I thought it might be useful for a lot of us to share tips for couples counseling (tips for finding a good couples therapist, tips for coordinating with the one you have, bringing the idea up to your Honey, etc - anything counts!). I'm not sure how many of you have also tried couples counseling, but I'm guessing its a fair amount. My Honey and I tried it and am thinking about bringing the idea up again.
I'll start. My tips are:
Double, triple, quadruple check to make sure your therapist knows ya'll's triggers. The one therapist we finally found that my Honey felt he could trust ended up inadvertantly triggering him big time right at the end of a session, with the advice of "I think you two should talk about _____ (the trigger, which not only was the subject of ___ but also the act of talking about it) and then come back and tell me what you think." As soon as she said it I knew he just rocketed into PTSD mode and there was no way to discuss this topic without serious therapeutic help, and was so angry at her for not realizing how incredibly counter productive her approach was. He couldn't get out of her office quick enough and we narrowly avoided a big fight later because we were both so freaked out. We pretty much never spoke of what she said again and never contacted her again. I was really disappointed because I was very much looking forward to getting some issues sorted out and opening up better communication with a couples counselor's help. Looking back on it, I realized two things I would change- remind the therapist of triggers as often as you can, especially if you can't meet regularly. Second:
Try to find a therapist that is both a couples counselor and has worked with PTSD. I have a feeling our therapist really didnt understand PTSD because of her mistake. Maybe in the future I'd ask a PTSD therapist to do couples counseling even if they have next-to-no experience with couples, rather than a couples counselor with next-to-no experience with PTSD :/ Otherwise we'd have to educate them ourselves...
What tips/experience do some of you have to share?
I'll start. My tips are:
Double, triple, quadruple check to make sure your therapist knows ya'll's triggers. The one therapist we finally found that my Honey felt he could trust ended up inadvertantly triggering him big time right at the end of a session, with the advice of "I think you two should talk about _____ (the trigger, which not only was the subject of ___ but also the act of talking about it) and then come back and tell me what you think." As soon as she said it I knew he just rocketed into PTSD mode and there was no way to discuss this topic without serious therapeutic help, and was so angry at her for not realizing how incredibly counter productive her approach was. He couldn't get out of her office quick enough and we narrowly avoided a big fight later because we were both so freaked out. We pretty much never spoke of what she said again and never contacted her again. I was really disappointed because I was very much looking forward to getting some issues sorted out and opening up better communication with a couples counselor's help. Looking back on it, I realized two things I would change- remind the therapist of triggers as often as you can, especially if you can't meet regularly. Second:
Try to find a therapist that is both a couples counselor and has worked with PTSD. I have a feeling our therapist really didnt understand PTSD because of her mistake. Maybe in the future I'd ask a PTSD therapist to do couples counseling even if they have next-to-no experience with couples, rather than a couples counselor with next-to-no experience with PTSD :/ Otherwise we'd have to educate them ourselves...
What tips/experience do some of you have to share?