Bilingual Couples Therapy & Marriage Counseling | Clinical Psychologist in Hong Kong

“We are never so vulnerable as when we love.”

—Sigmund Freud

Why marriage counseling (aka couples therapy)? Do you and your partner…

feel frustrated/helpless because you two are trapped in repetitive cycles of heated arguments (that tend to have the same beginning and end), despite how arguing has been extremely wounding and unproductive?
feel saddened/hurt by the distance, coldness, and disconnection in your relationship (a predominately functional, or “roommate” marriage), while not knowing what to do about it, or if the other person even cares?
feel disrespected, belittled, or controlled by your partner, while they don’t seem to get or care how much they are hurting you, and confronting them leads to further escalation or shut down?
feel devastated by a loss or a betrayal (e.g. an affair), and don’t know whether or how to save your relationship?
waver between leaving and staying, and want some help to decide one way or another?

Though this list is not exhaustive, if some of these questions resonate with you, you will find it helpful to talk to a professional about what’s happening in your relationship. We repeat what we don’t repair.

My SCMP article: 3 Reasons Why Modern Marriages Fail

**If you are seeking services for your child or as an individual, please go to Child Therapy or Individual Therapy. To see why people want to see a clinical psychologist, visit Common Concerns.

**Why couples can’t stop fighting

Does this sound like your situation?

When a couple comes in to see us, they are usually at a stage where their relationship has caused an overwhelming amount of hurt, distance, pain, disappointment, and resentment. When one partner picks a fight or pulls away, that can actually be their attempt to communicate their distressful feelings hoping, consciously or unconsciously, that these feelings can be addressed. However, it could lead to the other partner feeling attacked, criticized, rejected or abandoned. (E.g. Pulling away can be a way to say “this hurts!”, but that might leave the other partner feeling abandoned.) When these cycles get repeated, communication can feel like you two are just escalating an argument or going in circles. Even the non-verbal tension that permeates the fabric of the relationship can linger on for days. In some cases, couples might find themselves suddenly being thrown into a crisis (e.g. betrayal, loss of child) so significant that they wonder if they have what it takes to repair, or if they should just pack and leave. Either way, couples often feel lost as to how to dig themselves and their marriage out of what feels like a sinking hole.

Couples therapy can provide a way for partners to identify the difficult feelings that fuel repetitive arguments, the unmet needs that give rise to resentment and distance, their own part in the unhelpful patterns in communication. When the dance between a couple is brought to light, then both partners can study how they each invite and reinforce behavior in their partner that pains them.

**Things to avoid during an argument

Michelle Obama: “marriage counseling was a turning point for me” and “even the best marriages require work“.

Making the first step might not be easy…

Because couples therapy (some people call it couples counseling or relationship counseling) is first and foremost a personal experience, how it works, how you feel about and respond to it, and what benefits you could gain from it are best experienced through a consultation. These following questions might be on your mind.

How do I know…

my relationship needs help? (Some of these checklists might help.)
what to expect?
that I won’t be judged?
that my relationship issues are in fact resolvable?
that you are the right fit for us?

These are common and important questions, and well worth exploring. The purpose of an initial consultation is to provide an opportunity for us to explore these issues together. The purpose of an initial consultation is for you to tell me what you are struggling with and to find out how I work, and then we can talk about if working with me feels helpful.

**Common relationship mistakes

What if we want to find out more?

**Couples who stay together connect emotionally

Are you two contemplating divorce?

Some couples are looking to part ways in a manner that is less litigious and leaves room for constructive co-parenting. This is a very wise and healthy decision, and it will feel more manageable if there is a space for the two of you to work out your differences and how you anticipate these differences might cause problems in co-parenting moving forward.

If you suspect your child might be struggling with feelings associated with marital separation or divorce, you might find my new book Talking to Children about Divorce helpful.

How Dr. Bertie Wai works

When working with couples, I focus first on getting a sense of the issues that couples are grappling with: is it communication, is it distance, is it a lack of trust and intimacy, is it a perpetual feeling of being disrespected, left, misunderstood, unappreciated, or un-cared for? Then we work on locating how these issues manifest in the relationship and how the interaction between the couple keeps these issues alive.

One of the ways in which couples therapy unfolds (each course of therapy is different and so it will be hard to generalize) is that we often discover unhelpful modes of relating that keep both partners feeling stuck and dissatisfied. For example, one such mode is that one partner feels that to keep the peace one has to be silent and swallow negative feelings. Another mode can be that to avoid being controlled one has to maintain distance, or the flip side of that is to avoid being hurt one has to be in control all the time. There are many such unhelpful modes of relating. And as one can see, these modes solve one problem for the individual but create problems for the relationship. Once partners understand how these difficulties are created in the first place, they can begin to make adjustments to find creative solutions that go towards building the relationship rather than undermining it.

Visit the Couples Therapy Q & A page for more info.

View my SCMP articles on marriage as well as other topics.

The Power of You!

If you and your partner are not at a place where therapy is an option, visit our Relationship Kit for self-help tips.

When it comes to working on your relationship, remember the Serenity Prayer. Focus on what YOU can change, and start there. You will discover the power you have on changing your partner, when YOUR own behavior shifts.