family therapist in indore – FAMILY THERAPY INDIA

Can Your Marriage Partner Be Really Your Best Friend?

August 18, 2026 Ramneek Kapoor

Expecting a spouse to be both friend and lover is a relatively new concept. Some think it’s asking for too much while there are others who strongly believe their spouse can be the best friend.

Rajshree* (name changed) is always talking about her husband’s good qualities. He is working hard for the family. He has always been a man of words, has a strong character, loyalist and trustworthy. He always shows kindness and integrity. She added “He is a loving father, loves to spend time with kids and he gives me full respect”.

But is he her best friend?

“No!” said Damini*(name changed) who is a home maker and mother of a five years old .

“I don’t have intimate relationship with my friends,” she explained. “I don’t live with my friends. And if I did, it would not have changed into marital relationship, I believe friends would not make good marital partners”.

However, there are also many youngsters who have a different viewpoint .

Rhea and Pinky*(names changed) had been classmates from their kindergarten days and grown together as good friends for a decade sitting next to each other in their classroom in school every day, sharing tiffin and other goodies. They even laughed and cried together in all those years.

Pinky had joined defence forces while Rhea pursued her career in law. They decided to get married when time came to do so .

As per Rhea , “I couldn’t think of getting hitched to somebody else because Pinky had always been my best friend”. “And who else can understand you better than your childhood friend”, says Rhea while echoing the same thoughts.

The belief that your partner should be selected from friends’ zone and will make the best spouse is the latest thought prevailing amongst the youngsters and many of them do get married to their best friends Take the case of Darsh* (name changed) who got married to Samar *(name changed) her friend from high school onward.

When this family therapist met some of these couples during the course of a therapy individually or in group, they had voiced their thoughts.

“We definitely wanted somebody who valued and supported us as a friend and not any stranger who meets us over a cup of coffee for a couple of hours and expects us to say “yes”.

However those who opposed this thought line were of the view that “getting married to the guy who has been your friend for long years would mean shifting so many equations of life . Suddenly a kind of difference of status comes in and the society expects the girl to be more respectful and an obeying kind wife to the guy”, said Ragini*(name changed) who had been married to the guy from the college but who had not been her friend.

It’s quite apparent that there are things we want from our friendship and there are some others or additional needs and expectations that we look for in a marital relationship.

But is it unreasonable to expect your husband to be your best friend, or is it the highest form of marital bliss.

The Change of Roles from Friends to Marriage Partners

While staying friends is fine but converting this to marriage does not mean it will stay as it was prior to marriage. It is important that we understand the roles as a couple that we need to play as members of family that would call for a bigger level of responsibilities in addition to a greater level of empathy, understandings and patience towards other members of family.

The couple, who began knowing each other in kindergarten, have been leading their lives separately as they grew up but the time spent away from each other made them realise how much they had wanted to be with each other.

Historically, we have had all kinds of marriages, the arranged ones and the marriages of lovers and friends with the majority tilting towards arranged ones with strangers .

But a relatively new age coming together of boys and girls into their careers, professions and even online friendships have brought a new awakening to the romantic relationships.

The couples now definitely are more career oriented and want their spouses to be of the same mindset where they can support and stand by each other in the progression of life. Indeed, a novel thought.

The roles have been changing for over a decade and a half now where the provider who used to be man earlier can be either one of the partners or a sharing responsibility prevails , sharing of money ,sharing of responsibility , sharing of taking care of kids and sharing of taking care of parents on both sides .

Indeed a new dawn of romantic relationship for some ,while some couples prefer to go old ways yet there are some who still struggle to find fulfilment of their expectations from marriage.

Setting up of realistic expectations on either side can help such people whether marrying a friend or other person who can be made a spouse first and a friend later .We all want our marriage to work for both and make life smoother (or Anand Ashram ) as I often call it and tell the couples visiting us, “A marriage is a two way partnership where both partners contribute equally ,sometimes the balance can tilt either way but ultimately a good balance can be achieved by respect ,love, empathy ,understanding, sharing ,trusting and being compassionate towards self and towards your partner”. One must ensure that you don’t expect everything one sided , a two way communication and two way sharing is what makes a good relationship grow.

Every relationship comes with loads of expectations of the couple and others of their respective families. It is not possible to get every dream, every fantasy and everything you’d wanted out of this relationship.

Not putting on the loads of expectations from either partner and sharing of responsibilities, being there for each other always and at all times may not be sometimes possible for a couple who’s into familial commitments too.

Adopting some, adapting a number of them and giving up a few of your preconceived ideas and looking at your partners, similar situation would always be helpful for the two of you to make it a smooth and enjoyable journey towards marital bliss. In a blissful marital relationship love may not always be visible. Likes and dislikes can change from time to time, demands can be made or met but what triumphs is your commitment and loyalty towards each other.

*All names have been changed and no real names have been used in order to maintain privacy of the people*

Everything you wanted to know about couple therapy..

