Coupleworks Blogs
What has Covid-19 taught us.
As a Coupleworks therapist, I have always respected my clients and their agenda for coming into therapy, no matter what the presenting problem seems to be. During the last 15 months, my respect and admiration has grown for people in very difficult circumstances, who...
Jealousy: How to Embrace it and Talk about It
With lockdown slowly coming to an end, we are slowly interacting with more people. For some couples, this is a welcomed relief to spend time other than our partner but for some, it can bring up feelings of jealousy that have laid dormant throughout lockdown. Dr. Ari...
Wedding Season….
With Harry and Meghan’s reflections on their own wedding day at Windsor, and Carrie and Boris beating the media pundits and enjoying a very private ceremony at Westminster Cathedral, weddings, and all that surrounds them, have been very much in the news in recent...
Anxious Times and Quietening the Mind’s ‘Chatter’
‘You can’t stop the waves, but you can learn to surf’ (Jon Kabut-Zinn) ‘The way you tell the story to yourself matters’ (Amy Cuddy) Since the first news of the pandemic we have been aware of a global thrum of anxiety which has impacted on us individually to varying...
Is Online Therapy the Future?
As the country went into lockdown last year, the NHS could barely cope with Covid patients let alone the soaring increase in mental health problems. Faced with cancelled hospital appointments, long waiting lists to speak to, let alone see a GP and isolation from...
The Torment of Indecision in Couple Relationships
How many decisions do you think we average per day? Stop and think for a moment, before being completely sideswiped by the result which is an eye watering ....... 35,000 DECISIONS PER DAY Apparently about 227 of these are food related which is...
Change
Never was so much owed by so many to so few...has become a mantra in the UK in terms of our debt to the NHS. This same quote is present today under different circumstances in many areas as well as the NHS. Patterns and rhythms are altered by law. We, at...
Motherhood, Guilt and Self-care
Before women have babies, they are conditioned to believe that a good mother always puts themselves last; otherwise, they are overlooking their child and are being selfish. So, it’s not surprising that since the Pandemic began, being a mother has got even more...
While we can’t hug….
Physical closeness outside of our bubbles is something that many of us have been missing during the lockdowns and pleas for social distancing over the past year. For me so much of what that has meant is encapsulated in the title of a book that I have been...
Loneliness in our relationships
If there is anything positive that’s come out from this current Covid pandemic is that issues of loneliness and isolation experienced by so many especially during this last year are firmly at the centre of our awareness. Organisations such as Campaign to End...
What does it take to get through
Melanie Reid, the Times magazine columnist, wrote recently that, ‘Bravery is a concept I’ve always been suspicious of. I’m not sure it exists. Mainly it’s what you do when there isn’t really an option to do anything else. Bravado, though, that’s something else...
Developing Our Resilience in a Time of Pandemic
Resilience may be defined as ‘the capacity to adapt to and recover from adversities and difficult situations’ and it suggests ‘the presence of flexibility and elasticity that allows for an adjustment to misfortune and challenge’. Resilience may be understood as...
Kintsugi
THE JAPANESE ART OF SHOWING US THE STRENGTH AND BEAUTY IN HEALING AND REPAIR ‘The world breaks everyone and afterwards, some are strong at the broken places.’ Hemingway wrote this in his seminal work ‘A Farewell to Arms’ but it feels relevant to...
A link
Coupleworks sometimes find it useful to link everyday news items to real experiences of one of our couples. A news item which illustrates this was reported recently:- The North Circular is not a motorway….it is a main road running through both private dwellings...
Anxiety
Anxiety is the new epidemic running parallel to Covid-19, and there is no mask, social distancing or vaccine to combat it. Even with the second lockdown ending this week, people are more stressed and anxious than ever before with no assurances that the world will ever...
Why Little Things Matter
2020 will go down as a year in which almost everything changed, but one thing that has not is the usual outpouring of the Christmas advertisements. MacDonald’s asks ‘Are you Reindeer Ready?’, whilst Tesco, encouraging us all to indulge ourselves, proclaims...
Managing Uncertainty during Lockdown
For therapists, uncertainty is an issue that often comes up in therapy and never more so than now. It feels that over the past eight months when the first lockdown started, couples therapy sessions became more focused on uncertainty and anxiety than I can...
It’s not all doom and gloom
Nights drawing in, Covid anxiety, winter blues, Christmas panic, it’s all going horribly wrong Or is it? Many therapists are currently inundated with enquiries. Each client bringing their own dilemma, or needing a place to reflect, or wanting...
Couple Roles in Lockdown and Beyond
Often, relationship counsellors will see individuals on their own. The huge advantage of coming to a couples counsellor, rather than one who deals with issues solely around individuals, is that a long and intense training allows us to ‘see’ them...
When Couples Lie in Couple Therapy
As a therapist, I assume clients will be honest with me, naive as that might sound. This is not to say that people will be completely transparent; I appreciate that we all need to protect ourselves from our wounds and sometimes withhold things that might be difficult...
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