How Therapy Actually Works (and Why It’s Not Just Talking)

Many people come into therapy expecting advice, quick relief, or a few new tools. What surprises them most is that therapy is not about fixing you. It is about understanding you.

At first, therapy might feel like just talking. You share what has been happening, your struggles, and your history. But something deeper begins to unfold. Over time, the relationship itself becomes the space where healing starts to take shape.

1. Therapy is a Relationship, Not a Prescription
Good therapy is not about a therapist telling you what to do. It is about two people paying close attention to what happens between them. That relationship becomes a mirror, showing patterns that play out in the rest of your life. The goal is not advice. It is awareness and growth that come from being understood in a new way.

2. Talking Opens the Door, But Feeling Creates Change
Words help you describe what happened. Feelings show you how it still lives inside you. In therapy, talking creates safety, and when that safety deepens, emotion follows. Feeling what was once avoided is what actually creates change.

3. Healing Is Slow, Subtle, and Often Invisible at First
Therapy does not usually come with big “aha” moments every week. It is more like learning a new language for your inner world. Change shows up quietly. You notice less reactivity, more clarity, and more compassion toward yourself. Life begins to feel different even when the circumstances have not changed much.

4. The Therapist Holds the Space, But You Do the Work
Good therapy is a collaboration. Your therapist can hold space, reflect, and guide you toward insight, but the healing happens as you risk honesty, stay curious, and allow yourself to feel. The courage to show up again and again is where the real work happens.

5. Over Time, You Become Your Own Therapist
The deeper purpose of therapy is not dependence. It is integration. Over time, you internalize the voice of understanding that your therapist once offered. You begin to offer it to yourself.

That is when you know therapy has worked. Life does not necessarily become easy. It is that you are no longer alone inside your experience.

When Couples Get Stuck in a Double Bind

Have you ever felt like no matter what you do, it’s wrong? Or that you can’t win in a conversation with your partner? If so, you might be experiencing a double bind.

A double bind happens when you receive two conflicting messages, and responding to one seems to make the other worse. For example: your partner might say, “I need more closeness from you,” but then pull away when you try to get closer. Or they might demand honesty but react angrily when you share your feelings. The harder you try to get it “right,” the more stuck you feel.

Double binds are frustrating because the messages often feel invisible or unspoken. They aren’t about blame, they’re patterns that trap both partners, creating confusion, tension, and sometimes resentment.

Breaking the Cycle: What Couples Can Do

While double binds are tricky, there are practical ways to navigate them. Here are some strategies couples can try:

1. Name the Pattern
   Simply noticing and naming the double bind can reduce its power. For example, saying, “I feel stuck because it seems like whatever I do frustrates you,” opens up awareness without blame. Naming the pattern helps both partners step back from reactive behaviors.

2. Clarify the Messages
   Often, double binds involve mixed or hidden expectations. Take time to clarify what your partner really wants. Ask open-ended questions: “Can you tell me what closeness feels like to you?” or “What does honesty look like for you in this situation?” This prevents assumptions and misinterpretations.

3. Pause Before Reacting
   When emotions run high, reactions can feed the cycle. Try pausing to breathe, reflect, and choose your response instead of reacting automatically. Even a short pause saying, “I want to respond, but I need a moment,” can prevent escalation.

4. Use “I” Statements
   Focus on expressing your experience rather than pointing out your partner’s “mistakes.” For instance: “I feel anxious when I sense mixed messages,” instead of, “You always confuse me.” This reduces defensiveness and encourages dialogue.

5. Agree on Safe Check-Ins
   Create a routine for checking in with each other when conflicts arise. For example, you might agree: “If we feel stuck, we’ll take 10 minutes to share our perspective calmly before continuing the discussion.” Structured check-ins provide space to hear each other without getting trapped in the pattern.

6. Seek Support Early
   While these strategies can help, double binds can be persistent. Couples therapy provides guidance in identifying hidden patterns, practicing new communication skills, and repairing emotional distance. Early support often prevents small issues from becoming entrenched conflicts.

Double binds may feel inescapable, but couples can learn to recognize the patterns, communicate more clearly, and reconnect. It takes awareness, practice, and sometimes guidance, but the results are worth it: less confusion, less frustration, and a deeper sense of connection.

When Faith Hurts: Finding Peace When Your Faith and Relationships Collide

Faith can be one of the deepest sources of comfort and belonging… until it isn’t.
For many people, faith is where they’ve found meaning, purpose, and connection. But what happens when faith becomes intertwined with pain, rejection, or conflict? When the very place that once felt like home starts to feel unsafe, it can leave a person feeling disoriented and alone.

This kind of pain, spiritual or faith-based wounding, can quietly shape how we see ourselves, others, and even God. It can also create tension in relationships, especially when partners, family members, or communities hold different beliefs or expectations.

When Faith and Relationship Dynamics Intersect

It’s not uncommon for faith and relationships to collide in subtle ways:

• One partner begins questioning long-held beliefs while the other clings to certainty.

• A family expects loyalty to a religious tradition that no longer feels authentic.

• Someone experiences judgment, exclusion, or spiritual manipulation in the name of faith.

These experiences can leave deep emotional and relational scars. Many people wonder, “Can I still believe? Can I trust again? Can I love people who hurt me in the name of God?”

Recognizing When Faith Has Become a Source of Pain

You might be experiencing a faith wound if you:

• Feel guilt or shame for setting boundaries with religious people or institutions

• Struggle to pray, attend services, or connect spiritually in ways that once felt meaningful

• Carry fear of being judged, rejected, or “not enough” spiritually

• Find yourself avoiding conversations about faith or hiding parts of your story

Healing begins by naming these experiences, and acknowledging that faith can both heal and harm, depending on how it’s expressed and held.

