On this page, we’re going to talk all about couples therapy, relationship counseling and how to build a healthy intimate life. So, the first thing is to talk about emotional intimacy. For many couples, that is a huge factor in helping build trust and building security. If emotional security is lacking, that creates tension and distance in your relationship. And, if your partner doesn’t feel safe, they’re not going to want to open up their body to you. When emotional intimacy is not present, you partner will not going to get playful or partake in a sexual experience. Gottman marriage therapy in Darien, Connecticut can help you improve intimacy.
Gottman marriage therapist Katie Ziskind in Connecticut talks about building trust and intimacy
Why does my partner reject me sexually?
Sometimes, if your partner is rejecting you sexually, it is because they do not feel safe. You may perceive this in a defensive way or feel rejection. At first, negative emotions like blame arise. You might have a negative belief that your partner wants to control you. Or, a negative thought says your partner doesn’t like or love you anymore. As well, when you feel sexually rejected, you might blame yourself or feel like there’s something wrong with you. Rather than going to negative thoughts, focus on just considering this idea of emotional safety. And, in Gottman marriage therapy in Darien, Connecticut, you can talk about sexual rejection and safety together as a couple.
To begin, book your phone consult below for couples counseling for emotional closeness and a more meaningful, trusting, playful relationship.
How can couples start feeling safe together?
For one, get into counseling sooner than later. Couples don’t know how to emotionally nurture one another many times. From couples therapy, you can learn emotional curiosity techniques. These help your spouse feel safe and trust you. For one, you can get curious when your partner sexually rejects you. You can ask, “What do you need right now to feel safe?” Often times, what we see when couples come into counseling is a snowball impact. Frequently, couples coming into counseling too late. After anger, blame, fears of intimacy, or negative behaviors damage their relationship is often too late. If you relationship is already in shambles, Gottman marriage therapy in Darien, Connecticut can help. You might feel that you are on the brink of divorce due to sexual differences. Overall, starting marriage counseling sooner than later is going to be so much more effective.
Gottman marriage therapy in Darien, Connecticut teaches distant couples intimacy skills
Think about it and you’re in math class. You could start to get some help when your grades are a B-, but you wait until they are an F. At that time, very assignment’s missing and you know nothing about what’s going on. Essentially, Gottman marriage counseling is the same concept. Start the counseling process when things feel a little off rather than when things are horribly falling apart. Gaining relationship skills sooner is better than waiting. Again, many couples wait far too long to get into therapy once emotional damage has occured.
What are great reasons to get in for an Gottman marriage therapy appointment?
Well, criticism, blame, and anger are good reasons. Often, anger hinders intimacy. As well, criticism is when you are using a name to call your partner. Criticism shows when painful emotions are present, bu couples don’t have the tools to discuss them calmly. Plus, in negative communication, partners blame one another. In your relationship, do you notice put downs? You partner will start to feel like hurt by what you’re saying if you are being critical.
To begin, click the button below for a phone consult for increasing intimacy in Gottman marriage therapy in Darien, Connecticut.
What can you do today to reduce criticism in your marriage?
So, instead of like calling your partner a name, you can use an “I feel” statement. “I feel hurt, I feel disrespected, I feel unappreciated, I feel sad, I feel nervous.” Confidence is when you are owning that emotion. Gottman marriage therapy in Darien, Connecticut can help you learn to take ownership for your feelings. Instead of being critical, you can show consideration for your partner’s feelings instead of criticizing them.
How can Gottman marriage therapy in Darien, Connecticut help couples reduce defensiveness in order to rebuild intimacy?
Another thing that you can do in couples therapy is notice defensiveness. Now, defensiveness is when we feel like a wall or shield has to come up. Often, self-protection develops because we’re feeling under attack. And, this can happen in sexual experiences too.
What does defensiveness in an unhealthy relationship look like?
