Marriage therapy or continue individual therapy?
April 25, 2017 9:43 AM Subscribe
I have been seeing a therapist/counselor on my own for a few times due to major issues I have with my husband and his family. My husband knows that I have been going. Would you recommend that I bring him with me to my appointments, or keep on working on myself, alone?
I have major issues with my inlaws, which most likely translates to issues with my husband....issues with my completely dysfunctional family in law. I feel like I have been put in the position of family scapegoat, because I cannot deal with acting like e everything is okay anymore. The therapist I have been seeing thinks my husband probably has learned to dissociate since a young age; often when horrible things happen with me and his family, it's like they never happened and he truly doesn't remember. I feel totally trapped in my marriage, and very alone. We have three kids, and I feel like if I didn't have three, I would have probably separated from him long ago. I'm wondering if I should just continue to work on myself in therapy, or ask him to come along with me to appointments. He would go, it's just I don't know how much progress we would make. He likely wouldn't have much to say and I feel like nothing would change.
I have major issues with my inlaws, which most likely translates to issues with my husband....issues with my completely dysfunctional family in law. I feel like I have been put in the position of family scapegoat, because I cannot deal with acting like e everything is okay anymore. The therapist I have been seeing thinks my husband probably has learned to dissociate since a young age; often when horrible things happen with me and his family, it's like they never happened and he truly doesn't remember. I feel totally trapped in my marriage, and very alone. We have three kids, and I feel like if I didn't have three, I would have probably separated from him long ago. I'm wondering if I should just continue to work on myself in therapy, or ask him to come along with me to appointments. He would go, it's just I don't know how much progress we would make. He likely wouldn't have much to say and I feel like nothing would change.
He should be in individual therapy simultaneously,imo. It's not all on you to coordinate his wellbeing, if he's serious and he cares about your concerns, he needs to go. For the sake of himself as well as you. It's not on you to manage and protect yourself and your children from his family issues.
The problem with couples therapy is that it can often end up with the initiator(and let's face it often the woman) going home as a sort of full-time therapist. I'd suggest reading the emotional labour thread (maybe again). He needs to put in the work first himself, then couple's counselling may be a good option.
But if he's not willing to put in the effort himself, please don't stay just because you have kids. Your kids will know you don't want to be together and that's not a healthy way to learn about relationships.
posted by InkDrinker at 9:55 AM on April 25, 2017 [10 favorites]
The problem with couples therapy is that it can often end up with the initiator(and let's face it often the woman) going home as a sort of full-time therapist. I'd suggest reading the emotional labour thread (maybe again). He needs to put in the work first himself, then couple's counselling may be a good option.
But if he's not willing to put in the effort himself, please don't stay just because you have kids. Your kids will know you don't want to be together and that's not a healthy way to learn about relationships.
posted by InkDrinker at 9:55 AM on April 25, 2017 [10 favorites]
What does your therapist say about this?
If I were in your place, I would be looking for a separate couples therapist—while continuing to see the therapist with whom you have a history AND encouraging Husband to also enter individual counseling.
Seconding InkDrinker that you aren't doing your kids any favors by staying in a dysfunctional marriage. I believe it's better for them to have at least one fully-functional, emotionally healthy parent. And perhaps you will go on to have a solid relationship with someone else that will serve as a model for them in the future.
Finally, check out Deborah Tannen's work re communication in relationships. (Tannen is the thinking person's version of John Grey, i.e., author of those infuriating "Men are from Mars..." books.)
posted by she's not there at 10:08 AM on April 25, 2017
If I were in your place, I would be looking for a separate couples therapist—while continuing to see the therapist with whom you have a history AND encouraging Husband to also enter individual counseling.
Seconding InkDrinker that you aren't doing your kids any favors by staying in a dysfunctional marriage. I believe it's better for them to have at least one fully-functional, emotionally healthy parent. And perhaps you will go on to have a solid relationship with someone else that will serve as a model for them in the future.
Finally, check out Deborah Tannen's work re communication in relationships. (Tannen is the thinking person's version of John Grey, i.e., author of those infuriating "Men are from Mars..." books.)
posted by she's not there at 10:08 AM on April 25, 2017
Marriage counseling is for two people who want to work on a problem, ideally also seeing therapists (different therapists from each other, and different from the marriage counselor - this is best practice, and really your therapist should have said so already) to do solo work. It's not like taking a car to a mechanic, your husband has to be invested in the process.
