We have somehow modeled our parent’s couple (biological or adoptive) by accepting it or rejecting it or a mix of both. Or, its absence (anonymous childbirth, successive foster homes, …) led us to imagine one.
What we have integrated from it is part of our heritage in the sense of what we have accepted to receive, consciously or unconsciously.
So when we are in a couple relationship ourselves, we may be unconsciously replicating our parents’ ways. Yet we are neither the other party’s mother or father (and vice-versa). We are not here to “save” the other one even if we help each other, love each other and co-operate.
There’s a lot at stake in a couple relationship as it is (often but not always) made of physical and emotional intimacy.
We are getting into that relationship with explicit AND implicit expectations, individual representations up and including about sexuality.
The therapist helps in bringing each one’s expectations into light, decipher the respective representations and models, brings tools to better communicate, to really listen & understand each other in the couple (which does not mean necessarily to agree to everything), and helps exercise transparency in order for each one in that couple to really know each other (and does not mean say everything).
There are at least 3 entities in a couple: each person and the relationship.
In fact, with the integration of our parents, families and major figures of our lives, we are much more than 3 in that relationship: 2 a couple, 3 a crowd!
By speaking out what’s at stake, the expectations, the relational modes, by becoming conscious of what has not been said, the couple can become a rich and nourishing relationship.
- Couple sessions last from 45 to 90 minutes.