The Path Toward Peace

Finding peace doesn’t necessarily mean abandoning faith. It often means rediscovering it in a way that feels more authentic and grounded in love rather than fear.

Some steps toward that healing might include:

1. Allow space for grief. Faith changes can feel like loss of community, certainty, or belonging. Grief is a natural part of this process.

2. Reconnect with your values. Instead of focusing on beliefs that cause pain, explore what truly aligns with your sense of compassion, integrity, and connection.

3. Differentiate God from people. Spiritual abuse or betrayal can distort your image of God. Healing often means separating divine love from human imperfection.

4. Seek safe conversations. Healing often happens in relationships with trusted friends, partners, or a therapist who can hold your story without judgment.

When Faith and Healing Work Together

When we bring compassion into our spiritual wounds, faith can become a source of restoration again, not something to escape, but something to reimagine.
It’s possible to find peace even when faith has hurt you. Healing doesn’t require having all the answers. It begins when you give yourself permission to be honest, to rest, and to rediscover the kind of faith that makes you feel whole.

The Difference Between Coping and Healing

We all find ways to get through hard seasons in life. Some of those ways, like distracting ourselves, numbing, or overworking, help us cope in the moment. But over time, many people realize they are still carrying the same wounds, just hidden under layers of busyness or “strength.”

That’s the difference between coping and healing.

Coping is about survival. It’s the set of strategies we lean on to make pain bearable, like deep breathing during stress, talking with a friend after a fight, or even binging a show to get our minds off the hurt. Coping is important and often necessary. It stabilizes us in the moment.

But healing is about transformation. Healing goes deeper. It means turning toward the wound, working through the grief, trauma, or betrayal, and integrating those experiences so they no longer control our lives. Healing often requires time, reflection, safe relationships, and sometimes therapy.

Why the Difference Matters

• If we only cope, we may feel stuck in cycles of stress or hurt.

• Healing allows freedom. Instead of reacting to pain, we grow from it.

• Healing equips us with resilience and an ability to move through challenges without being defined by them.

Moving From Coping to Healing

1. Notice your patterns. Ask yourself: Am I soothing myself in ways that only give temporary relief, or am I working through the deeper pain?

2. Create safe space. Healing often happens when we allow vulnerability in trusted relationships or therapy.

3. Practice self-compassion. Healing requires gentleness. You cannot shame yourself into growth.

4. Seek professional support. Trauma, betrayal, or long-term struggles may need the guidance of a therapist trained in deeper methods like EMDR or couples therapy.

Coping is not failure. It is part of being human. But don’t stop there. Healing is possible. The ocean teaches us: waves come and go, but beneath the surface, there is depth and steadiness waiting to be rediscovered.

Rebuilding Trust: What Couples Need Beyond “I’m Sorry”

After a betrayal, whether an affair, a broken promise, or a hidden truth, many partners say the same words: “I’m sorry.” While important, an apology alone rarely rebuilds trust. True repair requires more than words; it requires action, patience, and consistency.

Why “I’m Sorry” Isn’t Enough
Apologies can acknowledge hurt, but they don’t automatically heal the wound. Trust is like a bank account, withdrawals (lies, betrayals, neglect) empty it quickly, and rebuilding requires many small deposits over time.

What Rebuilding Trust Really Takes

1. Transparency. Openness about schedules, communication, and even uncomfortable topics helps reassure a hurt partner.

2. Consistency. Trust grows when words and actions line up, day after day.

3. Empathy. The hurt partner needs to feel understood, not rushed past their pain. Phrases like, “I get why this hurts, and I’m here with you,” matter deeply.

4. Accountability. The one who broke trust must own their actions without defensiveness or blame-shifting.

5. Patience. Healing has no quick timeline. Pressuring a partner to “just move on” usually slows the process.

For the Hurt Partner

• Allow yourself to voice pain and ask questions.

• Notice small changes and efforts, it helps track progress.

• Consider whether the other’s actions align with their promises.

For the Partner Rebuilding Trust

• Show reliability in everyday moments (be on time, follow through, check in).

• Listen without rushing or minimizing.

• Accept that rebuilding is a marathon, not a sprint.

“I’m sorry” is a starting point, not the destination. Real trust is rebuilt through steady, intentional action. Couples who commit to this process often discover not just recovery, but a deeper, more resilient bond than before.

When Old Wounds Resurface: Why Past Trauma Shows Up in New Relationships

Have you ever wondered why a small comment from your partner suddenly sparks a big reaction in you? Or why certain moments in your relationship feel heavier than they “should”? Often, the answer lies not in the present moment but in old wounds that quietly resurface.

The Past Doesn’t Stay in the Past
Trauma, rejection, betrayal, and even childhood disappointments leave emotional imprints. The brain stores these experiences as patterns, like grooves on a record that can play back when something in the present reminds us of the past. A sigh, a glance, or a delayed text may not just be about today, but about the memory it stirs up inside.

Why Relationships Trigger Old Wounds

• Intimacy feels risky: Getting close to someone makes us vulnerable, which can activate past fears of abandonment, rejection, or betrayal.

• Attachment echoes: The way we learned to love and be loved (or not loved) in childhood often resurfaces with partners.

• Safety and danger signals: The body is wired to protect us. If something feels familiar to an old wound, our nervous system reacts, even if the present situation is different.

Signs an Old Wound is Surfacing

• Feeling an “outsized” reaction compared to the situation.

• Struggling with trust even when your partner hasn’t broken it.