June 16, 2026June 16, 2026 Ramneek Kapoor

Family therapist during meeting with a couple

In a country where approaching a psychiatrist/psychologist brings with it all kinds of taboos, fears and the unknown stigmas, reaching out to a family therapist by a couple simply can be a big uphill task. Most often the couple would prefer suffering in silence in their day to day disagreement and dispute rather than approach a professional family therapist. Approaching a therapist is often looked at as a step to lodging complaint against the partner. Couples shy off from reaching for the professional help because they do not want to disclose the problems they are having in their marriage to the family for one simple reason,”What would the people say “.

Let’s understand when do you need to approach a therapist and what process would couple therapy involve.

When you feel your communication with the spouse ends up into irritation and leads to the stomping of feet and rushing out of even a normal discussion quite regularly, the time to reflect is now.

When you feel your love has vanished and your acceptance of each other has been going down day by day, you need to be in touch with a family counselor.

When you carry strong resentment towards your partner on any account ,you should know,it is time to explore a session with a good family therapist.

When you feel you or your spouse has been losing interest in all kinds of spousal activities ,it is time to get a professional help to explore, understand, reflect and reconcile the challenges to your marriage .

Professional help can be available from an approved professionally qualified family therapist and not the usual agony aunts writing columns or providing readymade prescription to all problems.A good qualified professional family therapist necessarily should hold recognised postgraduate qualifications in family therapy in addition to a post graduate degree in psychology. The therapist should have a good standing in dealing with family therapy and counseling.

When you decide to eventually consult such a therapist you can be assured of total privacy and confidentiality of any discussion with the therapist.The professional code of privacy and confidentiality is absolutely sacrosanct for every therapist ,belying the fears “,What will people say”.

Let us now understand ,what would the therapy involve.

Usually the first session begins with the introductory process wherein the therapist is keen to understand as to what kind of issues,problems and disputes have been occurring in your family life and /or marriage.

The session involves knowing about your family history, the systems and the units of inner family circles within the family ,the communication system in your family and the power systems of the family.

The therapist is keen to understand the reasons for your contacting him/her i.e. the problems you are facing as a couple.How long has the problem been occurring and whether you have been consulting any other counselor earlier,if so what has been the impact of such counseling.

The therapist in this session evaluates the relationship the couple shares only on peripheral level as the depth of understanding and the misunderstanding would be assessed only in subsequent sessions and that too with a complete unbiased mind .It is not the task of the therapist to judge you,nor does the therapist acts as a complaint centre. The major task of the therapist is to understand the underlying emotional upheaval prevailing within the relationship of couple ,or amongst all other members of the family .

Though the families of the spouses or / and the spouses obviously look towards the family therapist as the complaint lodging centre ,but that definitely is an absolute misunderstanding of the process of family counseling .The therapist lends an unbiased ear and attention to every dispute,difference of opinion and misplaced emotions. The therapist is not a judge but a facilitator for bringing about better understanding of the misplaced emotions and feelings amongst the family members . It generally happens that the therapist is looked at as the mediator of the disputes by the family members,but mediation definitely has never been the scope of any family or couple counseling.

The therapist would also try to learn from you ,your career graph if working or in own business,the money position,the spending habits,financial interests if any and of course about the extended family members’ financial interests if any in connection with your finances.

Then again sometimes either of the spouses who has contacted the therapist,expects by default that the therapist would align with her or him ,but a true professional therapist approaches the counseling without any kind of preset mindset.The main task of the family therapist is to understand the tensions ,stresses and hindrances prevailing within the marital /family relationships and evolve better perception of the problems prevailing between the marital partners and other family members.

The couple issues could relate to any of the following:

Relationship of either spouse with in laws and other family members.
Household responsibility and commitments of members in honouring their responsibility.

Daily chores and spousal attitude towards sharing the chores.

Relationship of the spouses within and outside marital boundaries .

Marital compatibility of thoughts and emotions.
Sexual adjustments and acceptance.
Sexual orientation and attitudes towards partners.

Parenting plans ,children and parenting issues.

Communication pattern between the couple and the problems being faced in the communication.

Setting up priorities for the marriage and providing needed priority,time and space to each other in the marriage.

Modern couples also look for personal space in marriage as otherwise the relationship often gets suffocated with too much closeness .

Having understood all that has been delineated above, the therapist has to understand personalities of both the spouses ,the acceptance level or non acceptance levels of each others habits ,attitudes,opinions and daily functioning.

In fact a good therapist will help the couple evolve a new outlook and perception of their respective relationship provided ,the partners have the patience to continue with the sessions conducted over a long period of time varying from three to six months .the session may be conducted once or twice a week depending on the convenience and availability of both the spouses.

Though initially every session appears to be an exercise in raising grievances by the couple against each the other . The therapist’s intervention helps the partners read positive and negative cues of each others emotions in the right perspective and the couple soon moves from the warring zone to the negotiation levels. The negotiation is often done by the aggrieved partner to secure future as assurances and promises .The understanding levels though still remain far fetched and many more sessions will be needed to gradually establish a trusting common bond ,wherein an acceptance of each other is re-established amongst the family.

