At the beginning of a relationship it is easy for two people to connect with one another. We loved coming home at the end of the day and being asked:  “How was your day?” All the kisses, the hugs, the conversations, the sex, the whole nine yards felt sweeter than honey! With the passage of […]

It is often said that successful people do the things that unsuccessful people either don’t want to do, can’t do, or won’t do. I have found in all my years of doing counseling with couples, that the same axiom holds true for them: happy couples do the things that less happy or unhappy couples don’t […]

  It never hurts to revisit an old topic, one that applies to every one of us: I am referring to effective conflict management. Three or four times a week I have a couple in my office and one of them says they are afraid of conflict. When I asked them what that means, typically […]

Reducing Defensiveness There are several things that get in the way of relationship satisfaction, and I suppose it’s up for debate as to which one is the most destructive. The one I see most frequently in my office, usually on a daily basis, is defensiveness.  From what I can tell, no one is immune–we ALL […]

  Yelling at Children This is a topic that has meaning for everyone. All of us have raised our voices, probably more than once. No, I did not come from a home of screaming parents or siblings. However, I do see many families and couples who yell a lot at each other, and the short […]