The “Marriage Checkup”
Like an annual physical or dental exam:
Only 19 percent of currently married couples have taken part in marriage counseling; a recent study of divorcing couples found that nearly two-thirds never sought counseling before deciding to end the relationship.
You can even have therapy online.
I am not against marriage counseling (other than the fact that the mentioned study is federally funded). However, I am puzzled by people who skillfully communicate with colleagues and brilliantly solve problems at work, but who can’t seem to talk to their spouse or solve problems in their marriage. I wonder why work skills don’t always translate into life skills…
A WebMD article (New Tactic for Troubled Couples) explains the obstacles: half of couples who seek counseling do not improve their marriages. Of those who do, many are in trouble again within two years.
The article goes on to describe the difference between traditional couples counseling (i.e. behavioral couple therapy) and acceptance therapy (i.e. integrative couple therapy). Traditional couples’ therapy ties to get each party to modify their behavior in ways the other partner finds more amenable. That is, it tries to get couples to meet in the middle, so to speak. By contrast, acceptance therapy tries to get couples to better understand each other and accept each others’ annoying traits (when you understand your partner, you also might be better motivated to change your behaviors that most annoys them).
There’s an old saying that can be paraphrased thusly… “women marry men thinking their husbands will change; men marry women because they think their wives will never change.”
The State of Texas will waive your marriage license fee if you take a premarital counseling course. We did not do that because the only approved programs that we could find were conducted via churches.
However, we did do premarital counseling, and by far the best recommendation was a reading list of books. I actually started giving away copies of some of the books to our other friends who were married or getting married.
As far as the check-up goes, I think that most people know how their marriage is doing. They’re better off going for a weekend retreat to rekindle the flame than sitting through counseling.
In my opinion, most people could save themselves a lot of aggravation if they just choose their partner better and quit acting so selfishly once they get married.
Before bemoaning the claim that “only” 19 percent of couples take part in marriage counseling, it would be nice to see evidence suggesting that marriage counseling works.