationship counseling as it is for couples in any status of relationship (dating, engaged, married, divorced). Some couples may set their goal to mend their relationship and work to stay together, some are seeking guidance to decide what direction their relationship needs to go, and others are looking to end their relationship well. A marriage counselor’s job is NOT to decide if a couple should stay together or separate, but is to help the couple discover this for themselves and have the ability to accomplish this goal with great love and care.

For the first session, the couple usually meets with their therapist together to discuss the history of their distress, unsuccessful attempts to heal, and the goals for therapy. The therapist will provide feedback on the strengths that he or she sees in the couple and will propose a treatment plan.

In the following sessions, the therapist will likely meet with each person individually to gather a more in-depth personal history. Marriage counselors will usually state there are no secrets in couples counseling. Any information shared in an individual session cannot be kept secret from the other partner.

At the end of counseling, couples hope to have healed emotional injuries to the relationship, clarified their desire to be together, or have decided to enter a separation process with the highest level of care and compassion.

Most importantly, the counselor’s role is not to decide if the couple should stay together but is to help the couple achieve the highest level of healing possible. So, they can determine if they would like to stay together or separate.

No, “marriage counseling” can be for people in any phase of their relationship. It is for that reason that we typically call it couples counseling rather than marriage counseling. Couples that have recently started dating, are engaged to be married, are lifelong unmarried partners, are in civil unions, or are legally married can attend “marriage counseling”.

The most common presenting complaints for marriage counseling are the following:

• Communication difficulty
• Inability to resolve conflict
• Intimacy difficulties/disconnection
• Feelings of detachment
• Deep sense of hurt from a specific event
• Deep sense of hurt from numerous nonspecific events
• Infidelity or boundary crossing
• Phase of Life distress
• Repetitive arguments about parenting, finances, in-laws, work/life balance, etc

Emotion-Focused Therapy (EFT) does not focus specifically on irrational thoughts and communication, but instead is focused on adult attachment and bonding. Many high functioning couples don’t have intrinsic communication problems or difficulty resolving conflict in other areas in their life. Therefore, it is not a helpful solution to “teach” couples how to communicate when they already have these skills. Instead, it is important to better understand what is actually getting in the way of these highly developed skills from being utilized at the moment and Emotion-Focused Therapy does just this.

Many traditional approaches to couples counseling help couples have more controlled discussions, speak with less inflammatory language, and challenge places where they may have been thinking “irrationally.” While this approach may seem like an obvious place to start, the research finds that a large percentage of couples do not benefit from these interventions (up to 60%).

When a couple is able to understand and heal the hurt and disconnection that is getting in the way of them connecting/communicating, they are able to maintain their growth outside of therapy and have the skills to rebuild when hurt happens again in the future.

Some psychologists and therapists charge more for a session of couples counseling than for individual counseling. At Biltmore Psychology and Counseling, each clinician has their own rate for a counseling session and the cost for an individual or a couples counseling session is the same rate. If you have questions about pricing, please contact our offices for pricing: 480-999-7070

Our office is out-of-network, so we do not accept insurance directly. However, if your insurance plan offers out-of-network benefits, we can provide you with a receipt so that you can bill your insurance directly.

Depending on the individual insurance plan, many will be reimbursed for a percentage of their payment. To determine if you have out-of-network mental health coverage, contact your insurance and ask about whether your plan includes out-of-network mental health coverage. Feel free to contact our office with any questions.

Biltmore Psychology and Counseling clinical psychologists, marriage and family therapists, and counselors are known for being the best in their field. Counselors are held to the highest standards of excellence, and bring the best of their education, experience and professional knowledge to their practice. Our professionals build strong relationships with each person based on a mutual trust and confidence, and value each person’s perspective of his or her own life. Counselors work with each person to understand, engage and overcome even seemingly insurmountable difficulties, and facilitate each person’s process of transformation and hope.