Relationship Therapy
improve existing relationships or build new ones with relationship therapy.
Relationships are hard work. Could You Benefit From Talking To A Therapist About Your Relationships?
If you are struggling with developing or maintaining healthy, fulfilling relationships you are not alone. Supportive relationships are one of the most significant predictors of life satisfaction and wellbeing.
You may be struggling to communicate effectively, have a hard time managing conflict, or feel uncomfortable with building trust and being open and vulnerable in your romantic relationship.
Some of us struggle most with building supportive relationships with friends or colleagues, and others may feel overwhelmed by stressful family dynamics and longstanding patterns of family dysfunction.
You may find yourself frequently involved in conflict with friends, challenged by tension or drama, or isolated and disconnected from those you wish to be closer to. Or, you may find it difficult to get along with colleagues, feel minimized, misunderstood, or excluded. Feeling alone, disconnected, isolated, or like we have nobody to turn to can be extremely painful and result in sadness, anxiety, and shame.
You might wonder whether you will continue experiencing these same patterns and if relationship therapy could provide insight and guidance on how to break a cycle that doesn’t serve you.
Reach Out Today!
Repeating Similar Issues In Your Relationships Can Be Incredibly Frustrating
Perhaps you have just experienced a painful breakup, or are exhausted from a series of what feel like failed relationships, poor relationship choices, or hurtful patterns in past relationships. You might feel anxious about losing your partner, not feeling good enough for them, or seeking out unavailable or inconsistent partners that keep the cycle of negative beliefs about yourself going.
Even when you feel frustrated, defeated, or want to give up on dating or making connections, you know that you want to find a way to do things differently and build healthy, happy relationships. You want to be in loving, supportive relationships, but you don’t know where you’re going wrong. Align Therapy Services can help you gain perspective and build supportive and loving relationships with yourself and others.
Our Families Of Origin Can Impact Relationship Expectations
The communication styles and interactions we were exposed to growing up often set the stage for how we relate to ourselves, others, our emotions, and our environments in adulthood. Perhaps you grew up exposed adults who communicated with you and others in a kind, direct, and supportive way. Perhaps conflicts were handled with respect and understanding. Did adults in your life express their feelings and affection clearly and consistently, and make you feel understood and accepted, even if you were upset?
If not, you are not alone by any means. If we’re surrounded by high conflict, explosive anger, or a lack of boundaries between the adults in our lives, we may find ourselves in similar situations with relationships of our choosing in adulthood. What feels normal is often repeated over and over again.
Maybe problems at home were constantly swept under the rug, or family members used the silent treatment to address conflicts. Or maybe no one expressed their feelings at all or made it clear that feelings weren’t welcome or accepted. Additionally, family relationship dynamics are not always prioritized, and seeking help or support via therapy is not always accepted or encouraged in our families, cultures, or communities. If you can relate to any of these painful communication or relational patterns, you are like so many others, and it may be hard to navigate relationships now as a result.
Sometimes familiar coping mechanisms can become problematic. Many of us struggle to overcome relationship issues because we have learned coping mechanisms that perhaps served us at an earlier time in their lives but no longer serve us in the same way today. For example, if you often feel guilty saying ‘no’ in your relationships, you may ultimately find yourself struggling with people-pleasing tendencies, which may look like having a hard time expressing your true needs, wants, or feelings to others or setting boundaries that work best for you.
If any of these behaviors or tendencies resonate with your own experiences, we at Align Therapy Services can help you identify, understand, and make meaning out of patterns in your relationships that no longer serve you to make way for developing fulfilling connections.
How do I know if therapy for relationships can help me?
At our cores, all of us want to be seen, heard, accepted, understood, and supported by our significant others, family members, friends, and colleagues. If you are struggling in your relationships or want to strengthen relationships or build new ones, therapy for relationships can help.
Struggles with relationships and communication can look like:
Difficulty setting boundaries
Frequent conflicts or miscommunications
Trouble with or fear of expressing your feelings to others
Feeling disconnected, alone, or isolated in relationships
Feeling misunderstood, marginalized, or unprioritized, or unacknowledged in relationships
Frequently people pleasing, overextending yourself, or feeling guilty saying ‘no’
Difficulty ‘opening up’ to others or ‘letting others in’
Fear or avoidance of emotional intimacy, closeness, or connection
Trust issues
Frequently ‘playing games’ in relationships (e.g., playing ‘hard to get’)
Often feeling anxious or worried about losing someone or about being liked, loved, or approved of
Not feeling ‘good enough’ in relationships
Tumultuous, volatile relationships; constant drama
Frequently seeking partners or friends who are unavailable, are ‘hot and cold’, or aren’t consistent
Build Healthier Connections With Therapy For Relationships
Individual therapy for relationships and communication issues can help you better navigate existing relationships in your life, or build new relationships that are healthy, secure, and successful.
