Hollywood Couples Counseling

How Does Couples Therapy Work?

Do therapists give relationship advice?  Hopefully, the answer is no.  Online couples therapy with a trained couples therapist is an opportunity for you and your partner to engage with each other in a productive and meaningful way.  

Therapists that give advice to couples are sex therapists that will explain techniques and exercises based on their training.  Individual therapy is about talking with your therapist, and couples therapy is about talking with your partner.   

Once you get into the flow of sessions with your online couples therapist, you’ll learn to expect feeling surprised by what comes out of the session.  Not knowing what your partner will express can feel scary, but an Emotionally Focused Couples Therapist is there to support you in the experience.

Relationship Advice / Relationship Tips

If you’re googling for quick solutions to solve your entire relationship, you’ll likely get a quick answer. Unfortunately, there is no one “tip” that can save your marriage or relationship.  You deserve real answers and real solutions.

The real solution is the dreaded “couples therapist”.  Luckily, individual therapy has become normalized and we don’t think of ourselves as “bad” for participating.  Unfortunately, the same old stigma still lingers for couples; couples therapy doesn’t mean you or your partner are “bad”, it only means you and your partner need help moving forward more productively.

Here is the advice:  let your partner know you need to do therapy together the same way you would do therapy individually if you needed extra help.  Work with a trained Emotionally Focused Couples Therapist.   Setting up a session is easy and your relationship can feel better.

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What to Expect in Couples Therapy?

What to talk about in couples therapy?  How to prepare?  What not to say?  I can’t imagine how nerve-wrecking going into session can be.  It’s hard enough to talk about our feelings to a therapist in private, it makes sense it would feel harder with our partner listening. 

How to prepare what to say in couples therapy?  You can’t.  If you knew how to get the support you need from your partner, you would’ve said it by now.  Just express yourself as you normally do. 

An Emotionally Focused Couples Therapist will help you discover a deeper understanding of your experience, then help you express yourself to your partner more productively. 

How To Talk To Your Partner About Couples Therapy?

Following through on setting up a first couples therapy session with your partner can be tough.  Everyone gets there differently.  Sometimes you both don’t know what else to do and signing up together is easier.  When only one of you feels that the relationship needs guidance it can be harder.

Many times people go to individual therapy because of their relationship.  With most of those cases, unless someone is trying to break-up, participating in the couples work together would be more beneficial. 

If you feel you need more support, let your partner know.  That’s it.  You need support in your experience and you want your partner to be there.  Getting this support now would be better than letting something turn into a crisis later. 

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An Example of the Benefits of Doing Couples Counseling Online?

Picture an office session where you've created an understanding that you've spent years wishing for, and instead of enjoying the moment, you're back in the car stuck in traffic.

With TeleHealth, when the session ends, your moment doesn't have to.

Practice what works at home and keep the good going even when the session ends.

What is the Most Successful Type of Couples Therapy? 

Many new couples therapy modalities have developed over the years for couples since the 1980s. Each modality and approach try to help couples find themselves on the same page. But being “on the same page” can mean different things. Sometimes, this just means to agree on tangible things like; scheduling, housekeeping, parenting, etc.

Tangible outcomes are helpful, but are not necessarily long lasting. Gottman Method, Imago Relationship Therapy, PACT; these modalities focus on surface level interactions between partners. When there is a crisis that needs to be averted, these can be helpful toolsets.

But being “on the same page” can have deeper meaning like, having a secure bond and secure attachment in a relationship; this is what Emotionally Focused Couples Therapy can achieve. Emotionally Focused Couples Therapy is a type of couples counseling that helps partners communicate and feel more secure for long term benefits in relationships.

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How Will My Husband React To Couples Therapy with Alejandro Daniel Pina, LMFT?

“My husband and I found him quite helpful with navigating the ups and downs of the relationship prior to us getting married.“

“My husband really felt heard and has continued to use what we learned in our sessions and we both continue to grow, but truly our marriage has come around thanks to the guidance of Alejandro. He has a gift and was a gift to us.”

“Truly appreciate everything Alejandro has done for my husband and I.“

What kind of Couples Therapy works best for Interracial, Multicultural, BIPOC partners and couples?

Emotionally Focused Couples Therapy works for anyone willing to be honest with how they feel, or at least ready to learn how to talk about themselves with their partner. The reason EFT is the most inclusive form of couples therapy is because this approach only focuses on how each partner feels, and we all have emotions, whether or not we want to admit or understand them.

Understanding how a partner feels begins the couples therapy work, couples counseling is not about getting advice from the therapist. Not receiving direct advice from a therapist can seem off-putting to people of certain cultures and background. Depending on your background, you may feel more comfortable receiving direction from someone you respect, or someone that is respected in your community.

I can tell you that Emotionally Focused Couples Therapy with Feel Understood will offer some direction. Eventually, we will gain a better understanding of what needs to change in your relationship, and what will work better. But in order to figure that out, partners need to be open to being honest in how they feel, and open to learning how to articulate their feelings. The plan will be developed together, it will not be made up arbitrarily by the therapist.

