Couple’s therapy: why is so requested

Couple’s therapy: statistics on the increase in requests and causes of the phenomenon

Couples therapy is the most requested service in the field of psychotherapy. It is difficult to provide reliable data on the percentage of couples who decide to undergo therapy, but statistics show that three out of four couples improve after a full course of therapy. In many cases, the failure of therapy is due to the fact that partners wait five to six years before making the decision to seek help, making the situation even worse.

When is couple therapy recommended?

The best time to go to therapy is when the first signs of impatience begin to appear: when you start not to understand your partner, when communication difficulties begin, and conflict management becomes difficult, it is time to seek help. Couples therapy becomes the most effective solution when it is initiated in time, i.e. when conflicts have not escalated too much. In these cases, the success rate is around 70%, although the American Association of Marriage and Family Therapists reports a different interesting fact: it would seem that 98% of couples believe that psychotherapy has succeeded in resolving many relational conflicts, and therefore represents an important turning point for relationships in crisis. But why do so many couples who were initially united in love begin to ‘falter’? And why are the requests for access to couples therapy constantly increasing? The answer to these questions lies in the normal vicissitudes of life: the relationship between two partners who love each other, and establish a relationship, can result in a balance that is difficult to sustain, especially because of the hard trials that life forces them to go through.

The stages of a relationship

The initial stages of getting to know each other are usually full of emotions, positive feelings and expectations of the other: it often happens that, although initially the two partners are close and very attracted to each other, as the relationship deepens, it becomes more solid and the overwhelming emotions of the first phase of the relationship tend to fade away. This is not a sudden process, but a gradual one: as the relationship progresses, a more objective and ‘realistic’ evaluation of the partner takes place, the two partners begin to see each other’s shortcomings and find themselves feeling disappointed by the expectations they tend to have of the other, a situation that may raise doubts about the possibility of continuing a relationship that seems different from what one imagined.

The ‘objective’ and rational knowledge that one gets of one’s partner, a natural factor dictated by time, is accompanied by the worsening of the detachment between the two, dictated by the difficult situations that life can bring. There are countless stressful situations that a couple can encounter. There are no eternally happy couples, nor couples who have never had to face a crisis: sooner or later, all the members of a romantic relationship find themselves experiencing conflicts, arguments, moments of tension and misunderstandings. Of course there are couples who know how to ‘manage’ their difficulties: in these cases, the secret lies in the ability to communicate between the two, in passion and mutual understanding, but it is wrong to believe that there are absolutely ‘perfect’ couples.

In recent years, then, due to the economic crisis that has hit many families (also because of the Coronavirus pandemic), there has been a boom in separations and divorces, but also a significant increase in requests to go to couples therapy, in an attempt to save the relationship. But who says that relationship crises must necessarily be read as something negative? If the two partners feel a certain “impatience” in the relationship, they are no longer able to communicate or they quarrel frequently, couples therapy may be the right key to solving problems and transforming difficulties into moments of restart.