Why You Need to Do Marriage Counseling Alone by Dr. Deb Hirschhorn

Dr. Deb

Why You Need to Do Marriage Counseling Alone

By Deb Hirschhorn, Ph.D.

Some smart aleck recently told his wife, “I don’t need therapy. I’m a therapist!” He isn’t, but even if he were, who understands themselves so thoroughly that they can catch the bad moods before they take over, recognize their triggers at the moment they’re happening, and soothe their inner children when they react because of those triggers?

Who, in short, has so much self-leadership that they could do all that and have themselves figured out – without hurting anyone’s feelings – within minutes of the bad moment coming over them?

I can tell you that Dr. Schwartz says in his newest book, “No Bad Parts” (I recommend it), that he himself meets daily with all his parts just to be sure they’re functioning as helpers to him, enhancing his day, rather than taking over and destroying his grip on self-leadership.

And for years he’s had a colleague who acts like a chavrusa to be sure he hasn’t missed something.

Now, why would Dr. Schwartz himself, the big guy, miss something? The answer is because that is exactly the nature of parts. Our parts have been doing their jobs for a long, long time. And one of those jobs is to keep us from feeling pain. They do that through ignoring it, distracting ourselves from it, minimizing it, analyzing and rationalizing it, and even pooh-poohing it.

In other words, if it’s human to not want to suffer, then why would Dr. Schwartz himself, or any other therapist, or any person, actually, not use these valuable (though mistaken) tools for dealing with their pain?

They wouldn’t.

Which is why it takes a lot of thought, reflection, and introspection to catch moods (i.e., parts) taking over before they actually succeed. And why it might in addition take a more objective observer to help.

So what does this have to do with marriage help?

I don’t have to tell you what havoc is wreaked when you get triggered by the person you’re married to. You’ve most likely experienced any or all of these: • Feeling unloved • Feeling like a victim • Feeling mistreated • Feeling angry • Feeling scared or anxious • Feeling depressed or hopeless • Feeling frustrated • Feeling along, misunderstood • Feeling neglected • Feeling misjudged

And so much more is possible, right?

These feelings could have been triggered by something your spouse did. But the bad piece of the story is that then your reaction can trigger them back. And it escalates from there.

Whether it’s excessive fighting or feeling like roommates or like “ships passing in the night” as someone once remarked, the bad feelings engender worse ones.

So how do you get rid of the bad feelings?

According to IFS (Internal Family Systems), you don’t. You don’t want to get rid of parts of yourself. They are all parts of you that came to your aid and assistance when you needed it most in your life. They always mean well, even the very disruptive ones that make people say and do things that are dangerous. Those, too, are kids inside of you, many as young as five years old.

So, of course, their behavior’s no good. But they are good. They are the well-meaning children still living within us all and often making big mistakes out of not knowing what else to do.

Now picture a therapy room with a couple trying to be grown up and mature but not at all succeeding because each has triggered some child parts of the other: The part that stomps out of the room, the part that coldly uses logic you can cut with a knife (ten-year-olds can be very good at that), the part that cries, and the part whose heart has turned to steel.

Exactly how far will that therapist get?

Not very.

It is for that reason that the first step in marriage therapy has to be each person • Recognizing the parts that unexpectedly turn up • Knowing when and why in your life that part was needed to come to your aid in the first place. • Valuing and appreciating the roles that these parts have played for you, however misguided. (Remember, they’re kids.) • Having the desire to be in Self, a state of inner peace, wisdom, seeing the big picture, and knowing just what the right path should be. • Having the ability to get back into a state of Self when the parts hijack us.

• Having the ability to separate from parts, listen to them with respect and attention, absorb the weight of their message. • Having the ability from a place of Self to reassure these very parts that although their concerns are valid, you, your Self, can run your inner life. • Rescuing exiled child parts who have been shut down for far too long so that you hear their pain and you never, ever ignore or dismiss them again. • Maintaining that growth of Self and loving being in that state even under pressure and triggers from spouses.

Even that is not enough. Because the truth is that the only person in the world who can get under your skin is the person you were once so vulnerable to that they actually know your deepest and darkest secrets. So it’s not sufficient to be able to be in Self and exercising its leadership. Self has to be so large and so full of who you are that Self can hear the child parts of your partner and love them, too. Rather than be triggered or intimidated by the “difficult” parts of a spouse who has somehow gotten triggered, your compassion and un-

derstanding can rise to the top like cream, filling your heart and your head with wisdom and mature action.

There’s more.

In a relationship in which each person – separately – has gotten to this level, that ability to nurture and comfort the unavoidable child parts of the other person must be able to be shared. That is: one day my parts need your nurturing and another day yours need mine.

This is the essence of a true relationship, a true friendship that a marriage is supposed to be.

So how do you get there if you’re working alone?

When each person working alone expresses themselves in a way that shows understanding, love, and compassion, they will feel differently inside. They will know that, somehow, they’re “there.” Getting into Self won’t be so hard; it will feel good and come easily with all the compassion, wisdom, understanding and love that goes along with it.

That’s when couples therapy can begin.

And that’s when couples learn to discover what’s behind actions that once seemed confusing if not intimidating. That discovery process, from a place of Self, brings on the intimacy that everyone was afraid to share and show before.

All this means that if you’re not married, you’re still going to take the same steps forward in understanding yourself as couples do.

But married couples get the bonus of someone to share the process with – once they’ve gotten to the end of it.

It takes a lot of thought, reflection, and introspection to catch moods taking over before they actually succeed.

Dr. Deb Hirschhorn is a Marriage and Family Therapist. If you want help with your marriage, begin by signing up to watch her Masterclass at https://drdeb. com/myw-masterclass.