It is very common for unhappy, fighting couples who lack intimacy. Commonly, defensiveness is when you are deny or say, “I didn’t do that,” or “This is why I did this.” Instead of explaining why you think you viewpoint is more correct, use empathy. Unfortunately, fighting couples do a lot of explaining, which is not support of emotional intimacy. Couples who are fighting or distant don’t try to validate each other. Instead, they try to one up or have the last word in an argument. Gottman marriage therapy in Darien, Connecticut supports couples in sharing how they feel rather than why they are more right than their partner. Marriage counseling helps you know what skill to use and what you need to do in that moment, which is validate.
Can couples counseling tach emotional validation skills for a happier, more satisfying intimate life?
Yes, in couples therapy, emotional validation is a great skill couples can learn. It super fun and playful to learn these skills too. At Wisdom Within Counseling, you can reduce conflict by taking ownership and responsibility. As well, you can learn about how trauma and PTSD impact your relationship. So, if you have a trauma history, it’s not your fault by any means. However, you can learn to tell your partner how your trauma symptoms impact you. For instance, you may say, “I get really anxious because I have a trauma history, and I just need a little bit more patience.” Gottman marriage therapy in Darien, Connecticut teaches couples to confident ask for what they need. This plays into a healthy sex and intimate life too.
Your marriage therapist can help your partner receive your needs and understand them.
Taking responsibility can be a good thing. When you hurt your partner, apologizing is a form of emotional intimacy. For example, say, “I’m sorry I raised my voice.” You can also say, “I’m sorry I called you that name,” or “I’m sorry I walked away from you when you were talking to me.” Likewise, couples therapy helps partner see and apologize when they cause their partner to feel hurt. Essentially, letting your partner know that you see they are hurting can improve trust. From there, you can build safety and playfulness for a positive experience together sexually.
To begin, click the button below for a phone consult for increasing intimacy in Gottman marriage therapy in Darien, Connecticut.
Can Gottman marriage therapy in Darien, Connecticut help when we have differences in sex dives or libido?
If you’re noticing kind of different differences in sex drives, marriage counseling can be a safe place to talk. Often, blame, defensiveness, and rejection cause problems for couples. For example, one person has a high sex drive. The other person has a low sex drive. As well, you can have a safe place to talk about the length of your ideal sexual experience. Perhaps, you have want to increase sexually pleasurable experiences on a regular basis. You can talk about frequency of sexual experiences and increasing them. Gottman marriage therapy in Darien, Connecticut can help you build sexual confidence. Maybe, you feel your partner doesn’t understand you sexual needs.
Great reasons to come in for couples counseling are differences in your sex drives and your libido.
And a lot of times, these are emotionally rooted issues. Yes, there can be physical issues for sure that go on as well. However, a lot of sexual disinterest comes down to feeling safe together, and building trust.
If there’s been a history of an affair, a betrayal, hurt feelings, mistrust of any kind, lies, or secret keeping, these damage trust.
What is secret keeping and how does Gottman marriage therapy in Darien, Connecticut help? One partner may be keeping information private and other partner found it out. It is very hurtful to find your partner keeping a secret or having an affair. As well, secret keeping, lying, or affairs are major problems for intimacy.
These secret keeping behaviors are damaging and betraying the trust in your relationship.
Overcoming an affair or lying can be really hard for couples by themselves. Therefore, couples therapy helps you both talk about what honesty means. From marriage counseling, you can get on the same page and express loss. Grief and loss are common after finding out your spouse has been keeping secrets. Essentially, relationship counseling give you a safe place to talk about what it means to be in a relationship together. You can decide if you want to stay together and start to rebuild those walls of trust. Gottman marriage counseling helps couples start to use healthy communication, often for the first time. The team at Wisdom Within Counseling helps couples heal together after an affair.
To begin, click the button below for a phone consult for increasing intimacy in Gottman marriage therapy in Darien, Connecticut.
How does an affair or infidelity demonstrate a need for Gottman marriage therapy in Darien, Connecticut?
Often, there’s fighting, distance, and tension long before an affair takes place. Studies show couples experience distance five to eight years before an affair takes place. An affair or cheating is symptom of a larger marital issue. Many times, experiences of loss and trauma have occurred for the couple and they didn’t process them. Small cracks over time and a lack of emotional intimacy skills create problems.
