How Couples Therapy Supports Parents

Whether the two of you are figuring out whether or not you want to start a family or you’re already co-parenting, couples therapy is helpful for getting on the same page and learning to deal with your differences in a productive way.

To parent, or not to parent, that is the first question

The decision to have children or not is a deal-breaker decision, so it’s worth exploring together in couples counseling. Why is it a deal-breaker? If one person really wants children and the other person really doesn’t, one person would have to give up too much for there to be an acceptable compromise. Which means you want to learn what’s motivating your particular preference, rather than just going with a decision that’s more about pleasing society, your family, your friends, or your politics than about what you would find satisfying. In other words, make it a conscious decision.

Things to consider if you decide to start a family:

What’s your parenting style?

If you’ve already made the decision to have children and have one or more children or one on the way, working out your parenting style is important. Doing what your parents did with you or the opposite of what they did with you without questioning it or understanding child development is not helpful. Once again, conscious decisions are the way to go. The reasons behind the parenting style and resulting decisions matter.

What’s your parenting agenda?

Do you have an agenda for your child? Is your child an extension of you, or a person in his or her own right? Are you going to have your child play a sport, play an instrument, or learn another language because you did or because you had wanted to as a child or because you think that will guarantee success? What constitutes success? What if your child doesn’t have the aptitude for or interest in those activities? Is your job as a parent to mold your children into whom you would like them to be, or to support them in their quest to find themselves and what satisfies them?

These are important questions to sort out, as individuals and to find agreement on as a couple. That’s where individual therapy  is important, as well as couples counseling.

Individual Therapy

I often work with people in a combination of individual counseling and couples therapy, with the understanding that I will never, ever divulge anything one of you says in an individual session to your partner or in a couples session without your express prior permission. In individual sessions you learn about yourself and the forces that have shaped you.

Your primary caregivers when you were a child influence how you see yourself, others, family, friends, work, love, sex, money, leisure, fun, home, food, health, and so many other things. So it’s important to look at those dimensions and build on what you learned that was helpful and rethink the things you learned that haven’t been so great for you. The individual therapy helps you learn to separate what you desire from what your family, society, and friends desire for you.

Couples Counseling

And in couples sessions, you and your partner put so many things you’ve learned about yourselves into practice: You see how your viewpoint about the world and life plays out in your relationship with your partner. You work out how to balance what you desire against what your partner desires. You decide how and whether you can compromise. You learn how to apply the compromises to the daily rewards and challenges of parenthood.

Do you want to raise your children in the particular religious tradition you grew up in? In your partner’s religious tradition? Or no religious tradition? What is your partner’s view?

What style of discipline do you want to use with your children? Does your partner share your disciplinary vision? Is it the same as what your parents used with you? How did that work out?

Are the two of you in agreement on whether your child adapts to the life the two of you share, or whether you restructure your lives and choices around your child? What, if any, changes do you want to make in your work life?

If parenting is something you and your partner are discussing, talking about it with a professional can help you come to the decision that is right for you. Read about parenting counseling and contact me. I won’t tell you what to do. I’ll help you think through the issues, so that you make your own decisions that feel good!