20 Oct Is Couples Therapy Like the TV Programme?
Is Couples Therapy Like the TV Programme?
Many people’s experience of couples therapy is through watching the TV programme on Iplayer. Putting aside the ethical issues around confidentiality for a moment, it’s interesting to consider whether real life couples therapy is like the TV programme?
First off, your own session will be private! Any therapist is bound by rules around confidentiality that keeps you safe. However, just like Dr Orna Guralnik, the show’s therapist, every decent therapist will have supervision. This means that they share your story with their own supervisor. Sometimes this supervisor can offer a different perspective, or suggest an avenue to explore that might be helpful. They are also a check and balance to ensure that the therapist is working with you ethically and safely.
Secondly, the range of issues that couples bring to counselling can be as diverse as those on the show. It’s not always about affairs and betrayals. Our past, especially our childhoods, can instil patterns of behaviour that keep us stuck. These sometimes themselves raise issues and conflicts within a relationship. Likewise, a couple can feel like they’ve grown apart and want to use the therapy session as a place to explore how they can recapture their intimacy.
Working with different types of couples therapy
There are many different approaches out there. For a start, they might be called couples counsellors, couples therapists or even marriage guidance counsellors. Some take your early years as their focus, looking at the impact of childhood on attachment patterns for instance. My apparich is Solution Focused. This means that, while we will look at what’s brought you to where you are now, the attention is on what you can do right now to help things change.
This might involve trying out new ways of communication for instance, or some reflective work to notice when certain behaviors are triggered. Although Dr Orna sometimes gives homework, this is a big part of our work together. I believe real change is only made when we embed it into our lives.
We also do work around getting your needs met. These are needs like security, connection, community, meaning and purpose – how can you get these met so that your relationship becomes more of a choice and a joy?
Is Couples Therapy Like the TV Programme?
Of course one might imagine that the couples on the programme have been chosen because they are able to talk on camera, are comfortable opening up, and even, perhaps, promise a little drama. It can be very different in real life couples counselling sessions. One partner may find it difficult to open up, and I have to help them with that before we can unravel what might be going on. A couple that sounds like they are great communicators may, in fact, be very good at talking about everything except what needs to be brought out into the open. Subject matter meanders: one person’s experience of a stressful job may be impacting the relationship. Another person’s trauma may need to be dealt with.
The show tends to concentrate on a few strands for each couple, so that you can see how they move through the issues. Typically, there are multiple strands that we are dealing with. The good thing about this though, is the domino effect. When you make changes in one place, it impacts other things and momentum builds.
Face to face or online couples therapy?
Dr Orna tends to see people face to face, apart from one season which was filmed during Covid. I see clients both online and face to face. This is simply a practical thing. With our busy lives it can be challenging to find times that both people can make in person, especially if there are children involved.
If we work online, I always suggest that people use the time they would have spent travelling to the session, as a time for reflection or grounding, depending on what they need right then.
The Endings
Of course, the TV show has an end of series deadline. Couples therapy is often not quite so definite. A couple might pop back for top up sessions when life issues threaten to throw them off course, and that’s always fine. However, Solution-Focused work, which is what I do, works on giving you tools and changing behaviours so that, even if you want to come back, you do still have tools and a depth of understanding you can bring to any situation, and this will be with you for life.
Free couples consultation
If you’d like to meet me and see if we would be a good fit to work together, you can book in a free online consultation here. If you can’t see a time that suits, or want an earlier one, contact me and I’ll find a slot for you.