• Reliving feelings of shame, fear, or anger you can’t fully explain.

What Healing Looks Like

1. Notice the pattern. Pause when your reaction feels bigger than the moment. Ask yourself: What does this remind me of?

2. Communicate gently. Share with your partner: “This situation brings up something from my past, it’s not just about now.”

3. Seek deeper work. Therapy, especially trauma-focused approaches like EMDR, can help “unhook” past pain from present relationships.

4. Practice compassion. Healing isn’t about never being triggered; it’s about responding with awareness instead of being consumed by the past.

Old wounds have a way of resurfacing, especially in the relationships that matter most. But that doesn’t mean you’re doomed to repeat the past. With awareness, compassion, and healing, you can break the cycle, and let your current relationship be a place of growth rather than re-injury.

Healing from Collective Trauma in the Wake of Charlie Kirk’s Death

The death of Charlie Kirk, like so many other acts of violence in recent decades, has left many people grappling with difficult emotions. Even if we were not present, the constant replay of images, headlines, and arguments online can leave us shaken. For some, this has brought grief or fear. For others, anger, numbness, or even a conflicted sense of justice. These varied responses are part of the collective trauma we carry as a society when violence erupts in public life. Healing begins when we acknowledge both the pain and the division, and start to imagine ways to bridge the gap between us.

Why Collective Trauma Matters

Violence affects more than the immediate victims or witnesses. It ripples outward into families, communities, and even the nation as a whole. Each time such an event occurs, old wounds are reopened, from school shootings, to political violence, to everyday tragedies that remind us of our fragility.

Our nervous systems are not built to repeatedly absorb violent images, yet social media and news outlets expose us to these moments over and over. This can create a sense of hopelessness, division, and fatigue.

Holding Complex Reactions

Not everyone responds in the same way. Some feel grief and despair. Others feel anger or rage. Still others feel indifference or even a sense of justice. These differences can make it harder to come together, but they also remind us that trauma is complex. There is no single “right” way to react when confronted with violence.

Steps Toward Healing Together

• Limit your exposure: Take breaks from constant media updates and arguments online.

• Name your experience: Recognize what emotions are most present for you, such as grief, anger, fear, or numbness.

• Lean into connection: Healing collective trauma requires community. Find spaces where listening and compassion are possible.

• Ground yourself in hope: Division may feel overwhelming, but small acts of kindness and understanding still create change.

Collective trauma does not disappear quickly. Even as news cycles shift, the emotions we carry remain real. Healing will take time and requires us to resist becoming numb. By choosing connection, compassion, and reflection, we begin to soften the divisions and remember our shared humanity.

When Violence Finds Us Through Screens: Healing from Secondary Trauma

In our current world, many of us experience trauma not only by being physically present at a violent event, but also through what we see, hear, and read in its aftermath. The recent news and circulating images of Charlie Kirk’s death are a reminder of this reality. Even if we weren’t there in person, witnessing violence through screens can leave us shaken, fearful, and heavy with emotion.

For some, these moments evoke sadness and grief. For others, they stir anger, numbness, or even a conflicted sense of justice. And for many, the constant stream of arguments and posts on social media can intensify the pain. Our responses are human, and they reflect how overwhelming it can be to hold so many perspectives and emotions at once.

Why We Feel It So Deeply

Our brains and bodies don’t always distinguish between what we see firsthand and what we experience indirectly. Images of violence, especially when they are replayed across news outlets and social feeds, can trigger the same fight, flight, or freeze responses as if we had been there. This is sometimes called secondary trauma or vicarious trauma. It can leave us feeling unsafe in our communities, disconnected from others, or worn down by the intensity of public discourse.

The Added Weight of Social Media

Social media often amplifies trauma. Instead of giving us space to grieve, it can:

• Flood us with repeated images and headlines we can’t unsee

• Expose us to polarized arguments that dismiss or attack our feelings

• Pressure us to “take a side” when our inner world may be more complex

• Create a cycle of outrage and exhaustion that leaves us feeling powerless

The very place many of us go for connection can sometimes increase our sense of isolation.

Signs You May Be Carrying This Trauma

• Heightened vigilance or fear in everyday life

• Intrusive thoughts or images of what you saw online

• Emotional numbness when new tragedies appear

• Anger or irritability that spills into daily interactions

• Feeling overwhelmed by the arguments and hostility on social platforms

If you recognize yourself in these experiences, you are not alone.

Steps Toward Healing

• Set boundaries online: Limit your exposure to distressing posts and arguments. Curate your feed so it serves your well-being.

• Name your feelings: Whether it’s grief, anger, fear, or indifference, acknowledging your reactions is part of healing.

• Seek safe spaces: Connect with people who can listen without judgment, whether friends, family, or a therapist.

• Ground your body: Small practices like breathing exercises, walking, journaling can calm your nervous system.

• Balance with hope: Look for signs of care, resilience, and humanity, even in small ways. These reminders can soften the weight of despair.

Remembering Our Shared Humanity

Each time tragedy strikes, we are faced with both the pain of division and the reminder of how deeply interconnected we are. Social media may amplify our fractures, but it can also become a place to share compassion and solidarity. Healing begins when we recognize the impact these images and arguments have on us, and when we choose to respond with care to ourselves and for one another.

When Two Become Three: Understanding Triangulation in Relationships

In many relationships, tension can build quietly, leaving partners unsure how to express their needs directly. Triangulation is a common pattern that emerges when one partner turns to a third person, entity, or even an activity to voice frustration, seek validation, or cope with conflict. While often unintentional, triangulation can create distance and misunderstanding over time.

