Great Couples Counseling in Rancho Palos Verdes, CA. Therapy to heal relationships.

I specialize in Couples Therapy at the Narrative Couples Center. I help partners to achieve new stories for the future. My approach is strength-based. It explores what couples hold most precious in their lives and relationships and brings people closer to their hopes and preferences. My counseling offers tools and collaboration to help each member of a relationship to move towards shared understanding.

I work with couples on an emotional level focusing on long-held internal beliefs about how we view the world and each other. These beliefs often get in the way of healthy relationships. Uncovering these beliefs and becoming aware that we have choices as adults, provides the opportunity to change and improve our relationships. I work with the process, what happens between the couple, and with the underlying feelings we protect with defenses such as anger, jealousy, sadness and shutting down. I have seen couples and individuals change in weeks when they can be more honest with their feelings with each other. Call me at 760-766-1622 or email me.

When couples wish to work through their relationship difficulties, or do premarital couples therapy, they will find my office to be a safe, nonjudmental, and encouraging space. You will colaborate with your spouse, and prioritize issues you'd like to discuss. You will explore your own ability for acceptance and tolerance of your spouse's behavior. We will work together on communication skills, and styles, we'll try to soften the dialogue. We'll learn about problem solving skills with which husband and wife are heard. If there are sexual problems, I have experience in treating sex addiction, internet pornography addiction, and the affect of extended families on your relationship.

I will work with you to help you overcome whatever challenge you're facing, whether it's fighting, distance, a betrayal, or lack of trust, among other challenges. I will also help you to better communicate, including changing harmful or frustrating patterns of relating to each other. The ultimate goal that I keep in mind is to help the two of you become a more loving, cooperative, trusting, and intimate couple.

Couples counseling is some of the most rewarding work a Marriage/Couples counselor can do, we love to help restore broken or just wounded relationships. Sometimes the brokenness gets so bad that people start thinking of separating or divorcing. Often people think that once they separate or divorce that they will not have to put up with each other again. This may be true if you don’t have children. However, if you have children you will still have to navigate the process of getting along even after you have separated. The issues don’t go away. As a licensed Marriage and Family therapist I can help you separate out the pitfalls of separation or divorce realistically.

Relationships are an area where young adults can struggle. Wanting to create lasting bonds, they don't always think about who is a good match for them, given their family values, and plans for their life. Past failed relationships can also leave sensitive young adults hesitant to open their hearts and try to find love again. I help sensitive young adults discover what it takes to create the loving relationship they've always dreamed of.

There are countless models of healthy romantic relationships, from monogamous to polyamorous, and unique variations between partners. The scripts for dating and longterm relationships of our parents’ generations may not be applicable to your relationship, and there is no formal education in how to be a good partner or how to identify unhealthy relationships. But there is psychological research that shows that effective communication, emotional openness, intimacy, and other factors contribute to healthy relationships. Creating these conditions are skills that can be learned. I practice brief humanistic and emotion-focused therapy (EFT) to help my LGBTQ and hetero clients learn these skills.

Working with couples is a joy for me! I have a high success rate: approximately 90%. I help men and women make the transition from being single to being a unit, helping them learn to work together as a team. My primary aim is to make my clients feel at ease. I truly care about them and help them explore the underlying concerns and move forward to achieve the best possible results.

My work with couples begins with teaching ways to communicate from a calm place, avoiding escalation and rebuilding trust. I help you see the conflict as a third entity, with the both of you (and me) on the same team, tackling it. With new tools on how to better communicate, I can help you restore the love and passion that brought you together in the first place.

Dr. Levine is a clinical psychologist, not simply a "marriage counselor." He often works with couples whose difficulties involve such problems as disagreements about dealing with relatives, children and friends as well as arguments over money, sex and unreasonable expectations. His approach is relaxed and non-confrontational, within the framework of what is known as "cognitive couples therapy." The goal is to reduce unrealistic demands and help with acceptance of the limitations of being human within the context of a close interpersonal relationship. You will find Dr. Levine to be fair, open-minded and even-handed in working with the couples he sees. He will answer the phone personally.

The main thing I notice couples coming in for is to work on trust issues, communication problems, and lack of intimacy within the relationship. This can manifest into anger, affairs, shutting down, and a number of other behaviors. I work with couples FIRST on what does work, so that they can build upon skills they already possess within their relationship. 2: Teaching basic listening skills so that partners feel heard. 3: Teaching the couples how to communicate without attacking. 4: implementing those skills at home. Therapy is much more complex than this, and there are many more aspects of communication, but building strengths is very important to relationship success.

Last year, I have did over 80 hours of training in couples therapy. Nothing feels more important to me than to help people create great relationships. I have had much success over the past 16 years in helping couples; whether dating, married, newlyweds, separated, divorced (to create a successful co-parenting relationship, even when they can't stand to be in the same room), & those divorcing, so they can navigate the process with grace. Best advice: Come in before you think you HAVE TO, for the least # of sessions, don't wait. You are not a failure if you are having trouble in your relationship. Businesses hire consultants & so should you for the most important & complicated part of life.