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How Effective is Online Couples Counseling with Feel Understood?

“Our sessions made us better listeners and allowed us to communicate better without undermining each other's thoughts and feelings. We definitely would recommend him for couples therapy.”

“My partner and I have been going to Alejandro since August for couples counseling and it has helped our relationship and how we communicate tremendously. We are incredibly lucky we found someone so great. Highly recommended!”

“I have seen such a great improvement on how we view ourselves and each other.”

How is Feel Understood Couples Counseling Therapist Alejandro Daniel Pina, LMFT?

“Alejandro was wonderful. He was a very caring and thoughtful therapist.”

“Alejandro identifies the source of our conflicts and guides us to create new patterns of behavior. He is very intuitive and figured out the dynamics of our interactions and how to help us pretty quickly. We have had many breakthroughs in our sessions thus far.”

“I can't say enough about Alejandro. He's personable, patient, and can call the issues at hand out within minutes of listening to you which is a gift.”

“He is very serious about the subject matter yet can be very casual about his approach and delivery which makes us feel comfortable.” 

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How Does Feel Understood Couples Counseling Help Partners?

“My partner and I have been going to Alejandro since August for couples counseling and it has helped our relationship and how we communicate tremendously. We are incredibly lucky we found someone so great. Highly recommended!” 

What percentage of couples stay together after couples therapy?

Couples enter therapy at different stages in their lives. Sometimes, couples tend to try couples counseling when to much damage and time has passed, and there is too much left to try to repair. Other couples are more proactive and choose premarital couples therapy as a preventative measure before marriage or before other life changing events like; moving in together or starting a family.

It’s impossible to give one numerical percentage that describes the success rate for couples, when there are so many different situations to keep in mind.

Emotionally Focused Couples therapy with a trained couples therapist will offer the highest probability of success. EFT can support couples at every stage of their relationship because the couples therapy work is about building secure attachment and connection.

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How to Rebuild Trust?

There is no quick solution, but trust can be regained, after past hurts are repaired. That might sound vague, but there is a ton of work that has to be done, the same way you rebuild a broken wall; brick by brick.

Emotionally Focused Couples Therapy is essential at helping couples repair past hurts; it’s not just about apologizing, but truly understanding all the different layers of how a partner was effected.

After the work is done between partners to fully understand the pain caused and have a beneficial apology, then the trust can begin to be rebuilt; and that takes repetition over time. Inevitably, with enough repetition, after a thorough deep dive with a EFT-trained couples therapist, trust can be regained.

What is the Average Cost for Couples Therapy?

An average cost of couples therapy changes dramatically when considering the ultra rich. People who can afford to pay $700 for a session with television therapist, Dr. Orna Guralnik, from the show Couples Therapy are not the average American. There are couples therapists in Palo Alto that are currently charging $550 per session. These are extremely expensive and effect the average cost of couples counseling dramatically.

Keep in mind, that couples therapy is a long term commitment, where you’re expected to meet weekly. You can imagine how the session rates for the ultra rich can accumulate to huge costs per month.

When not considering the ultra rich, the average session for couples counseling is much lower, but can still be a difficult commitment on a weekly basis. Make a commitment with a couples therapist you find beneficial first, after time if you feel your rate is too high, talk with your therapist honestly to negotiate. Therapists are more willing to offer lower rates once they know you’ve made commitment to the work.

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What Makes A Good Couples Therapist?

“non-judgmental, empathetic, sharp, intelligent, knowledgeable, professional and engaged.”

“a great listener and compassionate.”

“very caring and thoughtful therapist.”

“personable, patient”

Is Feel Understood Couples Counseling with Alejandro Daniel Pina, LMFT Recommended?

“We highly recommended him to anyone who is ready to make a positive shift in their relationship or looking to improve their communication. We are grateful to have found him.“ 

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What is the No Secrets Rule in Couples Therapy?

Depending on which couples therapy modality your couples therapist utilizes, you may encounter an officially stated no secrets rule or policy. Different types of therapy sometimes has each partner talking to the couples therapist individually, this is more often the reason for having a no secrets policy, meaning that the therapist will divulge what each partner has said. Emotionally Focused Couples Therapy works with both partners in the room together, and any communication with the therapist always includes both partners at the same time.

Working separately in couples therapy is antithetical to building connection and security, which is why Emotionally Focused Therapy (EFT) never has partners working individually with their couples therapist.

Any concerns a partner has about the therapy process or scheduling should be brought to the group’s attention uniformly so that everyone can try to mend the situation together.

Is It Worth It To Go To Couples Therapy?

Couples therapy with an Emotionally Focused Couples Therapist is helpful for couples at any stage of their relationship because we’re always experiencing a dichotomy of emotion that fuels our behavior everyday.

Having a better understanding of our own emotion/behavior dichotomy and our partner’s inner world can give partners a more consistent opportunity at supporting one another.

This kind of understanding will transform a relationship for years to come, no matter what major transitions your relationship might go through.

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How Often Should A Couple Go To Couples Therapy?