Seeking Validation Elsewhere
One partner shares frustration about a recurring argument with a friend or family member, saying, “You know how hard it is to get them to see my point.” The listener offers support, but the partner never addresses the issue directly. Meanwhile, the other partner senses an unspoken tension, leaving both feeling disconnected.

Indirect Communication
During a shared moment, one partner hints at dissatisfaction about responsibilities, framing it as something others would understand. The partner on the receiving end may notice the comment but feels the concern is aimed elsewhere. Instead of opening a direct conversation, the tension lingers quietly.

Using Third Parties to Influence
Sometimes, a partner involves a child or family member in subtle ways, encouraging them to take sides. While this may provide temporary relief, it often leaves the other partner feeling isolated and frustrated, with the original conflict unresolved.

Emotional Outsourcing
Turning to colleagues or social groups for emotional support after a disagreement can feel comforting. Yet, returning home with that validation can create an emotional gap between partners, as the unspoken issues remain unaddressed.

Triangulation reflects deeper relational dynamics, including fear of confrontation, avoidance, or unmet emotional needs. It is rarely malicious, but it signals an opportunity for mindful engagement. Awareness of these patterns, along with therapy-supported strategies, helps partners move from indirect communication to authentic dialogue. By practicing vulnerability and direct expression, partners can foster understanding, rebuild connection, and address conflict without needing a third party.

Moving Beyond Survival: The Journey of Trauma Recovery

Trauma changes how we see ourselves, others, and the world. Whether it comes from a single event or a long history of pain, trauma leaves invisible wounds that often surface as anxiety, depression, relationship struggles, or feeling disconnected from life. But healing is possible.

Safety Comes First

Recovery begins by building a sense of safety, both internally and externally. This might mean practicing grounding skills, surrounding yourself with supportive relationships, or finding a therapist who can offer a steady and nonjudgmental presence.

The Body Remembers

Trauma doesn’t just live in memory, it lives in the body. Flashbacks, hypervigilance, and emotional numbing are not signs of weakness but the body’s attempt to protect you. Approaches like EMDR and somatic therapies help release trauma where it is stored in the nervous system.

Reclaiming Your Story

Trauma often robs people of their voice and sense of agency. In therapy, you can begin to tell your story at your own pace, reframing it from one of helplessness to one of survival and resilience.

Building a Life Beyond Trauma

The ultimate goal of healing is not simply reducing symptoms but creating a life where joy, trust, and connection are possible again. It is about moving from surviving to truly living.

Final Thought

Trauma may have shaped your past, but it doesn’t have to define your future. With compassion, support, and the right tools, you can reclaim your sense of self and step into a life of hope and wholeness.

5 Common Patterns That Block Healing After an Affair

Infidelity is one of the deepest ruptures a couple can experience. It shakes trust, safety, and identity. Many couples want to know: “Can we ever come back from this?” The answer isn’t about going back to what you had before. It’s about creating something new, together, with more honesty, depth, and intimacy.

Healing from an affair depends on how two inner worlds meet and shape each other in the aftermath of betrayal. Infidelity isn’t only about broken trust, it also raises questions about desire, identity, and meaning.

Yet many couples get caught in common patterns that can stall their healing. Naming these patterns can help partners notice them sooner and find a different way forward.

1. Rushing to “Forgive and Forget”

• Skipping past the grief and anger denies the emotional reality between partners. Both pain and shame need space to be acknowledged together.

• Infidelity isn’t just about sex; it often reflects unmet needs or a search for aliveness. Ignoring this deeper meaning keeps couples from truly rebuilding.

2. Getting Stuck in Interrogation Mode

• Endless questioning can become a defense against closeness, looping the couple in trauma rather than healing.

• Curiosity can be healing, but surveillance is not. Recovery requires shifting from detective work to meaningful dialogue.

3. Reducing the Relationship to “The Affair”

• When the entire relationship is defined by betrayal, couples lose sight of the complexity of their shared history.

• An affair reveals fractures but doesn’t erase the whole. Couples must hold the paradox: the betrayal matters, and it’s not the only story.

4. Treating Healing as an Individual Task

• Partners profoundly affect each other’s healing. Triggers and defenses reverberate between them. Repair happens in the space between, not in isolation.

• Both must take responsibility, not for the affair equally, but for the co-creation of what comes next in the rebuilding process.

5. Avoiding Desire and Intimacy Conversations

• Sexuality often becomes charged with shame or fear post-affair. Avoiding these conversations leaves intimacy fractured.

• Infidelity forces couples to face questions of desire and eroticism. Healing isn’t just about safety; it’s also about reawakening vitality and connection.

Closing Thought

Healing from an affair is not about returning to “how things used to be.” It’s about stepping into something new, where both partners face the uncomfortable truths about themselves, each other, and their relationship. With honesty, courage, and support, couples can move beyond survival into deeper intimacy.

The Body Remembers: How Trauma Shows Up in Everyday Life

You may not think of yourself as a trauma survivor. Maybe you didn’t experience a major accident, war, or natural disaster. But trauma isn’t always a single catastrophic event, sometimes it’s chronic stress, a painful relationship, childhood neglect, or moments when you felt unsafe and alone.

What many people don’t realize is that trauma doesn’t just live in memory. It lives in the body. Long after the event has passed, the nervous system remembers. And those memories show up in everyday life in ways that can be confusing, frustrating, or overwhelming.

