In Translation: “Let me introduce you to your mate.” This is what I would like to say to my patients “on the couch” more often than not. Have you met before? I feel as if my job as their therapist is to be translator, interpreter, facilitator and teacher to two people who at times speak [...]
counseling
Healing The Coupledom: Neurobiology and Couples Therapy
Written by Jill Edelman M.S.W., L.C.S.W.The Refuge of Stories: Steve Almond, the son of therapists, author and writing workshop teacher, described in a New York Times Sunday magazine article the mushrooming popularity of today’s writing workshops, which he views as a version of the old “talk therapy”, so popular prior to the psychopharmacological and managed care revolutions in mental health. [...]
The Un-Romantic Bed
Written by Jill Edelman M.S.W., L.C.S.W.Bill Maher: If ever there were an unromantic guy, it is Bill Maher with his surgeon-like skill to slice away all artifice and get to the earthy or seamy underbelly of so much of life, political and otherwise. Recently, he made a comment about sleep which got me thinking about the unromantic aspect of sleeping [...]
Couples Counseling: A Tool For Life?
Written by Jill Edelman M.S.W., L.C.S.W.Checking In: When a couple comes in for counseling, they are motivated by a personal crisis, either within The Coupledom or one pressing on the Coupledom. Typical triggers are a particularly volatile fight, an encounter with relatives/in-laws that leads to a clash of attitudes, a financial crisis, a child’s acting-out, loss, an affair, a suspected [...]
Nailing Down The Perfect Match
Written by Jill Edelman M.S.W., L.C.S.W.Hocus Pocus: Two articles appeared in the New York Times in the last week on couple compatibility. The M.R.S. and the Ph.D. article tracks the changing attitudes towards women’s educational achievements and marriageability over the decades. The early 1900’s through the 1950’s warned that “educated women” were less likely to attract husbands and were cautioned that [...]
The Affair: A Symptom of Marriage Rot or A Rotten Spouse?
Written by Jill Edelman M.S.W., L.C.S.W.Affairs Come In Colors: Not all infidelities look alike. The red-hot mega-media adulteries are not the prototype for most unfaithful Coupledoms. The shades of color for the common household variety of betrayal are in grays, not black, white or red-hot. Yet folks on either side of the betrayal highway feel more comfortable thinking in black, [...]
50% Of Us Is Done: Marriage Over?
Written by Jill Edelman M.S.W., L.C.S.W.The Unfairness Factor: One of the more profoundly emotional experiences in couples work is watching the demise of a Coupledom when only one of the partners is “done.” The spouse who wants to keep the marriage alive is outnumbered. Yes outnumbered because it only takes 50% of the vote to emotionally dissolve the marriage. How [...]
Bully Wives? Yes, But They Don’t Know It.
Written by Jill Edelman M.S.W., L.C.S.W.Powerful Impact: Women are depicted as the “weaker sex”; have been for centuries. And in so many ways the inculcation of that notion, along with certain biological and physical realities, has successfully rendered them so, a state many of us fight each day. Yet there are times when sitting in my office, or out socializing, [...]
The Divorced Coupledom: Milestones Celebrated In Court
Written by Jill Edelman M.S.W., L.C.S.W.Back To Court: Several times a year, whether I am in session with a patient, or bumping into friends, acquaintances or former patients in the aisles of the local supermarkets, the phrase “He/She is taking me back to court,” is whispered to me in tones of distress, anger, irony or weariness. Weariness often more than anything laces [...]
The Coupledom Contract: Who Gets Thrown Under The Bus?
Written by Jill Edelman M.S.W., L.C.S.W.The Costs Of Accommodation: There are many unspoken and even unconscious clauses in most Coupledoms. They may include never confronting your partner with the reality of their tone-deaf singing or limited grace on the dance floor. Perhaps the overcooked spaghetti goes unmentioned, or the gardening attempts that are less than stellar. None of these accommodations [...]