San Francisco COUPLES Counseling, Relationship Coaching & Sex THERAPY

ATTACHMENT & EMOTION FOCUSED COUPLE THERAPY, PRE-MARITAL & MARRIAGE COUNSELING AND SEX THERAPY

Your relationship security is largely determined by the answer to the question:           

"Are you there for me?"

"Attachment theory and research tell us that emotional accessibility (Can I reach you? Will you pay attention to me?), emotional responsiveness (Can I rely on you to respond and care about my feelings?), and emotional  engagement (Will you value me, put me first, and stay close?) characterize secure interactions between intimates." -Dr. Sue Johnson,  Author of Hold Me Tight: Seven Conversations for a Lifetime of Love 

Learn how to practice secure functioning in your relationship with San Francisco's Couple Therapy Center's highly skilled marriage and couples counselors and sex therapists. 

Couples and Marriage Counseling at San Francisco Intimacy & Sex Therapy Center can help you to get out of your problematic repeating patterns (or negative cycles) of relating and develop trust, connection and intimacy. When you enter into therapy as a couple, you bring your individual and collective experiences, dreams and hurts, as well as the history of your relationship.  Your relationship dynamic is created in the partnership based on these hopes and fears. In coming to therapy, I can help you to shift painful or damaging dynamics.

At the core of every relationship, is the need to know that your partner will show up for you in a loving and engaged way.  To feel safe in an intimate relationship, you need to know that your partner will be accessible, responsive to your needs and engaged in the partnership. This is the foundation of secure-functioning attachment.

INTIMACY DEEPENS WHEN PARTNERS SHARE THEIR MOST VULNERABLE THOUGHTS AND FEELINGS WITH EACH OTHER. 

In order to open up to your partner and share yourself in such a vulnerable way, you must know that your partner is emotionally available to respond to your feelings and needs. You may not know how to reach out to your partner and your partner may not know how to support you. Or perhaps you have become stuck in your old and painful patterns, leaving you feeling closed and guarded. 

If you sense that your partner is not accessible and engaged with you, you may respond by shutting down or pushing away (fight, flight).  While this serves to protect you from immediate pain, it also leaves both partners feeling alone and disconnected.  This damages and often ends, many otherwise loving relationships.  However, you can break this cycle and learn to communicate with your partner.

We offer couples & sex therapy, marriage & pre-marital counseling and relationship support to partners and individuals at our 30 convenient San Francisco, East Bay, North Bay & Napa Valley locations. 

OUR LEADING San Francisco BAY Area COUPLES COUNSELORS & SEX THERAPISTS CAN ASSIST YOU IN HAVING A HEALTHY & CONNECTED RELATIONSHIP. SOME BENEFITS OF RELATIONSHIP THERAPY ARE:

• Cultivate a Secure functioning partnership
• Learn better communication skills
• Identify problematic dynamics
• Deepen and build intimacy (emotional and sexual)
• Build trust
• Communicate effectively in conflict
• Shift unhelpful or dysfunctional dynamics and patterns.
• Explore commitment issues
• Work with fidelity/infidelity ruptures
• Break out of your relationship rut
• Work on parenting issues
• Develop relational health
• Reconnect to your core friendship and love for one another
• Enhance connection
• Repair your relationship and restore your your commitment to one another
• Relight the spark and passion in your partnership (read more about sex & intimacy therapy).
• Learn how to de-escalate conflict, settle your nervous system and use effective, nonviolent communication (NVC) to deepen connection.  
• Be in true partnership....in other words, be team players! 

“In the context of couples, research in this area suggests how we as partners can manage one another’s highs and lows. We don’t have to remain at the mercy of each other’s runaway moods and feelings. Rather, as competent managers of our partners, we can become expert at moving, shifting, motivating, influencing, soothing, and inspiring one another.” 

— Dr. Stan Tatkin, Wired for Love: How Understanding Your Partner's Brain and Attachment Style Can Help You Defuse Conflict and Build a Secure Relationship