Everyday Signs of a Nervous System on Alert

Trauma activates the body’s survival system. When that system never fully resets, it can show up like this:

• Startle responses – jumping at sudden noises or movements

• Tightness in the chest or stomach – feeling “on edge” even in safe moments

• Trouble sleeping – difficulty falling asleep or waking up in the night

• Irritability or reactivity – snapping at loved ones without knowing why

• Difficulty concentrating – brain fog, forgetfulness, or zoning out

• Numbing out – disconnecting from emotions or avoiding situations that feel overwhelming

These symptoms aren’t signs of weakness. They’re signs that your body is still trying to protect you.

Why the Body Holds On

Unfortunately the past doesn’t just vanish, it often gets replayed. Early experiences shape how we view ourselves, others, and the world. When trauma happens, especially in relationships, the nervous system encodes “templates” for safety and danger.

This is why someone who grew up walking on eggshells around a volatile parent might still feel anxious when their partner raises a voice, even if no harm is present. The body says, “I know this. I’ve been here before. Protect.”

In EMDR and other trauma therapies, we work with this embodied memory directly. The goal isn’t just to talk about what happened, but to help the nervous system finally release what it’s been holding.

Healing: From Survival to Safety

The good news is that what is wired in can be rewired. Healing is about moving from survival mode into a sense of safety and connection. In therapy, that often means:

• Naming what the body is saying – learning to recognize triggers and body signals

• Reprocessing traumatic memories – with tools like EMDR to release the nervous system’s grip

• Rewriting relational patterns – practicing new ways of connecting that feel safe and secure

• Building self-compassion – shifting from “what’s wrong with me?” to “my body is trying to protect me.”

Over time, people notice that they’re less reactive, more grounded, and able to experience joy, intimacy, and calm without the constant background hum of hypervigilance.

A Note of Hope

If you see yourself in these descriptions, it doesn’t mean you’re broken. It means your body has been protecting you in the only way it knew how. Healing is possible. With the right support, the body can learn a new language, one of safety, freedom, and connection.

The body remembers, and it can also relearn.

Healing After Betrayal: What Couples Can Expect in Therapy

When betrayal enters a relationship, whether thats through an affair, secrecy, or a broken promise the impact is seismic. The relationship you thought you were in is gone, and both partners are left in the rubble, wondering if anything can be salvaged.

Yet affairs don’t just rupture a relationship, they also reveal. They reveal unmet needs, unspoken longings, and the fault lines that may have been invisible until now. This duality is painful, but it can also be the beginning of something new: a more honest, resilient, and connected relationship than the one that existed before.

The First Stage: Shock and Survival

The discovery of betrayal is often traumatic. The partner who was betrayed may feel grief, rage, disbelief, or shame. The partner who strayed may feel guilt, defensiveness, shame, or fear of losing everything.

In therapy, the first step is stabilization, making space for each partner to speak and to be heard, while protecting against further harm. This isn’t about forgiveness yet; it’s about emotional survival and grounding when the world feels turned upside down.

The Second Stage: Asking “Why?”

After the initial shock, couples often find themselves circling the same question: Why did this happen?

For the betrayed partner, “why” is about making sense of what feels senseless. For the partner who strayed, “why” is about exploring what the affair represented… passion, validation, freedom, escape, or a longing for a part of themselves that felt lost or cut off.

It is not about excusing betrayal or minimizing the pain it caused, its about making meaning. It’s about moving beyond the surface of the act to uncover the deeper story:

• What did the affair awaken in the partner who strayed?

• What longings or vulnerabilities were left unspoken in the relationship?

• What patterns of distance or disconnection may have quietly shaped the bond?

This process is rarely neat. It often brings forward uncomfortable truths, but it also creates the possibility of transformation. By making meaning, couples begin to understand not only what broke, but what might need to be rebuilt differently if the relationship is to move forward.

Answering “why” does not excuse the betrayal. Instead, it reframes the affair as more than a crime of lust or opportunity. It becomes a window into the dynamics of the relationship, as well as the inner world of each partner. Sometimes an affair isn’t about leaving the other person, but about leaving the version of oneself that felt trapped, unseen, or disconnected.

This deeper understanding is painful, and it’s also the beginning of transformation.

The Third Stage: Rebuilding Trust

Trust is not repaired with promises. It is rebuilt through consistent action over time.

In therapy, rebuilding trust often means:

• Radical transparency from the partner who betrayed trust

• Patience for questions, triggers, and painful emotions from the betrayed partner

• New agreements around communication, boundaries, and intimacy

It’s not about returning to “normal.” It’s about creating something sturdier and more intentional than what existed before.

The Fourth Stage: Creating a New Relationship

The paradox of betrayal is that, if couples are willing to do the work, it can be a catalyst for growth. Many couples who commit to the process of healing discover that their relationship becomes more alive, more connected, and more truthful.

This new relationship is built not on the illusion of safety, but on a deeper knowing of each other’s vulnerabilities and needs. Affairs may destroy the old marriage, and they can also give birth to a new one.

A Note of Hope

If you’re navigating betrayal right now, it may feel like nothing could be harder. That’s true, and yet it is also true that repair is possible. Couples therapy provides the structure, guidance, and safety to navigate this fragile terrain.

Betrayal may mark the end of what was, and it can also be the beginning of what’s next. With care, courage, and support, healing is possible. And for many, love can be rediscovered in deeper, more authentic ways than ever before.

What is Freedom?

“I just want to be free.”
I’ve heard this sentence whispered with longing, spoken in frustration, shouted in protest. It shows up in the therapy room as people wrestle with relationships, obligations, shame, history.

But what do we really mean when we say we want freedom?

In our culture, we often imagine freedom as an escape: from rules, expectations, burdens. The lone figure walking away from it all. The clean break. The weight lifted.

