Couples therapy – part 2 - Another way of being
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Couples therapy – part 2 - Another way of being
Life after another way of being
After the Bali retreat he went back to the corporate world, returning to his international travels and workaholic ways. Nothing had truly changed and his relationship with his wife ebbed further.
By 1999 they were in a very ordinary space. He started to visualise living life separated from his wife, the kids and the dog too. Uncomfortable but possible.
His 6 to 8 pm relationship with fermented grapes was now a habit.
Eventually his wife (always the pathfinder), suggested couples counselling … He reacted.
Counselling was for people who are dysfunctional, addicted, broken, weak… Not he, who ran an international public company with a few thousand employees – He had shuddered at the thought. Therapy was an impossible concept for him to grasp.
By this time, his wife was well trained as a therapist. She knew the theory well and often explained, in what he viewed as patronising language, what was wrong with them.
He re-coiled, re-buffed and retired, not having the answers, but not accepting the challenge for change either. He withdrew to the safety of his offices both at home and at work.
He eventually succumbed to couples counselling therapy when his wife suggested that corporations sometimes employed consultants when divisions of the company were below performance par; and perhaps they could employ a consultant for their relationship in similar straits.
It was a disaster
Having agreed to attend counselling, they went to a therapist whom his wife had been seeing in a professional capacity for a couple of years. This therapist should never have taken them on – she was conflicted and primed by his wife.
He was cornered by the two of them. He lasted two sessions and was out of there. He felt even more disillusioned.
But his wife is an amazing person. She realised that she had made an error using this conflicted therapist and that instead they needed an independent umpire – someone who was an experienced therapist but had no interest in taking sides. Through her now burgeoning network of therapists she landed on someone – Julie.
So they had more kitchen table negotiations about visiting a new therapist. With folded arms, feeling cornered and generally unhappy about the whole thing, he eventually and reluctantly agreed to one more go at counselling and to try this Julie. But he warned his wife that it was not going to work and that he was only trying to show her that he was not afraid.
You get the picture
So he attended his first session with Julie with his shoes metaphorically on backwards. He was looking for the first excuse to pull the rug on this one. He thought he had won a moral victory with the first therapist and was expecting to go two up this time.
But Julie was interesting. He warmed to her style.
By the end of the second session it was his wife who was in tears with her issues; uncontrollable tears. See – this was not about him – it was about his wife....
But as they delved deeper it soon became his turn to be sombre, then tears, then deep pondering. They were unpeeling two raw onions here…
"There is so much love to re-connect to - it is worth the journey.</b>"
Serge Benhayon Esoteric Teachings and Revelations, p 667
He started to look forward to these sessions!
In each counselling session they were given “homework “and they became diligent students that worked on their homework exercises together.
The sessions were never easy. He always came out feeling he had just written a tough exam, tested but exhilarated at the experience. They both always came away knowing that they had heaps to learn.
Within a few months they could often be found holding hands together in therapy… nestled together on the therapist’s couch. Then, sometimes a bomb would go off between them, facilitated by Julie, and they would each retreat to different corners of the couch again.
Have you seen the Meryl Streep movie “Hope Springs”? It was sometimes a bit like that.
He remembers one session, quite early on in the piece when Julie looked at them both and quietly said “So let’s talk about sex”. He could not believe his ears!
He never talked about sex with anyone except his wife and was not about to start now. But he did. Everything. The lot…
Then, back together – More homework. And so it went… For two and a half years!
It was hard work but it was the most rewarding process. It was so revealing. It was confronting, sad, angry and happy… all rolled into one. But positive change was discernible almost from the very first session and they built on that experience each month. They are still building today. And it is fantastic!
But they never stopped there, this amazing unfolding continued ...
But they never stopped there, this amazing unfolding continued ...
Filed under
Marriage, Couples therapy, Love, Sex, Counseling, Relationship problems
