By Shirley Shropshire, MS, Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist Associate

It has been reported by The Knot, a wedding planning website, that the average cost of a wedding in the United States in 2017 was $33,391.  This only represents the cost of the wedding.  Often, couples have made life altering decisions before they ever tie the knot such as making a job change, relocating, or making major purchases with one another.  Of course, people assume their marriage will work out without giving much thought to the possibility it might not.   When there is trouble in paradise, many people are often unprepared for the harsh realities of ending a relationship.  The emotional toll carries a high burden, and that is just the beginning.  Couples often have to negotiate how to divide property, finances, and determine new living arrangements.  Lawyers.com report the average cost of a divorce in Texas at $15,600, ranging from $5,000 to $34,000.  Again, this is jut the financial piece of the equation.  What if there are children involved?  What about emotional costs?

True Cost

The true cost of any endeavor can only be answered by the person who has risked without certainty in the hope of a return that is beyond expectation.  Money represents only one investment in a relationship.  People have often invested time, energy,  love, and countless dreams in their relationships.  Many of these investments cannot be equally divided in a divorce, nor easily restored when a relationship is dissolved.  However, being on the brink of divorce represents only one of many obstacles facing unhappy couples.  Most couples wait years before seeking counseling, when their discontent is so pronounced that it interferes with most aspects of their lives and can take more time to address.   If a relationship has any value, then investing in therapy is easily worth the expense.  After all, what is your relationship worth?

Couples Counseling

Most couples do not know what to expect when starting couple therapy.  They have no idea what it looks or should look like, and are curious about the process.  First, couples should find a qualified therapist.  If you are not sure how to do this, read our post on What You Should Know When Choosing A Marriage/Couple Counselor.   If you live close to our office then contact us, we would be happy to assist you.

Choose a counselor that is trained or specialized in treating relationships, relational issues, couple/family conflict, and has advanced training in couple therapy.   Would you go to an orthopedist if you were having heart problems?  Then why would you go to a counselor that doesn’t specialize in marriage/couple counseling to fix your relationship?

At Foundations Couple and Family Therapy, we use a form of Couple Therapy called Emotionally Focused Therapy.  There is over 30 years of research to support this model.  What does that mean?  It means the model has been shown to be effective with many different relationship issues and with different people.  Sessions at our office typically range from 10 – 20 sessions.

What Therapy Looks Like

First, all therapy starts with an intake session to gather background information and relationship history.  The therapist builds enough background and relationship information in order to make decisions about treatment, develop ideas about working with the couple, and develop goals for therapy.  The therapist offers recommendations and discusses the number of sessions needed based on information gathered from the couple.  Couples are encouraged to discuss their concerns and provide feedback about their progress.  They should expect to discuss their relationship, including their joys, frustrations, and concerns.  Couples are typically asked to talk to their partner in session and to discuss unique experiences in their relationship.

Cost

Consider the overall cost of getting a divorce, not just attorney fees.  For example, think of the long term impact of changes to your financial well being and loss of time with your children.  One of the greatest concerns among parents who divorce, is losing time with their kids.  While parents may be eager to distance from another, they often do not fully consider the emotional impact of divorce to their family.  For couples who ensue in lengthy litigation for a custody agreement, the financial impact can be extensive.  Couple therapy is comparatively cheaper than divorce in terms of financial investment.

How Insurance May Interfere

It is common for counselors committed to providing treatment to couples to not accept insurance.  Why?  Because their work is focused on understanding and changing what occurs between each partner, not diagnosing a mental health condition within one person in the relationship.  In other words the relationship is privileged, as it should be because couples have invested so much in them.  It is worth stating, that any existing diagnoses are not ignored.  Furthermore, counselors can use a diagnosis for couple conflict, but insurance typically does not cover it.  Couple conflict does not classify as a significant mental health issue in need of treatment by most insurance.  Yet, there is much current research focused on the benefits of treatments that address couple relationships, including positive impact on physical and mental health.  Maybe one day insurance will catch up.

Currently, insurance works by diagnosing a person with a mental health condition that an insurance company will “cover.”  Coverage will depend on each person’s policy.  The disadvantages of using insurance are:

• having a mental health diagnosis on your health or insurance record,
• possible over diagnosing in order to get insurance coverage,
• overly focusing on the role of the diagnosis, instead of the relationship issues,
• it encourages people to chose a therapist that may not “fit” them and who doesn’t specialize in providing couple therapy.

So what is the advantage of insurance? Cost. Too often people let their insurance determine their therapist without considering the importance of having to develop a relationship with the person delivering their treatment, or for that matter the therapist’s area of specialization.

Visit our site to learn more or schedule an intake session!