What causes couples to fight and go down a negative path towards divorce?
Whether that’s infertility, IVF, or childbirth, these experiences can push couples apart. Buying a home, getting a choric illness diagnosis, or loss of a parent can stain a couple. As well, that’s in-laws, family trauma, and childhood trauma that’s getting reactivated can create major intimacy issues. Additionally, a past history of physical domestic violence, rape or sexual trauma leaves a last impact into the next relationship.
Reducing anger in a healthy way can improve intimacy
For some couples explosive conflicts and anger lead to major trust issues. You may feel like you walk on eggshells around your spouse. Couples who need Gottman marriage therapy in Darien, Connecticut are stuck in an emotional cycle. Commonly, both people lack relationship skills. Couples counseling helps partners learn to take ownership emotionally of their part in things. When conflicts never getting resolved, they snowball pile up.
Jealousy and anxiety and the impact on sexual pleasure in Gottman marriage therapy in Darien, Connecticut
Couples struggle with jealousy, anxiety, and fears that play into sexual pleasure. As well, jealousy is a big thing that can play into sexual performance. Anxiety about sexual performance or feeling worried about the future can hinder an otherwise positive sexual experience. If you or your partner is worried or have too many responsibilities, these can negatively impact your sexual performance. Gottman marriage therapy in Darien, Connecticut can give you a safe place to talk about your sexual pleasure. You can learn stress management skills in holistic ways to improve your ability to receive sexually.
Let’s talk about creating safe, playful, pleasurable sexual experiences.
It is not just about sexual intercourse. When you have a sexual experience how does it go? What emotions come up for you? Are you feeling excited and happy and pleasantly surprised? Do sexual experiences give you anxiety? Or are you feeling scared and frozen from a past sexual trauma? Is that trauma response coming up again for you now?
Can trauma play into a sexually pleasurable experience?
You partner may be a survivor of sexual trauma. Sexual trauma memories play a role in current sexual, intimate experiences. Your therapist can help process how trauma impacts your sex life. So, being able to articulate your needs can help couples build emotional intimacy. At Wisdom Within Counseling, we can help couples share sexual desires and needs. Couples are not talking about what they sexually need very much. Often, couples lack sexual confidence and are silent in the bedroom. A lack of communication plays through into sexual pleasure and the bedroom.
To begin, click the button below for a phone consult for increasing intimacy in Gottman marriage therapy in Darien, Connecticut.
At Wisdom Within Counseling, our team of Gottman therapists love supporting couples who are in distress. Perhaps, you are always fighting, and there’s blame. On top of that, there are challenges with sex and intimacy. Couples counseling increases playfulness and communication as a whole. Remember, emotional validation is essential to rebuilding broken trust. Katie Ziskind at Wisdom Within Counseling would love to help you build a meaningful sex life and intimacy. If you feel like you’re walking on eggshells at home, there are probably some emotional issues that need to be processed. Emotional issues impact sexual desire, pleasure and sexual satisfaction. You get to talk with your partner in a safe environment. We can meet in person in Niantic, Connecticut, or on telehealth. In Florida, we offer couples counseling on video. We offer video counseling to couples in Darien, Old Greenwich, Weston, Riverside, Westport, West Hartford, Litchfield, Simsbury, and Wilton, Connecticut.
At Wisdom Within Counseling, the team of Gottman therapists would love to help you build a healthy, safe, playful marriage.
Couples counseling is a healing way to get to know each other again in a creative way. At Wisdom Within Counseling, we also incorporate holistic mind body therapies including art, breathing techniques, and yoga. For couples, meditation, painting and outdoor walk and talk sessions promote togetherness. We offer these both in session and as homework. As well, couples therapy homework can help couples get back into the present moment together. You can build strengths and a skill set was never there from the start. More so, mind-body therapies help couples rebuild some meaningful connection in ways they’ve never had before.
At Wisdom Within Counseling, Katie Ziskind and her team of therapists support couples. Katie Ziskind is a licensed marriage and family therapist in Connecticut and in Florida.
