Specialty Areas

• Anxiety
• Depression
• Trauma and Abuse
• Relationship Problems
• Couples Counseling

Are You Experiencing Relationship Problems?

Intimate relationships can be a real gift, bringing joy, connection, and love into your life. But when important relationships are not going well, life can feel lonely, depressing, and unsatisfying. Whether your relationships turn out to be frustrating or fulfilling has a lot to do with the patterns and behaviors that you bring to these relationships. Some of the common patterns and behaviors that may be at the root of your relationship problems include:

• Continually feeling misunderstood or underappreciated by your partner
• Easily getting hurt or angered by your partner
• Isolating or withdrawing when upset
• Believing that you are responsible for your partner’s happiness
• Experiencing anxiety or panic at the thought of being away from your partner
• Feeling inhibited or unsafe with intimacy or sexuality
• Getting jealous easily
• Feeling like you've been hurt too many times or too deeply to ever love again
• Being hostile or argumentative
• Putting up with a disrespectful partner because you don't believe that you deserve anything better

If you've struggled with relationship problems, it can be tempting to blame your partner or jump from one relationship to another. But as long as you continue your old relationship patterns and behaviors, you are likely to see the same results.

Counseling for relationship problems can help. By getting to the source of your problem, you can overcome the painful relationship patterns that set you up for disharmony. Traumas that take place in important childhood relationships are often at the root of current relationship struggles. If you've experienced any of the below issues, you've experienced the type of emotional trauma that can significantly impact your intimate relationships:

• Abuse (physical, emotional, verbal, or sexual)
• Being ignored, abandoned, or rejected by a parent or important person
• Death of a loved one
• Being constantly put down, humiliated, or embarrassed by an important person
• Having a self-absorbed parent
• Being underappreciated or heavily criticized by a parent, sibling, or someone close to you
• Having your boundaries violated by an authority figure

Traumas from childhood relationships have a significant impact because they create sensitivities that get triggered in your current relationships. For example, criticism by a partner can unknowingly bring up the old pain of having a highly critical parent. The problem is that all the pain and suffering from the past is experienced in the present, creating problems in your current relationship

Trauma can be challenging to overcome because of the way it gets "frozen" in your nervous system. The experiences that were emotionally overwhelming to you as a child often leave a traumatic "imprint" on you, which is what accounts for your current sensitivities. Fortunately, the emotional trauma that holds you back from experiencing fulfilling intimate relationships can be healed.

I utilize specific counseling techniques to help you release the traumas that have been the source of your recurring relationship problems. You can begin to:

• Experience more meaningful and enjoyable relationships
• Feel comfortable setting healthy boundaries
• Enjoy intimacy
• Feel trusting and safe with your partner
• Communicate more effectively
• Be more assertive
• Let go of worries of abandonment and rejection
• Be less critical and angry

Relationship problems can be very confusing and overwhelming, but they typically have a specific source. By tracking your current struggles back to their origin, maladaptive relationship patterns and behaviors can be transformed into new, healthier skills. Counseling for relationship problems can help you to find the satisfaction and fulfillment that you desire from your relationships.