"Married to a boarding school survivor - a family in crisis"
Married to a Boarding School SURVIVOR
From the day Peter and Julia first came into the room to talk about their relationship, it was obvious that the two of them were not speaking.
They used the sofa like a no-man’s-land, and the cushions got used as a boundary line.
A couple will lose the ability to connect
When a couple come to see me, this is often the first image I have of two people who have lost the ability to connect – and stay connected.
Communication has become difficult to maintain, apart from when sticking to basic safe subjects that do not become challenging, but this is not enough to sustain a good relationship.
Often, one partner has become avoidant of conflict and the other has become frustrated by this, but the attempts between the couple to overcome this does not succeed in re-establishing what was there in the past.
Two people who have reached this point in their relationship need help to pick apart what is happening. There is no black-and-white thinking that will help this, because each couple is different, and that’s why the relationship is like the grey area in the Venn diagram.
By the time partners in the marriage have reached this point, they have come to an impasse, and neither are able to communicate in a way that holds a connection, so it is likely that both are also unable to make repairs after conflict. Being in a relationship is a dynamic – one which has been raised together unconsciously, and has formed patterns. Coming to therapy is to bring awareness of the patterns being made, so that new possibilities can be discovered, which result in change.