EFT For Couples
We want to help you break out of old, negative patterns for good.
About EFT for Couples
Emotion-Focused Therapy (EFT) helps us address the core questions that we often ask ourselves about our relationships:
- “Do I matter to my partner?”
- “Will they be there for me if I reach for them in moments of need?”
- “Can I really be my authentic self and be accepted the way I am?”
These questions are often at the root of what couples fight about: the emotional safety and security of the relationship. When the answer to the above questions is “no,” over time, we tend to feel isolated, angry, and alone. We can get caught in unhealthy patterns of communication and might feel as though we’re having the same argument time and time again. We may respond from a place of trying to engage our partner, only the way we do chases them further away. Alternatively, we may respond by shutting down and walking away, only this very withdrawal causes our partner to become anxious and chase more. What partners often don’t see or hear are the more tender emotions hidden behind these self-protective strategies: the fear, hurt, or loneliness effectively gets scrambled by the angry, critical edge in our tone or our silent retreat.
Did You Answer “No” to Any of the Above Questions?
At Oceanside Psychology Group, we help couples strengthen the emotional safety and security of their bond.
EFT for couples was designed to help couples break out of negative patterns that erode emotional safety and trust in the couple relationship. It does this by helping partners get to the bottom of what they’re really feeling, express themselves more clearly and openly, and respond to each other from a place of curiosity, caring, and respect, rather than attack, avoidance, or withdrawal. In essence, it helps you unscramble the emotional signal you send to your partner so that your partner can hear you and respond differently, creating space for a deeper, more secure connection to form.
What to Expect
In your initial sessions, you’ll talk in-depth with your therapist about your current challenges, experiences that have led up to this point in your lives, and your family and relationship histories. You’ll work together with your therapist to understand the negative cycle or “dance” that you get caught in when things don’t go as smoothly with each other. You’ll work on identifying each of your trigger points and you’ll explore and understand the basis for your triggers and your responses. Recognizing how you get pulled into negative patterns of interaction is the first step to changing them.
Once you understand “what” your negative cycle is and you’re able to step out of it with some success, no longer seeing each other as the enemy, but rather fighting against a common enemy – the cycle that pulls you both in – then you’ll start to work on creating new, positive patterns of interaction and communication that build a more secure bond. This is the “how” of EFT; in other words, how you change your dance of distress and disconnection to a dance of safety, security, and connection. You’ll develop new ways of expressing yourself that don’t trigger each other and set the old negative patterns in motion. You’ll learn how to express your feelings and needs in a way that will help your partner respond in a more emotionally engaged and responsive way.
EFT has been well-researched and demonstrated to reduce couples’ distress in 70%-90% of cases. Therapy duration can vary from 8 to 20 sessions to a year or more when trauma, infidelity, or broken trust has been central in a couple’s challenges. The longer we dance the same dance with our partner, the longer it takes to change it, as well.