But from a therapist perspective, freedom is not about walking away, it's about showing up. More specifically, it's about showing up as oneself, in relationship, without being hijacked by the ghosts of past relationships.

Freedom Isn’t Solitude. It’s Selfhood in Connection

We are never fully separate. From the moment we’re born, our sense of who we are is shaped in relationship. We learn early, many times before we even speak, how much of ourselves is welcome, how much is too much, and which parts we have to hide in order to belong.

Those early adaptations often follow us into adulthood. We might smile when we’re hurting. We might go quiet when something matters. We might fuse with the needs of others and call it love.

In these moments, we’re not free. We’re loyal. We’re surviving.

So in therapy, I don’t help people break free from relationship. I help people reclaim themselves within it.

Freedom Is Saying What You’ve Never Said, And Staying Present

When working with people, I often slow things down. We become curious not just about the story a person is telling, but about what’s happening between us in the telling. Where do they look away? When does their voice drop? What are they protecting?

Freedom might look like a client saying, “I’m scared to tell you this because I think you’ll be disappointed.”

Or, “I’m angry at you for not understanding me last week.”

Or even, “I have no idea what I feel. Can we sit in the not-knowing?”

Each of those moments is a quiet revolution. A departure from the old dance. A turning point where the client notices the urge to hide, and chooses to stay visible.

Freedom Is Living Beyond the Repetition

So often we’re stuck in relational loops that don’t belong to the present moment. We repeat patterns with partners, friends, even therapists. patterns that are often rooted in early wounds.

Freedom is not found in pretending those patterns don’t exist. It’s in seeing them as they’re happening. And then consciously, vulnerably, with full presence, choosing to do something new.

To speak instead of shrink.
To stay instead of bolt.
To feel instead of numb.

Freedom Is Mutual Recognition

Therapists like Jessica Benjamin describe freedom as the ability to be both a self and an other in relationship. Not merged. Not dominating. Not disappearing.

That means I don’t just get to be me, I also have to let you be you.

And that’s where real freedom gets tested. Because being a full self while staying connected to another full self? That’s not easy. But it is profoundly human.

So, What Is Freedom?

It’s not about being untouched or uninfluenced.
It’s not about independence at the cost of intimacy.
And it’s definitely not about winning or being right.

Freedom is the ability to be in relationship without losing yourself.

It’s the courage to stay open, even when the past tells you to shut down.
It’s the strength to speak your truth, even if your voice shakes.
It’s the slow, unfolding possibility of becoming who you are, in the presence of another who sees you.

And maybe, in the end, that’s what we really want when we say, “I just want to be free.”
Not to be alone.
But to be known.

Gaslighting: When Doubt Becomes the Weapon

You’re not sure when it started, maybe it was the way they’d brush off your feelings, or how their version of events never quite matched yours. You began to question yourself, replaying conversations in your head, wondering if you were the one who got it wrong.

That slow erosion of trust in your own perception? That’s gaslighting.

What Is Gaslighting, Really?

Gaslighting isn’t just lying. It’s not simply disagreeing. It’s a deliberate (though not always conscious) pattern of manipulation designed to make you question your reality, your memory, and even your sanity.

The term comes from the 1944 film Gaslight, where a husband slowly convinces his wife she’s losing her mind by dimming the gaslights in their home and then denying it’s happening. She comes to doubt her senses, her instincts, and eventually, herself.

Modern gaslighting may not involve flickering lights, but the effect is just as disorienting.

The Subtle Mechanics of Gaslighting

Gaslighting works slowly. It’s not usually one explosive moment, it’s the accumulation of a thousand small ones:

• “You’re too sensitive.”

• “That never happened.”

• “You’re imagining things again.”

• “Why would you even think that? What’s wrong with you?”

Over time, the gaslighter shifts the ground beneath you. You stop trusting your memory. You hesitate before speaking. You second-guess your instincts. You begin to wonder if maybe they’re right. Maybe you are too sensitive, too emotional, too dramatic, too much.

But gaslighting isn't about the truth. It’s about power.

Why It Hurts So Much

Gaslighting doesn’t just confuse you, it disconnects you from yourself. From your intuition. From your internal compass. That’s what makes it so devastating.

And it doesn’t always happen in abusive relationships. It can occur in friendships, families, workplaces, and even in broader social systems. Anywhere there’s a power imbalance and a fear of being wrong, gaslighting can creep in.

It’s especially dangerous because it hides inside love, loyalty, and longing. You want to believe the other person has your best interests at heart. You want to keep the peace. You want to be fair. But gaslighting turns those very desires against you.

What It Can Sound Like

Gaslighting often shows up in language like:

• “You’re remembering it wrong.”

• “You always make everything about you.”

• “You’re being paranoid.”

• “You know I didn’t mean it like that.”

• “You’re blowing this out of proportion.”

Sometimes, it's more subtle. It’s a raised eyebrow, a dismissive shrug, a silent treatment that makes you feel like you're the problem for even bringing something up.

How to Recognize It

If you’re unsure whether you’re being gaslit, look for signs in yourself:

• You feel like you're walking on eggshells.

• You frequently second-guess your thoughts and feelings.

• You apologize constantly, even when you’re not sure what you did wrong.

• You feel confused, anxious, or “off,” but can’t explain why.

• You find yourself defending someone who hurts you.

These are not signs of weakness. They are signs that your nervous system is working overtime to make sense of something that doesn't make sense.

Healing From Gaslighting

Gaslighting isolates you from your truth. Healing means coming back home to yourself.

• Start by trusting your gut again. That uneasy feeling you keep pushing away? Listen to it.

