Making Couples Therapy Stick

CPD

Handouts

Speaker

Objectives

1. Explore how to switch from “toddler brain” to “adult brain” coping mechanisms by focusing on improving, appreciating, connecting, or protecting.
2. Explore how to act on their deeper values rather than temporary feelings by discovering what’s most important to them and which behaviour choices make them truly like themselves.
3. Explore how to turn guilt and shame into love motivators that help them show compassion and kindness.
4. Explore how to use the power of habituation to help them reinforce love and affection into their daily routine.

Outline

• Couples often fail to maintain the skills they learn in therapy.
• Under stress, they retreat to entrenched habits of emotion regulation.
• Under stress they invoke childhood coping mechanisms of blame, denial, and avoidance.
• Teach clients to switch from “toddler brain” to “adult brain” coping mechanisms.
• Convert blame, denial, avoidance into improve, appreciate, connect, protect.
• Show clients how to act on their deeper values rather than temporary feelings
• Show clients how to use guilt and shame as motivations to stay true to deeper values, i.e., showing compassion and kindness to loved ones.
• Create positive emotional habits to replace dysfunctional ones.
• Help clients build routine micro-moments of connection, e.g., eye contact, brief touch, smiles.
• Help clients use cognitive dissonance to improve their connection.

Target Audience

• Psychologists
• Physicians
• Addiction Counselors
• Counselors
• Social Workers
• Marriage & Family Therapists
• Nurses
• Other Behavioral Health Professionals

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