However, you could certainly go to a counselor or mediator in order to have some support while you make your final offer: he pursues treatment or you leave, outlining the terms and conditions of both options. That way if he does want to pursue treatment, there's someone right there to tell him what to do next. Someone who isn't you, because this is a project he has to manage without you or, like InkDrinker said, you'll end up doing all the work.
I strongly recommend putting your plan together before you have this meeting, though. Go ahead and talk to a lawyer and find out what next steps will be if you end up leaving. Maybe your therapist can help you decide on what reasonable timelines are if he decides to get help (especially since just getting a first appointment in some areas can take months) so you can set out a timeline like 3 months to get a physical with bloodwork (you need to rule out a physical problem, because no amount of therapy will fix that, and it's also possible his doctor will suggest medication as support for his talk therapy) and a first appointment, consistently going to therapy and doing homework by six months, have a status meeting then to see if both your therapists suggest some kind of joint counseling yet, another status at one year to decide next steps.
But you also need to be prepared for the possibility that he is so entrenched in his issues - and it sounds like he's trapped in a sick system - that choosing to change is scarier than passively losing his wife and kids. But you need to get the kids as far out of that system as you can, so you do that and he either comes along or he doesn't.
posted by Lyn Never at 10:16 AM on April 25, 2017 [5 favorites]
However, you could certainly go to a counselor or mediator in order to have some support while you make your final offer: he pursues treatment or you leave, outlining the terms and conditions of both options. That way if he does want to pursue treatment, there's someone right there to tell him what to do next. Someone who isn't you, because this is a project he has to manage without you or, like InkDrinker said, you'll end up doing all the work.
I strongly recommend putting your plan together before you have this meeting, though. Go ahead and talk to a lawyer and find out what next steps will be if you end up leaving. Maybe your therapist can help you decide on what reasonable timelines are if he decides to get help (especially since just getting a first appointment in some areas can take months) so you can set out a timeline like 3 months to get a physical with bloodwork (you need to rule out a physical problem, because no amount of therapy will fix that, and it's also possible his doctor will suggest medication as support for his talk therapy) and a first appointment, consistently going to therapy and doing homework by six months, have a status meeting then to see if both your therapists suggest some kind of joint counseling yet, another status at one year to decide next steps.
But you also need to be prepared for the possibility that he is so entrenched in his issues - and it sounds like he's trapped in a sick system - that choosing to change is scarier than passively losing his wife and kids. But you need to get the kids as far out of that system as you can, so you do that and he either comes along or he doesn't.
posted by Lyn Never at 10:16 AM on April 25, 2017 [5 favorites]
Oh, and there is a third possibility: you two still split up, because sometimes the earth is just too salted to regrow the relationship and it sounds like you're feeling that already, but it's a wake-up call and he realizes he doesn't want his kids to end up like that. And the two of you have a better coparent relationship than you would if he was clinging to the old ways.
posted by Lyn Never at 10:21 AM on April 25, 2017 [3 favorites]
posted by Lyn Never at 10:21 AM on April 25, 2017 [3 favorites]
He would go, it's just I don't know how much progress we would make. He likely wouldn't have much to say and I feel like nothing would change.
One of the good things about your husband going to a couples counselor with you is that it's a GREAT place to ask questions like, "Why don't you have much to say about this?" and "do you think anything should change?"
posted by rhizome at 12:01 PM on April 25, 2017 [1 favorite]
One of the good things about your husband going to a couples counselor with you is that it's a GREAT place to ask questions like, "Why don't you have much to say about this?" and "do you think anything should change?"
posted by rhizome at 12:01 PM on April 25, 2017 [1 favorite]
You sound pretty clear and grounded about this, which is what individual therapy can help achieve in these instances (as well as helping you stay that way), so I think couple's therapy could be more useful, if you have to choose.
Doing both individual and couple's therapy would be ideal, because couple's therapy will be frustrating for awhile. It can take trial and error to find a good therapist (maybe plan on trying out 3 therapists before you stumble on one you both like?), and it can take something like 6 sessions to get past the introductions and start to see any sort of shift.
I think turning a solo therapist into a couple's therapist would be weird and not ideal. If he felt put on the spot, he might think "your" therapist "sided with you." And you might lose the sense of having someone in your corner helping to keep you grounded.
I don't think that getting him in solo therapy is necessarily what you want -- his coping method is "working" for him, for some definitions of working. You want him to work on what's not working for you, and that's a couple's-therapy kind of conversation, in my opinion. Once he sees "oh, I have a lot of work to do here," then he can go do his work individually.
posted by salvia at 1:04 PM on April 25, 2017
Doing both individual and couple's therapy would be ideal, because couple's therapy will be frustrating for awhile. It can take trial and error to find a good therapist (maybe plan on trying out 3 therapists before you stumble on one you both like?), and it can take something like 6 sessions to get past the introductions and start to see any sort of shift.