• Keep a journal. Write things down so your reality has a place to live outside of someone else’s distortion.

• Talk to someone safe. A therapist. A friend. Someone who believes you, without twisting your words.

• Set boundaries. You don’t owe anyone unlimited access to your mind and emotions, especially someone who manipulates them.

Most importantly, remember this: if someone consistently makes you feel small, confused, or crazy, that is not love. That is control.

You Are Not Broken

Gaslighting doesn’t work because you’re weak. It works because you’re human. It works because you want connection, because you’re willing to self-reflect, because you care.

The antidote to gaslighting is not convincing the other person to see you clearly. It’s reclaiming your own clarity. Your voice. Your inner truth.

You don’t have to doubt yourself forever. The path back to trust, your trust, is still there. Waiting for you.

When Love Gets Tough, Liking Each Other Matters Most

Love is often painted as the glue that holds a couple together. And it is. But love can also be elusive in hard moments, when trust is frayed, when exhaustion outweighs affection, when the past barges into the present, uninvited. In those moments, it isn’t always love that carries you through. It’s something quieter, often overlooked, but no less vital:

Do you like each other?

Not in the heady, “we like all the same music” kind of way. But in the deeper, steadier sense. Do you like who your partner is when the romantic fog lifts? Do you like how they treat people, how they speak about their friends, how they respond when things don’t go their way? Do you like how they repair after hurting you, or try to?

Because here’s the truth: Love can survive for a time without liking. But a relationship can’t thrive that way.

In therapy, I often see couples who love each other deeply but are worn down by resentment, criticism, and chronic disappointment. They say things like, “Of course I love him… I just can’t stand being around him right now.” Or, “I know she loves me, but I don’t think she respects me anymore.” What they're describing isn’t a lack of love. It’s the absence of liking.

Liking makes room for playfulness when things feel heavy, and for patience when everything else is fraying. It’s what allows you to say, “I’m furious with you right now, and I still want to sit next to you on the couch.”

Liking someone means you still see their humanity, even when you're hurt. It means you remember what’s good about them, even when what's hard feels the loudest. It’s the thing that helps you reach for their hand not because everything is okay, but because you both want it to be.

So if you’re in a rough patch, ask yourself not just “Do I still love them?” but “Do I still like them?” And if the answer feels distant, don’t panic. That distance can be closed. Sometimes liking each other again is a process of rediscovery: learning how to laugh together again, how to listen without defensiveness, how to be curious about each other instead of critical.

Love may be the heart of the relationship. But liking is what lets that heart keep beating, even when it’s bruised.

Because when love gets hard, and it always will, it’s liking each other that reminds us why we ever wanted to try in the first place.

Beyond Us and Them: Finding the Third in a Divided America

In the therapy room, one of the most challenging dynamics a couple can face is polarization. Each partner becomes entrenched in their perspective, convinced the other is wrong, or worse, that the other is dangerous. They stop seeing each other and start seeing symbols. Battles over dishes or discipline become proxies for deeper existential threats. It becomes you or me. Someone has to win. Someone has to lose. This is the “us vs. them” trap. And right now, America is caught in it too.

Whether it’s political parties, racial identities, gender dynamics, or social class, we are explicitly and implicitly being told to divide the world into opposing camps. You’re either for or against. Woke or asleep. Patriot or traitor. Citizen or stranger. There is no space for nuance, no room for complexity. No one gets to be uncertain, evolving, or contradictory. And in this binary, empathy dies.

But there are different ways to understand conflict than just binary. When a couple is gridlocked in an all blame and no curiosity split, what we look for is the third.

The third isn’t a person. It’s a space. A possibility. A perspective that arises between the two and because of the two. It’s the “us” that can hold both “me” and “you.” It is not compromise, but a transformative process of witnessing, imagining, and integrating. The third doesn’t mean agreement. It means recognition. It’s the space between, or in other words, a heart big enough to hold difference without annihilation.

In a marriage, cultivating the third means slowing down, asking questions, tolerating discomfort, and recognizing how each partner’s position might be protecting something deeply vulnerable. In a country, it might look like listening to someone’s story without needing to immediately agree or dismantle it. It might look like being curious about the fear underneath the rage, or naming the pain that gets masked by righteousness. Or even allowing yourself to see the humanity, or pieces of you, in the other.

The third is hard to hold when you’ve been hurt, threatened, or marginalized. It’s not about false equivalency or forced unity. It doesn’t mean we excuse harm or pretend everyone’s reality is the same. But it does mean we challenge ourselves to see more than caricatures. To resist the pull toward totalizing narratives that keep us locked in cycles of retaliation and dehumanization.

Right now, the U.S. is in a psychological splitting. And in that splitting, we lose not only each other, we also lose parts of ourselves. The third reminds us that we are more than this fight. That every “them” is a person with a story. That democracy, like a relationship, requires the capacity to hold competing truths without collapsing.

It’s not easy. The pull to simplify, to divide, to scapegoat, is seductive. Especially in times of fear. But if we want to build something different, we have to reclaim the third.

Not just tolerance. Not just opposition.

But the radical, difficult work of metallization and relational imagination.

That’s where healing begins.

The Illusion of Fireworks: A MFT's Take on the Meaning of Independence

There’s a strange hollowness that can accompany holidays, especially the ones draped in symbols of triumph.

Every year on July 4th, we gather under exploding skies to celebrate our country’s independence. The rituals are familiar: red-white-and-blue paper plates, the smoky scent of barbecue, kids with sparklers, adults with beer. And, of course, the fireworks.

But what are we really celebrating?

