Gottman Method Couples Counseling
85% prediction success rate??!!
John Gottman, Ph.D., can spend five minutes with a couple and predict with 85 percent certainty if their relationship will last. Gottman has studied couples for over 40 years at his lab at the University of Washington and has identified the factors that make people masters or disasters at love.
In our culture, people don’t learn how to successfully navigate the complexities of love and marriage. If you’re fortunate, you had good parental role models – but many don’t. You fall in love and assume the things that brought you together will keep you together.
You never consider that you might be among the 40 to 50 percent of marriages that end in divorce.
Gottman’s research shows that high-conflict relationships predict divorce. These relationships share these characteristics:
Harsh Startups – All relationships have problems and conflict. But when discussions about them begin with criticism and sarcasm, it will end on a negative note and nothing will get solved. Learning how to initiate discussions with Soft Startups will lead to positive outcomes.
The Four Horsemen – Certain kinds of negativity are so powerful that they are lethal to a relationship. Criticism, contempt, defensiveness, and stonewalling slowly poison a relationship. These are the factors that predict divorces which Gottman is looking for when he interviews couples. Learning the antidotes to the four horsemen can turn a relationship around.
Flooding – This occurs when your partner’s negativity is so overwhelming that you react defensively or withdraw and shutdown. The continual presence of the four horsemen leads to negative sentiment over-ride, the anticipation and expectation of negativity that ultimately prevents you from seeing anything positive in your relationship.
Failed Repair Attempts – Efforts made by couples to reduce tension during a discussion can reduce or eliminate flooding. Failed repair attempts predict unhappiness and divorce.
Bad Memories – After years of conflict, hurts and wounds multiply. Positive memories from the beginning of your relationship have been replaced by negative memories. These bad memories begin to define your relationship.
Learning to restore and rebuild your relationship
The Gottman Method is both a therapeutic and educational approach that helps couples heal and learn strategies and techniques to restore and rebuild their relationship.
This method is effective for couples who are just starting out (premarital counseling), couples struggling with stressors (birth of a child, financial difficulties, etc.), and long-standing problems that haven’t been resolved.
Long-standing problems may involve couples where there has been a significant breach of trust (affairs) and couples who have drifted apart over time.
When you and your partner enter therapy, you can expect the following.
Assessment – Couples therapy begins with a thorough assessment of your relationship. You will complete a battery of online questionnaires and diagnostic interviews that help me understand your relationship and identify both problems and strengths.
Therapeutic Framework – The couple and therapist decide on the frequency and duration of sessions.
Therapeutic Interventions – Based on the assessment of your relationship, therapeutic interventions will be implemented to help you communicate more effectively, handle conflict in a healthy way, rebuild trust, and address specific problems. You can expect homework between sessions.
The goals of Gottman Method Couples Counseling are to increase intimacy, respect and affection; remove barriers to effective communication and conflict resolution; and create more understanding and empathy between partners so that trust and commitment can be strengthened.
Principles of the Gottman Method are based on sound research. The length of therapy will depend on how severe and chronic the problems in your relationship are – and your and your partner’s commitment and efforts in counseling.
I received my training in Gottman Method Couples Counseling from John Gottman, Ph.D., and Julie Gottman, Ph.D.
Go ahead and reach out by phone at (662) 435-0050 or email – or complete the contact form below to schedule a free consultation.