I can help you improve your existing relationships and build new ones via therapy in a safe, compassionate, and judgment-free environment. We will explore your relationship wants, needs, and values while identifying cycles of conflict and recurring issues that are not in line with your goals.
Together, we will:
Identify consistent areas of misunderstanding in your relationships and improve your communication skills
Build trust in yourself and others to repair existing relationships and foster new ones
Learn and practice healthy conflict management skills that encourage empathy and compassion
Acknowledge and take accountability for your part in relationship conflicts, and seek out the same in others
Deepen your connections and capability for intimacy by addressing current barriers to relationship development
Address struggles with loneliness or isolation
Support you with coping during and after a breakup, moving through separation, divorce, or loss, as well as with navigating infidelity
Learn how to cope with changes or challenging relationship transitions
Additionally, you’ll develop healthier boundary-setting skills and identify coping patterns that restrict you from developing supportive relationships. You’ll also gain the skills to cope with loneliness and isolation in therapy, addressing core wounds around the fear of abandonment and vulnerability that will help you ultimately open up to others even after a breakup.
Therapeutic Modalities That Help Heal Old Wounds And Promote Healthy Connections
I use evidence-based interventions, including:
Cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT) for relationships provides you with the chance to understand and explore how our thoughts, feelings, and behaviors impact one another and are interconnected. We may hold limiting beliefs or thought patterns that get in the way of developing and maintaining healthy relationships.
Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) for relationships focuses on increasing psychological flexibility to best manage our challenges and move toward our relationship goals and values.
Interpersonal psychotherapy (IPT) is a research based type of therapy that primarily addresses symptoms of depression, which can co-occur with consistent relationship problems. The IPT model assumes that depression symptoms are largely rooted in interpersonal issues. We will focus on alleviating mood symptoms due to relational factors and improving communication skills that ultimately strengthen relationships.
Emotionally-focused individual therapy (EFIT) can help you find ways to better connect with your emotions and make sense of them. EFIT supports us with processing our emotions and developing healthy, secure relationships with the self and others.
Through relationship therapy we will work toward building supportive communication skills, unlearning harmful coping strategies, and finding ways to show up authentically in your relationships. Together we can help you improve both romantic and non-romantic relationships (e.g., family, friendships, professional relationships). I affirm and work with all types of relationships including LGBTQIA+ and consensually non-monogamous relationships.
There is hope for you to feel seen, understood, and unafraid of deep, lasting connections. You will gain confidence in your relationships to move forward and grow into the best version of yourself - on your own, and together with loved ones.
You Might Still Have Concerns About Relationship Therapy…
I’m worried I won’t connect with a new therapist because I had a bad experience in the past.
I aim to create a warm and compassionate environment in my practice, and your sessions will be tailored to your unique needs. As your therapist I deeply understand the importance of both creating a safe space in which you can be held, heard, and understood, as well as for incorporating collaborative feedback, challenges where appropriate, and practical tools to use outside of sessions into our work. My goal is for us to join together to gain insights about your life and build the skills you need to help you move forward in your relationships. If you have had a challenging or negative past experience with a therapist, relationship counselor, relationship coaching, or with another form of counseling that didn’t suit your needs, beginning again with renewed optimism is always possible.
I have a full schedule and don’t feel like I have enough time to consistently attend sessions.
Taking the time to attend therapy can feel like an overwhelming commitment, but let me assure you, every session can help, and I can find a time that suits your schedule. As a virtual-only practice, we have more opportunities to adjust as well. At first, meeting once weekly is typically recommended to develop a therapeutic relationship and begin working toward your goals. I have options for regular weekly or bi-weekly sessions, and over time, we can meet for monthly maintenance sessions or check-in sessions as needed.
I’m worried that nothing will change or that it's no use trying to fix my problems.
Maybe you've been in different relationships and the same patterns or conflicts happen over and over again. Or perhaps you’ve had counseling in the past for dating or relationship issues, but it didn’t result in the change you hoped for. It is common for us to believe that we will always face the same problems, but that limiting belief does not have to be your truth. While each individual’s needs are unique in therapy, I aim to treat the root causes of relationship issues rather than simply addressing the resulting symptoms to sustain long-term results, growth, and healing.
You Don’t Have To Navigate Relationship Challenges Alone
Align Therapy Services can help you improve your existing relationships or build new ones that are fulfilling, loving, and healthy. Your journey toward better interpersonal connections begins with your connection to yourself. Schedule a free 25-minute consultation by calling me at (646) 493-8084 or using my contact form to learn more.
other SERVICES
In addition to supporting those who want to improve their relationships, as a New York City therapist, I offer mental health services for teens and adults including therapy for anxiety, therapy for depression, and PTSD therapy, as well as disordered eating treatment, among other speciality areas. I specialize in therapy for women who want to find fulfillment, build self-worth, and become the best version of themselves. I provide online therapy to residents of New York, Connecticut, and Washington D.C.
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