Why Marriage Counseling Won't Work

to be honest marriage counselors um even today those who get their masters in marriage and family counseling usually get absolutely no training in domestic violence or emotional abuse and those kind of tactics so they really don't know what to look for and they really don't see anything but one of the reasons why marriage counseling doesn't work is marriage counseling has a couple of assumptions and one of the assumptions is it takes two to tango and so they're always looking for both parts of the destructive dance and they're right it does take two to tango and in fact if you've listened to me at any length of time you know my hashtag is do your own work right just do your own work we're so busy trying to fix the other person because we see all the work they need to do and everything would be great if they would just do their work that we neglect that we have our own work to do so marriage counselors can sort of see hey there is no perfect person there's no perfect couple and you have your work and you have your work so let's dig in and do the work the problem becomes is that in marriage counseling oftentimes you're the blame for why he behaves the way he behaves right you know if only you would respect me more if only you wouldn't criticize me if only you wouldn't push my buttons if only you would do this or do that or if only you wouldn't do this or do that and to be to be told you're not a perfect wife let me give you a real example that happened to me early in my marriage counseling i was working with a couple in the philadelphia area where i used to have my practice and there was some physical physical violence in their home um he was uh a nice guy on the surface he was charming he was educated um she was a homeschool mom she homeschooled i think four or five kids um she was a kind of a martha woman and he was kind of a touchy feely guy who wanted a lot of attention and wanted a lot of interaction with hers and she was like hey i'm done listen i had to go to wash i got a full blast and so they would butt heads a lot right very common in marriage and so i could see that she wasn't the perfect wife she didn't really give much attention to him at times when he really asked for it and then he'd get madder and madder and madder and sometimes he'd get erupt and he'd get violent with her he'd like shove her push her one time he spit at her all right very disrespectful and she was disrespectful too so it's easy to kind of say in the marriage counseling well look she she wasn't nice to him and that's why he did that right so it's so easy for her to look like the bad guy and she had some issues that she could have worked on do your own work okay so this is what i did i talked turned to the man i said so what you're saying to me is all you want is for your wife to just sit down with you for 15 minutes every night and just hear your heart and talk with you and listen to you patiently and you know just affirm you as a husband show attention in a loving way and you don't think you're asking for too much that's just what you want from her is that right and he said yes that's all i want you know that's all i want and here's where the marriage counseling goes south the typical marriage counselor would turn to her and say let's talk about why you can't do that let's talk about why you can't give him what he wants he's not asking for anything unreasonable he's asking for a little bit of your time and in a normal marriage where there was no abuse that might have been a perfectly appropriate question but not when there's abuse because then it sounds like she's responsible for what he did so i said to him so what you want is perfectly reasonable there's nothing wrong with what you want but what happens to you when you don't get what you want because nobody gets what they want in marriage all the time so what happens to you how do you try to control and punish for not getting what you want and the lights began to go on for him and for her that way see nobody gets what they want all the time in marriage there is disappointment there is heartache there is hardship there is frustration in every single marriage but if i'm entitled to abuse you or i'm entitled to control you or i'm entitled to punish you when you don't give me what i want that's not a marriage problem that is a personal sin problem or if i'm entitled to cheat on you or if i'm entitled to lie to you or i'm entitled to ignore you for two months and be indifferent to you that's not a marriage problem that is a personal character issue personal sin problem that needs to be addressed and that will never be addressed through marriage counseling that's why marriage counseling doesn't work because it often tries to make it tit for tat equal and often times also when a woman finally is able to drag her husband or even a man able to drag his wife into marriage counseling usually the person who's been in this situation is so frustrated and so either depressed or angry that they're not handling themselves real smooth in the counselor's office and so it's easy for the counselor to really target them as the problem which reinforces his idea that see the counselor agrees with me you're the problem you're the crazy one you've got the issues that's why our marriage is the way it is if only you were a perfect wife if only you did it better husband i wouldn't have three affairs chronic adultery chronic addictions chronic abuse is not a marriage problem and that's why marriage counseling usually goes nowhere

Channel: Leslie Vernick

Views: 7,585

Rating: 4.92068 out of 5

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Id: 8pR38o4XpmU

Length: 5min 33sec (333 seconds)

Published: Sat Jan 02 2021