When a relationship is struggling, one of the first decisions a couple faces is what kind of help to seek. Should you find a couples therapist and meet once a week? Would a couples therapy intensive make more sense? Or is the situation serious enough that you need help quickly?
There isn’t one answer that is right for every couple.
Weekly couples therapy and intensive couples therapy are not competing treatments in which one is inherently better than the other. They are different formats, and the right choice depends upon the problems you are facing, how long they have been occurring, how urgent the situation has become, and what you have already tried.
When Weekly Couples Therapy May Be Enough
For many couples, weekly therapy is an excellent place to begin.
If the relationship is basically stable but you want to communicate better, resolve a particular disagreement, improve intimacy, navigate a life transition or prevent smaller problems from becoming larger ones, meeting with a skilled therapist once a week may provide exactly the amount of help you need.
Weekly therapy also gives couples time between sessions to practice what they are learning. They can try something different at home, see what happens, and return the following week to discuss what worked and what didn’t.
There is no reason to choose intensive therapy simply because it sounds more powerful. More therapy is not automatically better therapy.
When Weekly Therapy Becomes Difficult
The limitations of weekly therapy become more apparent when the relationship is seriously distressed.
A couple may arrive for a 50-minute appointment with several major issues competing for attention. They may spend considerable time explaining what happened since the previous session. By the time they reach the deeper issue, the appointment is almost over.
Then they go home.
Another conflict occurs. One person withdraws. Resentment builds. Something else happens, and the following week’s appointment begins with the newest crisis rather than the issue that was beginning to emerge the week before.
For couples with longstanding or complicated problems, the stop-and-start nature of weekly therapy can sometimes make it difficult to develop momentum.
What Is Different About a Couples Intensive?
A couples therapy intensive provides a larger block of uninterrupted time.
Instead of working for approximately an hour and stopping, the couple may spend several hours at a time with the therapist, sometimes over several consecutive days.
That continuity allows the therapist and couple to stay with an important issue long enough to understand it more fully. A conflict can be slowed down and examined while it is happening. An unresolved injury can be explored without watching the clock every few minutes. The couple can practice responding differently and then continue working with what emerges.
The advantage is not simply that an intensive contains more hours.
The advantage is continuity.
When I Would Consider an Intensive
I would give serious consideration to an intensive when a couple is experiencing problems such as persistent conflict that never seems to get resolved, years of accumulated resentment, severe emotional withdrawal, damaged trust, an affair or other betrayal, repeated unsuccessful attempts to repair the relationship, or growing discussion of separation or divorce.
I would also consider it when a couple has already participated in weekly counseling and understands many of their problems intellectually but continues to fall into exactly the same patterns when emotions become intense.
Another consideration is urgency. If one partner is seriously considering leaving, a couple may not feel they have six months to determine whether weekly counseling will eventually gain traction.
That doesn’t mean an intensive will necessarily save the relationship. It means the couple may benefit from having enough concentrated time to understand what has gone wrong and determine what would have to change.
What If We’ve Already Tried Couples Counseling?
This is an important distinction.
If previous counseling didn’t help, that doesn’t necessarily mean couples therapy doesn’t work for you.
Ask what actually happened.
Did you feel understood by the therapist? Did both partners participate? Did the therapy address the central problems or repeatedly get diverted into the latest argument? Did you gain useful insight without being able to turn that insight into change? Did one partner stop attending? Did the sessions simply feel too short to get anywhere?
Sometimes the issue is the therapist or therapeutic approach.
Sometimes the couple wasn’t ready.
And sometimes the weekly format itself did not provide enough time and continuity for the work that needed to be done.
Understanding why previous counseling failed is more useful than simply concluding, “Therapy doesn’t work.”
What If One Partner Wants Out?
This is where the decision becomes more complicated.
If one person desperately wants to save the marriage and the other has already decided with complete certainty to leave, intensive couples therapy may not be appropriate.
But many couples live in a less definite place.
One partner may say, “I don’t know if I can do this anymore,” or “I’m thinking about divorce,” while still agreeing to seek help.
That uncertainty matters.
Sometimes a person does not necessarily want the marriage to end; they want the pain, conflict, loneliness or hopelessness of the marriage as it currently exists to end.
A therapist should not pressure that person to stay. But the couple may benefit from understanding what brought them to this point and whether the relationship could become substantially different from what it has been.
An Intensive Is Not a Last-Minute Miracle
Couples sometimes seek intensive help because they are frightened and want someone to tell them their marriage can definitely be saved.
No responsible therapist can make that promise.
An intensive cannot erase an affair, undo years of neglect, manufacture love or make an unwilling partner recommit.
What it can provide is concentrated time to understand what has happened, address what can be addressed, and find out whether the two people can begin interacting differently.
Sometimes that leads to substantial repair. Sometimes it provides clarity about what would be required for repair. The outcome depends upon the couple, the problems they are facing, and what each person is willing to do.
Choosing Between the Two
If your relationship is fundamentally sound and you are addressing a manageable problem, I would usually begin with a good couples therapist and meet weekly.
If your problems are longstanding, highly emotional or complicated; if your relationship is deteriorating quickly; if previous weekly therapy has not produced enough change; or if separation or divorce is becoming a serious possibility, I would at least investigate whether an intensive format makes more sense.
Don’t choose based on the word retreat or intensive. Find out exactly what the program provides, who will work with you, how much actual therapy you will receive, whether the work is private or conducted in groups, and whether the therapist has substantial experience with the problems you are facing.
How I Work
At Colorado Marriage Retreats, I work privately with one couple at a time for 2–5 consecutive days, 5–6 hours a day. Couples work directly with me; there are no groups or workshops.
I am Neil Rosenthal, a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist who has been in practice since 1980. My intensive work is particularly intended for couples struggling with serious conflict, resentment, defensiveness, emotional withdrawal, damaged trust, affairs and betrayal, previous counseling that has not produced enough change, or uncertainty about whether their relationship can be repaired.
If you’re uncertain whether weekly couples therapy or an intensive would be more appropriate for your relationship, I offer a complimentary telephone consultation. I will listen to what is happening and tell you whether I think intensive work with me makes sense. If I don’t believe it does, I will tell you that as well.
Call (720) 331-5564, or send me a private message describing briefly what is happening in your relationship.