From my perspective, the word “independence” doesn’t signal freedom in the way we often think. It’s not the clean severance, the heroic autonomy, the myth of the self-made individual. It’s something murkier. More painful. More intimate. And perhaps less celebratory than we’d like to admit.

Because real independence doesn’t come in a burst of light. It comes slowly, and with grief.

The Myth of Self-Mastery

Many of us are taught from a young age that independence is the goal. To not need, to not rely, to not feel beholden. We internalize the idea that the stronger I am, the less I need you. That to be free is to be disentangled. So we become high-functioning, high-achieving, self-contained… independent.

But in the therapy room, we often find that this “independence” is actually a defense, a shield against longing, vulnerability, dependency. Behind the self-sufficiency is often an ache. A child who learned that their needs were too much. A teen who couldn’t afford to rebel without losing safety. An adult who keeps everything and everyone together, all the while wondering why they feel so alone.

Dependence Is Not the Enemy

I want to invite us to reimagine dependence not as weakness, but as a necessary condition for growth. We never stop needing others, not as infants, not as adults. What changes is the way we relate to our need.

In therapy, independence is not an endpoint. It’s a process of differentiation that happens in the context of deep relationship. Not “I don’t need you,” but “I can be me while staying in connection with you.” That is a far more complicated kind of freedom. One that requires us to feel our dependency, to tolerate the anxiety of being known, to risk that our autonomy will not cost us love.

It is excruciating. And it is worth everything.

Legacy and Lineage

Then there’s the collective unconscious, the inherited emotional history we carry, especially in this country. Our national origin story is one of rebellion, conquest, and independence. But also one of disavowed trauma like colonization, genocide, slavery, and silenced grief. There is no true independence without reckoning. Without acknowledging who paid the price for our freedom.

For many clients, especially those from marginalized communities, July 4th doesn’t feel like a celebration. It feels like a rupture. A reminder of who was never invited into the dream. Therapy often becomes a space where people begin to untangle these intergenerational legacies, what it means to be “free” in a system that was never built for you. Or to carry the burden of ancestral survival while also trying to find space to rest, to soften, to become.

The Fireworks Inside

So maybe the question is not whether we feel proud or patriotic. Maybe the better question is: Where am I still trying to become free?

What internal colonizers still rule my psyche? What parts of me have been silenced, enslaved, exiled? Where have I declared independence prematurely, cutting off connection, numbing emotion, dissociating from need, in the name of “strength”?

And what would it mean, truly, to come home to myself?

Because sometimes, the path to freedom is not a declaration. It’s a quiet, painstaking journey back to the parts of us we left behind in order to survive.

This Independence Day, if the fireworks feel too loud, too bright, too performative, that’s okay. You’re not ungrateful. You might just be in touch with a deeper truth, that real liberation is internal. Slow. Messy. Full of contradiction. And absolutely worth the fight.

Even if no one’s watching.

Even if there are no fireworks.

The Ache to Be Alike: When the Threat of Differences Show Up in a Couple's Therapy Room

They sat on opposite ends of the couch, barely looking at each other.

He crossed his arms. She looked out the window.

I had asked a simple question, something about what made them feel safe with each other when things were good. She didn’t answer right away. He spoke first.

“I just want us to be on the same page, just like we used to be. We liked the same music, wanted the same things. Now everything’s a debate.”

She sighed. Not an eye-roll exactly, but the kind of sigh that carries years of trying to explain something that doesn’t translate.

“We weren’t the same,” she said quietly. “You just never noticed I was editing myself.”

That’s when I knew we weren’t just talking about conflict. We were brushing against something deeper… twinship.

He wasn’t trying to dominate her. In fact, he was tender in his own way, eager to repair, to fix, to understand. But underneath that urgency was a fear I could feel in the room. “If we’re different, maybe we’re not okay.”

And for her, that sameness he longed for didn’t feel like connection. It felt like annihilation.

Like being asked to disappear in order to stay loved.

In the language of self psychology, twinship lives in the ache to feel “like” someone else. Not similar in tastes or politics or morning routines, but in essence. In one’s emotional makeup. In what it means to be a person moving through this world.

When that need goes unmet in early life, we carry it with us. Some people try to recreate it in adult relationships. Not consciously, not manipulatively. But with a quiet desperation, “If you and I are the same, then I know I belong. Then I know I’m real.”

But when the other person starts to individuate, to assert difference, it stirs up something ancient. Panic. Threat.

Over time, he began to realize he wasn’t asking her to agree with him, he was asking her to make him feel safe.

And she began to see that underneath his need for sameness wasn’t entitlement, but vulnerability.

That shifted things.

He said one day, “I didn’t know that asking you to see things my way was really me asking, do you still see me at all?”

And she cried. Because she finally heard him, not as someone trying to control her, but as someone trying to not disappear.

This is what twinship does in couples, it whispers the lie that we have to be the same to be close. That if you are different from me, I might vanish.

And so often, that whisper is coming from an early wound, the child part of us that never quite felt mirrored, never quite felt like we belonged.

But in the therapy room, when we can name that fear, when a partner can say, “I don’t need you to be me, I just need to know you see me and you’re not leaving,” it creates room for a deeper kind of intimacy.

Not built on sameness, but on recognition. Recognition that different is not a threat. Different is simply different.

Now, they still don’t agree on everything. They still bump into difference. But something’s changed.

Less fear, more curiosity. Less performance, more presence. Less defensiveness, more openness.

And maybe that’s the gift of therapy, not to erase the differences between us, but to help us hold the differences in each of us, without feeling like we’re losing ourselves.

Because sometimes, the most healing thing in the world isn’t to be the same.

It’s to be seen as different, and loved anyway.