FIVE HABITS THAT HELP TO MANAGE CONFLICTS
People used to believe that highly satisfied couples had very few disagreements and very little conflict. But when relationship researchers measured the incidence of disagreements, they discovered that highly satisfied couples disagree just as often as other couples....
FOUR HABITS THAT DAMAGE RELATIONSHIPS
Marriage researcher John Gottman’s groundbreaking work on how couples interact revealed the four most common interactional patterns that damage relationships. While everyone exhibits these behaviors sometimes, when they become habitual, they are damaging to the...
BIDS FOR ATTENTION AND CONNECTION
What is a “bid” and how do you make one? Marriage researcher John Gottman calls bids the “fundamental unit of emotional communication.” Bids are actions that people take to connect to or to gain the attention of their partner. Bids can take many forms: pointing at...
ATTACHMENT STYLES
Attachment for Survival Many people are aware of typical survival routines like fight, flight, or freeze. Someone becomes angry and they take an aggressive stance. Someone becomes frightened and they run away. Someone becomes horrified and they freeze. Lesser known as...
Why Change Feels So Hard
Coming to therapy can feel really hard. What usually brings us to therapy is the feeling of being out of control in some way and not knowing a way to change. One person might be in a series of unstable relationships. Another might not be able to stop drinking. And...
What is Couples Therapy and How Can It Help Me?
When I tell people that I am a couples therapist, they have all sorts of questions. In today’s post, I thought I would write about the questions I’m asked most frequently about couples therapy and share how I answer them. Who should go to couples therapy? There are...
What Can I Do To Change My Partner?
As a couples therapist, I get this question all the time. Sometimes it’s spoken with anger, sometimes despair, sometimes sorrow, and sometimes exhausted resignation. Behind the question is often feelings of hurt, powerlessness, and a sense of something being...
The Importance of How You End Your Day for the Management of Mood Disorders
Think for a few minutes about how you usually end your day. Are you “doomscrolling” through news websites, watching an endless queue of suggested videos on YouTube, binge watching a Netflix series, ruminating about a problem at work, getting into an...