My approach is to help each partner see clearly where s/he stands, what s/he stands for, and what meaning the relationship holds. How do these values come into play in the relationship? How do our own expectations, and those of society at large, influence the relationship? Often, understanding the role of a relationship in our own lives reveals possible ways forward. Sometimes, it shows us that moving forward might not be what we want to do.

I enjoy working collaboratively with couples and moving towards what they want their story to be. What do they stand for as a couple? What is getting in the way of their desired story? What are their strengths? How are the outside influences such as culture and family affecting them? How can they come together based on their values? Is there healing to be done in the areas of trust, jealousy, or infidelity? Every relationship is different and I help all types of couples re-connect and move forward.

The goal of couples therapy is to bring out the best in you and your partner, strengthening the quality of your relationship, as a point of balance, allowing you to deal with issues in ways that support you to grow as individuals and a couple. To increase your understanding of yourself, your partner, and the patterns of interactions that have become detrimental to the relationship.

Let me guess. One partner feels alone and like they don't matter and the other feels they are always being criticized and can't get anything right. The more one asks for the other to show up, the more the partner disappears physically and emotionally. You both bicker and fight and the idea of sitting and just hanging out seems elusive, if not impossible. Something like this? Often we crave connection but are blocked by the pain and the history that gets in the way. Small fights about little things become battles that highlight our struggle to have our basic relational needs met. I can help you get under the bickering to the parts crying out for connection- to an enriching relationship.

I specialize in couples and marriage counseling. My approach is based on recent research in marriage science showing what habits successful couples have that other do not. My approach is skills based and practical, teaching both of you how to communicate more effectively, how to understand each other, how to decide what is changeable and what is not in your relationship, how to deal with perpetual issues,on which you may be deadlocked, and different ways to view issues and problems in your relationship to reduce conflict. I also help you identify what is working in your relationship, (or what used to work) so that we can build on the positive.

Our work with couples focuses on rebuilding communication and understanding in the relationship. Our clinical focus is on three entities; you, your partner, and the relationship. We consider the relationship our client, and because of that, we start by getting a history of the relationship, how it developed, and what’s happened to build it up, and what’s happened to weigh it down. Couples counseling works best when both you and your partner show up in a compassionate, honest, and with the intent to reflect and improve yourself in the relationship.

Is this you? All we do is fight! It seems like we never hear each other and neither of us listens anymore! It is so frustrating I do not want to come home and try. I have been successfully helping couples to develop the tools necessary to communicate effectively for more than 20 years. Having disagreements is not unusual. Learning how to resolve disagreements is a key element to healthy relationships. Conflict resolution is about learning to fight fairly by listening in an atmosphere of Respect, Trust, Safety and love and not placing my desire to be right over the relationship.

Are you questioning whether to remain invested in your current relationship? Would you like to learn ways in which to strengthen your existing relationship? Learn effective ways of communicating with your partner that can help bridge the gap of misunderstandings, focus on strengths and identify tools that are already building on your commitment to one another.

What are the most common couples' issues? If you are thinking "communication, conflict, sex, money, child rearing" you are correct. However, most therapists will go after the symptom on each side of the couple fence thinking that the way to effective change is by getting each party to "work" on their respective "issue". Many times the parties don’t agree but comply. Imagine if you could align the unconscious brains of a couple and stop the "working on your issues" part that has become so popular in therapy settings? Contact kevin@kevinflemingphd.com to learn how! Or call 877-606-6161. DR. FLEMING'S NEW RELATIONSHIP/COUPLES INTENSIVES. www.kevinflemingphd.com/marriage-couples-retreats.php

Married, dating, heterosexual, gay, or bisexual? I specialize in emotional intimacy, sex, addiction, and trauma, any of which can derail a relationship. You can heal your relationship or end it. I can help either way. Improve communication and handle conflicts better. Get your emotional baggage out of the way so it doesn’t hurt your relationship. Better for the couple and especially better when there are kids. Have kids and you’re divorcing? You’re still tied together. We can make that less damaging for everyone. Kids do better when their divorced parents work together for the kids’ best interest – dealing with emotions and communication better and not putting kids in the middle.

“Unlatch” from Negative Emotions and Behaviors Some couples make the assumption that serious and persistent conflicts and differences will get resolved on their own. Time can heal, but it also helps if you are willing to work on improving your relationship. Relationship issues can be quite complex and it is not just a matter of learning how to “communicate” nice thoughts to one another. My role as a counselor is to identify and track the emotional experience of each person and to support the couple as they learn to engage in a more productive way so that each feels more heard, considered, respected and acknowledged.

Relationships are hard. This is a fact that many people deny and others become aware of when it is too late. By creating an environment where couples can communicate in an honest manner, I work with them to establish clear lines of communication. In addition to working with couples, I am currently working toward a certification as a sex therapist.

As an ICEEFT-certified EFT couples therapist, I can help you and your partner to reconnect, escape from the repetitive cycles that keep you distant from each other, make sense of your emotions, improve the way you handle stress and conflict, and restore trust and safety with each other. There is no bad guy in your relationship. I'll help you see how your feelings and behaviors make perfect sense - and work with you both to create new, positive cycles that draw you closer together. EFT is very well supported by research showing that it significantly improves over 86% of distressed relationships, and importantly, that those benefits are still present two or three years after therapy is over.