I think turning a solo therapist into a couple's therapist would be weird and not ideal. If he felt put on the spot, he might think "your" therapist "sided with you." And you might lose the sense of having someone in your corner helping to keep you grounded.
I don't think that getting him in solo therapy is necessarily what you want -- his coping method is "working" for him, for some definitions of working. You want him to work on what's not working for you, and that's a couple's-therapy kind of conversation, in my opinion. Once he sees "oh, I have a lot of work to do here," then he can go do his work individually.
posted by salvia at 1:04 PM on April 25, 2017
Most therapists generally won't let individual counseling turn into couple's counseling, for the reasons that salvia suggests -- the partner who initially started therapy may feel abandoned because the therapist is no longer just on "her side," the partner who joined later may feel ganged up on because he'll assume the therapist is on the "other partner's side," plus the therapist now has a bunch of information about both partners that was given under confidentiality rules that likely don't include the second partner, which makes navigating that information in session a minefield (e.g., Did you tell her anything you wouldn't want your husband to know? Should the therapist tell your husband exactly what you said about his family? If she does, will your husband get upset that you were talking behind his back? If she doesn't, will it undermine the therapy that she's basically keeping secrets for you at the expense of your husband?). If you want couples therapy, which I agree might be a good idea, I would ask your current therapist for recommendations for a separate couple's therapist. If you can afford the time and money, I would also encourage you to stick with individual counseling as well.
posted by lazuli at 2:12 PM on April 25, 2017
posted by lazuli at 2:12 PM on April 25, 2017
Please don't mix up your individual therapy with couples therapy, I mean with respect to therapists. My ex husband and I did find a good couples therapist, but not until after his therapist offered to see us together after having seen him individually for a number of years. I thought it was a bad idea, but he said that she would do it for a very low cost and I mistakenly agreed to it. It added to a number of other external factors (including studying for the California bar exam) to create the worst several months of my life. On therapy days, I got no studying done at all because I was so devastated after the two of them went after me. I still think that it was unprofessional and borderline malpractice for her to agree to it, much less suggest it.
posted by janey47 at 4:52 PM on April 25, 2017 [3 favorites]
posted by janey47 at 4:52 PM on April 25, 2017 [3 favorites]
My therapist has suggested my partner sit in on a session, specifically to deal with in-law issues. She recommends couples counselling but that suggestion was because I had exhausted all my communication avenues and things were still bad.
Turned out the couples counselling suggestion + defending my boundaries was the communication strategy that worked to convince him that shit had gone sideways really badly.
As yet we have not done couples therapy, or even the workbook, and that sucks. But also I don't have to deal with his family as anything but a passing moment (mostly) and have tools to enforce my boundaries when he starts putting his family's wants above our family needs.
posted by geek anachronism at 5:58 PM on April 25, 2017
Turned out the couples counselling suggestion + defending my boundaries was the communication strategy that worked to convince him that shit had gone sideways really badly.
As yet we have not done couples therapy, or even the workbook, and that sucks. But also I don't have to deal with his family as anything but a passing moment (mostly) and have tools to enforce my boundaries when he starts putting his family's wants above our family needs.
posted by geek anachronism at 5:58 PM on April 25, 2017
There's a inside-baseball (do people still use that phrase?) distinction in therapy between couple's therapy and collateral therapy; it can be normal (and helpful!) to have a partner attend a few sessions to work out a particular issue or learn more about the in-therapy partner's mental-health condition, but in those cases, the partner is there as an adjunct to the in-therapy partner's therapy, rather than being a client themselves. The distinction can get a bit fuzzy, but basically: In couple's therapy/counseling, the client, in many ways, is the relationship itself, and the therapist/counselor is working on behalf of both partners, and the therapy is often longer-term. In a collateral session, the therapist is acting as a mediator or advocate for the in-therapy partner, and it's generally just a couple sessions, if that.
posted by lazuli at 6:04 PM on April 25, 2017 [2 favorites]
posted by lazuli at 6:04 PM on April 25, 2017 [2 favorites]
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I think that if you want your marriage to be better, it's necessary to dig into this deeply with him.
Denial/dissociation is a deeply rooted coping technique and it is very likely that when you start to apply pressure to him because the effects are damaging, that he will react by doing more of the same. It's a tough situation.
posted by Sublimity at 9:55 AM on April 25, 2017