Coupleworks Blogs
How to tell if your relationship is in trouble
If you are continually fighting with each other, what does that say about your relationship? When you need each other the most why can’t you communicate and stay connected rather than turn against each other? If you find yourself in a relationship where you are...
Finding a Therapist isn’t always easy
Finding an individual or couple’s therapist should be straightforward and yet it can sometimes be a complicated process for people. Asking for help can be difficult and finding the right person that you’re comfortable with requires the ability to be clear about what...
Dealing with Tension – A Quick Fix!
How often do you pour that glass of wine, or reach for the chocolate, or slump in front of the television, to try to switch off from the day’s problems and stress? The relief may not last but, for a short while, you feel better. However, it may be that those choices...
Five Tips for Improving your Relationship in 2014
We can offer praise in so many situations, but this can so easily disappear in relationships. remember to thank each other for the small things. Make a point of showing appreciation for at least one thing a day. Find time for each other. The couple relationship will...
Reuniting with Family this Christmas?
Alongside the gifts and good food arrives a big box of expectations – all creating an atmosphere that feels highly-charged and which could be explosive. What if we do not wish to conform this year? Is it hard to risk disappointing others? Does it feel too challenging...
Boarding School Syndrome
The way in which we form our early relationships with our parents or primary carers affects our long-term relationships in later life. Young children who have to deal with early separation and loss, either from adoption, bereavement of a parent or prolonged separation...
Lies, economical with the truth, (white lies), and lies.
Couples hope for truth from each other but is this always the best solution whenever questions are asked? Some will wonder how anyone can trust anyone else unless there is total honesty within an adult partnership. Truth and lying are rooted in family history,...
How to Survive Long Distance Relationships
More and more couples appear to be struggling with the affects of being in long distance relationships. This can either take the shape of couples who usually for reasons of work, spend long periods of time apart often in different countries, with different time zones...
Anger and the Couple
Like a sniffer dog recognising the scent of explosives, we all learn to be alert to any hint of danger to our psychological well-being. Whenever we have a suspicion that our partner may be behaving in a way that makes us feel vulnerable, we move to defend ourselves...
The Use of Antidepressants and Therapy
My views on antidepressants have changed over the years. Where I was once not in favour of their use, I now see their benefits with clients. The problem is that most antidepressants are too freely given out without thought or proper assessment and there is rarely...
Caring for a Loved One with an Eating Disorder
Addictive behaviours draw in other family members. There will be instinctive reactions in concerned onlookers of anyone with an eating disorder. The Maudsley Hospital in South London have developed a range of descriptive animal metaphors to clearly illustrate the...
Love Sex and Intimacy Fair 19-20 October
If you are in the Brighton and Hove area this weekend, or if you can make it from London – we would recommend that you visit the Love, Sex and Intimacy Fair at Hove Town Hall on the 19-20th October. To quote from their website ‘The fair has the intention of exploring...
Adult trust
Trust is often aligned to unease about a possible affair. But there are many other areas of trust which also cause disappointment, hurt, anger and a sense of unfairness and let down. How much can you really trust yourself in any unforeseen circumstance however...
Loss
It is not only the loss of a partner, or someone in our family, that can cause us to feel distressed and grief-stricken. Losing a close friendship can cause overwhelming feelings of sadness of bereavement. Friends form part of the jigsaw which makes up the secure base...
Stages in Couple Relationships
Falling in Love/getting to know one another: How we negotiate the challenges of becoming a couple determines the way we communicate as a couple in the future. As the initial excitement/passion dies, the couple is weighing up whether their other connections are...
Emotion is the Glue in our Relationships
Every day we talk to couples because they are either struggling with their relationship and want to stay in it and want *more from it, or they want to get out of a relationship that is no longer working and is causing distress and pain. Equally single clients are...
Tips for New Parents
While the birth of the Royal baby has brought much attention in the media to the Royal couple, they are of course new parents going through many of the joys and struggles that all new parents experience. Having a baby is wonderful but getting through the early months...
Tips for Separated Parents
Remember what you once had, and try to separate this from where you are now. We often get the relationship we needed at that time. You are now different people. Remember what was good about the other. Never discuss or criticise an ex partner in front of your children....
To have and to hold
To have and to hold or to have, love and let go, which is the question? The questions presented are both applicable to either relationships or parents and children. To have and to hold is to be avoided if possible in both areas. To hold a partner is stifling and...
What makes us return to a partner, after separation, even if we know it’s not right?
If it is very soon after the break-up, it may be that the grief and loss feel overwhelming and unmanageable. This may be particularly true if we have experienced other significant losses in our lives. A panic that we are unable to cope with the sadness, grief and...