Counseling Blog | LGBTQ+ Couples & Individuals

February 2, 2020 by Alan Zupka

How to Deal with Loneliness Around Valentine’s Day

Valentine’s day is just around the corner. For many people that means celebrating with their spouse or partner and showing them extra love and attention. But for others, Valentine’s Day is a sad reminder that they are single or are perhaps grieving the recent loss of their significant other.

If you are celebrating it alone this year, here are a few ways you can alleviate your sadness this Valentine’s Day.

Give Yourself a Break

It’s bad enough to feel lonely, but it’s even worse to scold yourself for doing so. Loneliness is not an indication that you’re doing anything wrong or that there is something wrong and unlovable about you.

Even people that are in relationships can feel incredibly lonely. Loneliness affects everyone at some point in their life. It’s not a sin to feel this way, so stop scolding yourself.

Take Yourself on a Date

How many times during the year do you make a real effort to show yourself love? If you’re like most people, you don’t really think much about how you treat yourself.

This Valentine’s Day, if you find yourself a party of one, try and make the best of it by focusing all of your love and attention on yourself. Take yourself out to a nice dinner. Or, if you don’t like the idea of sitting at a table alone surrounded by couples, then order in your favorite food and watch your favorite movie.

Take a nice long bath. Listen to your favorite band. Buy yourself a little gift on the way home from work. Use this Valentine’s Day to commit to showing yourself more love and kindness throughout the year.

Show Your Love for Others

Valentine’s Day is a holiday to show love. No one says that love must be shown in a romantic way.

This is a great time to show your affection and appreciation for the wonderful people in your life. Get your best friend a box of chocolates or your mom a bouquet of flowers. Put a card on your neighbor’s windshield and your coworker’s computer monitor.

You can be filled with love by being loved, and you can be filled with love by loving others. The more love YOU show this holiday, the more love you will feel inside. And you would be amazed at how the loneliness quickly slips away when you are full of love.

Don’t let the commercialism of the holiday make you feel alone and isolated. You really can have a lovely Valentine’s day if you love yourself and others.

January 31, 2020 by Alan Zupka

3 Ways Individual Counseling Can Help Your Marriage

Even happily married couples can hit obstacles along the way. When this happens, couples can either go it alone and try to work through their issues themselves, or they can seek the guidance of a trained and experienced marriage counselor. While some couples feel their problems should be kept private, many more are finding the value of seeking help from an impartial and nonjudgmental third party.

Here are 3 ways individual counseling can help your marriage.

Identifying Behavioral Patterns

Most of us are aware of our partner’s behaviors but unaware of our own. And, most challenges faced by spouses is the result of the patterns between them. But when you only see half (or less) of the dysfunctional patterns, the problems in the marriage can seem confusing and overwhelming.

A therapist is trained to help individuals recognize their own negative patterns and how they manifest in a relationship. The result is both partners are empowered and able to take a step back during conflicts as they occur, preventing escalation.

As a bonus, a therapist can also point out the strengths and resources they find in your relationship so you can leverage and learn how to nourish them.

Change at the Root Level

Once your therapist has helped you identify negative patterns, they can then help you understand why they are happening and assist you in changing them. Most behavioral patterns are formed and ingrained when we are very young – before we become self-aware and before we’ve met our significant others.

Understanding why your partner reacts a certain way can create empathy and help communication. Once you’ve laid this solid foundation, your therapist can give you specific adjustments that can change your relationship for the better.

Deeper Intimacy

A therapist will not only tailor changes based on your unique dynamics as a couple, they will help you practice the adjustments and encourage you to remain vigilant and consistent. The result is a deeper intimacy and a deeper understanding of each other with a renewed commitment to meet each other’s needs and desires.

While you may first feel embarrassed discussing marital problems in front of a stranger, ultimately a marriage counselor can bring you both to a more fulfilling phase of your partnership.

If you or a loved one is interested in exploring treatment, please contact me today. I would be happy to speak with you about how I may be able to help.

January 26, 2020 by Alan Zupka

When is the Right Time to Try Couple’s Counseling?

For better or worse. Those words seem easy to say at the time, but when worse gets really bad, many couples are ready to throw in the towel. That’s because they didn’t seek help in time and let things get out of hand.

The Stigma of Counseling

It can be hard to make the decision to go to couples counseling because it means you have to face your problems and admit you and your partner are on shaky ground. That can be incredibly scary to admit. It’s not dissimilar to thinking something may be wrong with your health, but you’re too scared to face the music and so you ignore the issue until it gets way too big.

Beyond having to admit you and your partner have problems, there’s also the uncomfortableness of not being familiar with therapy. It can definitely feel a bit mysterious and scary sitting down with a total stranger and sharing personal information about your relationship.

For these reasons, far too many couples let their marriage issues sit on the back burner, percolating. But the better option is to nip an issue in the bud as soon as it rears its ugly head.

To save you some confusion, here are some of the most common relationship issues that typically require some time in couples counseling.

Broken Trust

Whenever there is a major breach of trust, as in an extramarital affair, there is usually a need for couples counseling. A therapist can help you both rebuild the foundation of trust.

More Frequent Arguments

To each relationship, a little rain must fall. But when you start having frequent torrential downpours, it’s time to ask for help. An increase in fighting and intensity of fighting often means significant problems under the surface.

You’ve Experienced a Devastating Event

Life throws us events in our lives that are hard to rebound from. Whether it’s a financial loss or the loss of a loved one, as in the loss of a child, the trauma can change the way you and your partner relate to one another.

These are just a few of the reasons you and your partner should consider exploring couples counseling. It’s always better to seek help than try and go it alone.

If you are interested in treatment options, please be in touch with me. I’d be happy to discuss how I may be able to help.

January 19, 2020 by Alan Zupka

The Importance of Creating & Sharing Goals as a Couple

Many authors, from Viktor Frankl to Deepak Chopra, have discussed the importance of living a purposeful life. It is purpose that allows us to transcend ourselves and create meaningful moments. Frankl believed that a pursuit in meaning in life is far more important than the pursuit of happiness, as meaning connects us to our past, present and future.

It can also be said that purpose in a relationship is more important than happiness. Relationships that last are the ones where two people create shared meaning; where goals are set and met alongside each other. A healthy relationship involves building a life together where dreams are not only visualized but come to fruition.

While happiness is a feeling that can eventually fade, meaning and purpose are everlasting. With this in mind, here are 3 ways you and your partner can create and share goals together.

Commit to Creative Time

Couples are often encouraged to commit to a date night once a week to stay connected. While having fun together is definitely important to the relationship, it is no more important than creating together. Be sure to set time aside each week to create a shared vision and figure out how you’re going to make that vision become reality.

Be Open

During your dreaming and planning hours, it’s important that you both be open to what the other has to say. Dreaming and planning your life is not the time to put each other down for ideas or questions. Being open and non-critical will create an environment of respect and safety, and this is where magic can happen.

Share Responsibility

Once you have come up with your goal (live a sustainable lifestyle, homeschool the kids, create a home gym, etc…) and devised a plan of how you’ll get there, it’s important you BOTH see the plan all the way through to the end. Be sure to keep yourself and each other accountable and support one another. Remember, you’re on the same team – cheer each other on so you can win the gold!

In order for your marriage to thrive, it is vitally important you both commit to spending quality time together dreaming and planning, being open and respectful to what the other has to say, and share in the responsibility of seeing your dream come to fruition. If at any point during your dreaming and planning you find your communication is troubled, consider seeking the guidance of a marriage counselor who can help you reconnect and tackle any issues you may be having.