At the beginning stages of Couples Therapy, it’s important for couples to meet consistently. If there is a crisis, some couples therapy modalities would recommend meeting with a therapist multiple times per week. For relationships that aren’t in crisis, meeting once a week is standard.

What’s important is not letting too much time pass between sessions. Emotional interactions between partners in therapy need to be revisited and worked through, avoiding a session, and skipping a week, can cause more damage and harm in the relationship.

Unfortunately, couples that avoid sessions are likely to be avoidant in their own relationship. The irony is that couples therapy can teach partners the benefits of not being avoidant, only if the avoidant partner doesn’t avoid the session in the first place. When both partners are avoidant, attending sessions regularly is almost impossible.

Make a commitment with your couples therapist and make a plan for how many sessions in a row you can honestly expect to participate in. At least a few consecutive sessions could be better than no sessions at all.

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Is Couples Therapy Better In Person At An Office or Online via Telehealth?

Having worked in-person pre-pandemic, I discovered that genuine benefits increase when couples invest in TeleHealth sessions from their own homes.

Imagine learning how to communicate with your partner in an office.  Guess when you'll utilize that new form of communication?​

The answer is - back in that office.

Learn a new way of being with your partner at home, where you'll practice that skillset  regularly, and imagine how much faster you'll learn how to help each other.

Does Couples Therapy for Cheating, or Couples Counseling for Infidelity Help?

At the very least, I can guarantee that couples therapy with Feel Understood will surprise you with a thorough understanding of how infidelity happened in your relationship. There are so many factors and variables that you will not have considered, and discovering a clearer picture can be a relief.

After this understanding is established, trust needs to be rebuilt; and there is no guarantee that will happen, but it absolutely can. Rebuilding trust takes repetition and effort, and time. The repair work that will happen is not just about the infidelity, couples therapy will teach you both how to have a more secure relationship that will prevent any further cheating to occur.

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Which is better: Talkspace or Betterhelp?

Thankfully, in our new era of mental health awareness more people are in Therapy. Unfortunately, more corporations, startups, and Silicon Valley entrepreneurs are interested in turning Therapy into profit. Think of BetterHelp and TalkSpace as the Uber and Lyft of mental health.

Yes, these companies can be convenient and economical for customers, but are you getting ethical treatment? These apps incentivize therapists to unethically extend the Therapeutic Relationship with clients to gain financial bonus rewards.

A therapist shouldn’t be treated like a gig economy worker. Work with a Licensed and Trained Couples Therapist who doesn’t unethically utilize a phone app to gain financial bonuses off clients.

Why Do Some Couples Prefer Doing Couples Therapy At An Office?

Couples that want to go to an office have a few misconceptions. It’s important to build a therapeutic relationship with your individual therapist, but couples therapy doesn’t exist to build a relationship with your therapist, it exists to strengthen an intimate relationship with your partner.

Telehealth and online couples therapy is still a relatively new concept, but I believe that future studies will prove that couples who participate in therapy together from their home will have a higher success than couples who venture into an office.

Most couples that have an impulse to do couples therapy in an office are avoidant. They know that online couples counseling is an option, but that feels too overwhelming for them, and they’d rather take their problems elsewhere. Ironically, being avoidant is likely their main source of conflict in their relationship in the first place.

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What is Regain Couples Therapy, the Online Platform, is Regain good?

Regain is a rebranding strategy of BetterHelp. Think of BetterHelp as the Uber of Mental Health, and Regain as UberEats. Regain is the exact same platform as BetterHelp, but redesigned to advertise toward the now booming couples therapy market.

If you know how unhappy gig-economy workers are, then you can imagine how unhappy licensed therapists are in working with BetterHelp and Regain. But the quality of a bad food delivery from a resentful driver is less harmful than the quality of mental health from an underpaid therapist who spent years to obtain their license.

What’s worse for the consumer, is that Regain only expects the therapist to utilize CBT to address couples concerns. CBT is not a couples therapy modality; there are numerous, well-researched couples therapy approaches that Regain customers will not be paying for. Approaches like Gottman Method, Imago Relationship Therapy and Emotionally Focused Couples Therapy.

Regain uses CBT because they can easily monitor minor surface level progression on paper, keeping track of arbitrary ratings on a scale that they expect customers to provide, they are not interested in providing the best couples therapy available.

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Is Our Ritual Better Than Regain?

Our Ritual is an online platform marketed to couples to compete in the new era of gig-economy therapists. Think of Our Ritual and Regain as the DoorDash and Postmates; corporations making easy money from couples going through difficult times.

Television therapist, Dr. Orna Guralnik, from the show Couples Therapy, is the face of Our Ritual; she is known to charge her clients $700 per session. Our Ritual, on the other hand, charges only a small monthly fee. Could you imagine Dr. Orna actually working happily as a therapist for the company she is promoting?

Why would a consumer knowingly want to buy a cheaper version of the real thing? Mental health, and the secure attachment and happiness of a couple’s life should not be viewed as a problem that can be solved by a generic brand.

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