SUPPORT FOR WOMEN IN SANTA BARBARA, CA IN-PERSON & ONLINE ACROSS CALIFORNIA
Modern Therapy for Couples
Our closest relationships have the power to bring out both the best and most defended parts of us.
My approach to couples therapy integrates research-backed principles from the Gottman Method with attachment-focused and somatic work, helping couples understand the patterns between them while developing a greater capacity for safety, attunement, intimacy, and repair.
Couples therapy asks us to bring our inner work into relationship.
The way we speak, listen, respond, and repair matters deeply in relationships. The Gottman Method offers a valuable framework for understanding these patterns and developing healthier ways of communicating.
But knowing what to do is very different from being able to access it when we feel hurt, rejected, angry, or afraid. Our bodies communicate an enormous amount of information in these moments.
We may become activated, defensive, shut down, pursue connection, or pull away from it altogether. Couples therapy gives us an opportunity to slow these moments down, understand what is happening within each partner, and practice returning to safety and connection together.
Individual self-awareness is an important part of couples work. Each partner is asked to become increasingly familiar with their own internal world rather than locating the source of the problem entirely in the other person.
Much of this awareness can develop within couples therapy, though I may encourage individual work when something deserves its own space and attention.
Together we’ll explore
Recurring cycles of conflict, pursuit, withdrawal, and disconnection
Communication, listening, and the ways partners respond to one another
Attachment patterns and the deeper needs beneath conflict
Nervous system activation and what happens in the body when we feel hurt or disconnected
Emotional and physical intimacy
Vulnerability, trust, safety, and attunement
Repairing after conflict and finding our way back to connection
The individual patterns each partner brings into the relationship
Together we’ll explore
Recurring cycles of conflict, pursuit, withdrawal, and disconnection
Communication, listening, and the ways partners respond to one another
Attachment patterns and the deeper needs beneath conflict
Nervous system activation and what happens in the body when we feel hurt or disconnected
Emotional and physical intimacy
Vulnerability, trust, safety, and attunement
Repairing after conflict and finding our way back to connection
The individual patterns each partner brings into the relationship
My Integrative Approach to Couples Therapy
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The Gottman Method provides a research-based framework for understanding the patterns that strengthen or erode connection over time. We pay close attention to how partners communicate, listen, approach conflict, respond to bids for connection, and repair after hurt. These skills give us a shared language for understanding the relationship and a strong foundation from which deeper work can unfold.
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Our strongest reactions in relationships often reveal something important about our needs for safety, closeness, autonomy, and connection. Attachment-focused work helps us look beneath the surface of conflict to understand the fears, longings, and protective responses each partner brings into the relationship. As these experiences become more visible, partners have greater opportunity to respond to one another with attunement rather than defense.
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Relationships are experienced in the body as much as they are understood through words. Somatic work brings attention to nervous system activation, sensation, emotion, body language, and the ways we instinctively protect ourselves when connection feels threatened. In session, I often invite partners to slow down and turn toward one another, allowing safety, vulnerability, intimacy, and repair to become experiences we practice together rather than concepts we simply understand.
Conflict can be a path to connection.
The goal of couples therapy is not to eliminate conflict or become perfect communicators. It is to become more capable of staying in relationship when things get difficult.
As each partner develops greater awareness of their own internal experience, there is more room to listen, tolerate vulnerability, communicate honestly, and remain attuned to the person sitting across from them.
Over time, the skills we practice begin to become something more embodied. Couples develop a greater capacity to move through hurt without continually losing one another, repair when disconnection inevitably happens, and create a relationship with more room for safety, intimacy, play, honesty, and love.
Get in touch
If something you’ve read here resonated with you, feel free to write me a message and we can set up a time to chat. I would love to meet you.