How To Win Her Back

Posts Tagged ‘the counselors’

According to statistics, divorces are down. This is due in part because the economy is so bad that people have to stick it out just to keep their heads above water. The cost of a divorce is, on average, between $10,000 and $20,000. In fact, divorce has become a $28-billion-per-year industry that includes lawyers, courts and divorce counselors alike. To avoid the financial and emotional toll of this lasting decision, try seeking the help of mental health counselors, marriage therapists or credit counselors first.

Divorces are frequently caused by financial hardship. Therefore, the counselors who could help most are often skilled in financial planning. “I’ve never seen a case in my 18 years of doing this where there hasn’t been a reason to have hope,” said Karin Maloney Stifler, a certified financial planner from Hudson, OH. She said she sees a lot of couples who are affluent but failed to save up a sufficient enough nest eggs to keep them afloat during tough economic times. Karyn Pistone, a financial planner from Beachstone, says she counsels a lot of people who are big spenders, often reaching beyond their means with credit and winding up in massive debt. The advisors say the best marriage therapy is in forming common goals and a united plan for spending and saving.

Another option is to attend divorce counseling with mental health counselors, rather than attorneys. “Divorce counseling” is sort of a misleading term because it’s intended to smooth the divorce process, rather than prevent it. If you’ve tried seeing licensed counselors and realize that there’s no other alternative, then divorce counseling can help avoid an expensive and hotly contested court battle. Often divorced couples feel deep resentment over property or the kids, which can be avoided by seeking divorce assistance. With therapeutic help, couples can gain a sense of closure and prepare for their separate futures. They’ll gain help deciding upon property division, child custody/visitation, child rearing and coming to a fair agreement.

Abandonment, abuse and adultery are certainly grounds for divorces. Finances, intimacy and boredom are things that could be fixed through counseling for couples. Even though relationships are viewed as personal affairs, it can help to have an impartial party helping to uncover and resolve your conflicts. There are certain strategies for problem solving, expressing discontent and promoting a healthy relationship that trained, licensed counselors can offer.

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“For a lot of couples, life gets up and running and we stop paying attention to the health or our marriage,” explains Dr. James Cordova, Ph.D. “Often, our marriages don’t catch our attention until they start to hurt.” Cordova is an associate professor of psychology at Clark University in Massachusetts, where he is heading a study on the effectiveness of an annual couples counselor. So far, he says the results are promising for “a marriage checkup,” which can offer prevention and treatment for a number of marital snafus.

In an annual couples counselor check up, you and your spouse will attend an initial session to complete a series of questions about marital health, revealing how problems are solved, what communication skills each mate possesses, what each person feels about child rearing, which intimacy issues may come up and what patterns of disagreements frequently surface. In the second session, the couples will come in face-to-face for an interview with the counselors. “We ask about the early phases of their marriage, how they got together, the decision to get married,” Cordova says, thereby identifying strengths and weaknesses.

The initial results of these annual counseling sessions for couples have been promising, Cordova reports. In the first 68 couples, most reported increased marital satisfaction, improvements in intimacy and a higher level of cooperation and acceptance in their households. “People that have been through the marriage checkup are improving in all kinds of ways in comparison to couples who haven’t.” He admits that some couples will undoubtedly relapse, as anyone would in medical or emotional therapy, yet those with access to treatment always fare better.

“Essentially, what we’ve discovered over time is that marital health is really a health concern. The qualities of a person’s marriage and the extent to which they are doing well in that marriage has a dramatic effect on physical health and mental health,” said Cordova. He points out that many studies reveal that couples who stay together often live longer, but also that those who attend sessions with a couples counselor experience fewer physical health issues. Compared to the cost of other treatments, counseling for marriage is extremely low, so why not make a few phone calls today?

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