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Does Emotional Abuse Drive You Crazy?

September 4, 2019April 18, 2026 Ramneek Kapoor

“I have not been able to find out till date, how he can twist me around his fingers like a puppet and how I give in so easily to all his demands .It is only much later I would realize that I have been made a succor. He played with my emotions”, said Tina. Emotional abuse even though is visible and disturbing yet the victim finds it difficult to ask the perpetrator to stop and leave the victim alone. We all know that the abuse is real and we are being abused but we find it extremely difficult to come out of it. Abusive relationship is in true sense a violence of the soul and mind. Unlike physical abuse it does not hurt on the physical body parts. It hurts in such a way that the bruises and the blood don’t come to the fore yet it shreds the mind, emotions and the self respects to many uncollectible bits, leaving the victim broken in body mind and soul . Its impact can be every time more killing than the actual bullet is fired by someone. The abusive behavior is often directed at a weaker personality irrespective of the status, gender or creed or relationship.

argu cpl The abusive behavior in marital relationship is often made a tool by either partner to control the other partner’s mind and soul. The advantages sought by the perpetrator could be to gain control over the victim for financial, emotional, psychological, social or simply sadistic pleasure. Emotional abuse is a form of domestic violence, and it can have devastating effects on the physical, emotional and mental health of the victim more so if the victim is a housewife, as she feels threatened of losing her matrimony.

The first thing you need to understand is that emotional abuse is not so easily recognized by others as the one who indulges into it is always fully well prepared to go on the offensive, should the victim seek any outside help or interference. The others would be made to believe that you are creating difficult situation by your emotional weak mind. They are made to understand that you could be unnecessarily reacting to the situations which you are finding difficult to handle. You could be rather called the one initiating it. The abuser poses to be the victim here. Then again no law of the land looks at emotional abuse as a crime. You do not have any valid proof against the abuser as it is always done in such a manner that none other can come to know of it except the victim. At the basic level all forms of emotional abuse is an act of coercion, intimidation and suppression.
emotional abuse 4 The victim of emotional abuse is often tortured so much that he or she begins to blame self for provoking the perpetrator. The victims are made to believe that they deserve the treatment that is being met to them. In the victim’s perception the villain deserves sympathy. In this manner the abuser becomes the person being sympathized with piety and kind attitude.

Over a period the victim starts thinking: I am definitely sick of my mind and psyche to have caused distress to the one who sympathized with me so much. One could never be more incorrect than this misconception. Such misperception can make one think that one is definitely suffering from psychotic issues and the thought itself can give severe depression.
How can one know one is being subjected to emotional abuse?

emotional abuse 2 It is not necessary that only intimate and romantic relationship can bring about emotional abuse. The emotional abuse can happen between the mother-son or daughter, parent and the child, or vice versa, between the co-workers, between the friends, amongst the official relations or even casual acquaintances. But often the position wielding stronger power would indulge into such an abuse making use of the power inherent in the opposition.

Gender does discriminate when it comes to emotional abuse. Women tend to be more vulnerable than men to emotional exploitation by their men folk.

The ways the perpetrators make use of Emotional Abuse.

There are several ways by which emotional abuse can take place in relationships. Actually abusers may adopt multiple tortuous tools against the weak victims, to control their minds.

Threats

cpl fgt Threatening to either break the relationship, of leaving the person alone or even threatening to harm physically the victim or self ,defaming or spoiling reputation amongst the friends and family, of taking the kids away are some of the ways . Entire plan of the villain is to play vicious and manipulative mind games to create mental fear, awe and terror and kill the independent thinking of the victim.

Regular Fault Finding and Negation of Contribution

crop-hand-pointing-at-upset-girl_23-2147798382 Regular Fault finding, pointing out shortcomings and negation of the person’s any and every act would upset even the most brave and positive person. The constant denial of any appreciation and consideration is a terrible abuse causing low self esteem and feelings of failure in the mind of the victim. Critical words turn into put-downs, which are not productive, it’s abusive. When someone is constantly putting you down or questioning your decisions, there’s a malicious motive behind their behavior.

This chronic shaming wears down the victim’s respectability ,self confidence, decision making ability, conative skills , reducing him or her to a mere moot spectator to the life and happenings around them. Criticism is often in the garb of taunts, challenges and ridicules to ensure the victim does not react and further gets drowned into the abyss of self insult and pity. For example a person may not be referred to as self respecting person but one who expects others to bow before him or her just because he /she thinks very highly of herself/himself.

Not respecting and responding to opinions and suggestions.

emotional abuse 3 The abuser will have scant regards for victim’s any and every thought, suggestions opinions and would always use statements like,” you don’t know anything and hence don’t talk. A regular flow of fault finding, opposing and blocking, continues. The result of repeatedly having your opinions shot down or being told to shut up or that your thoughts don’t matter is that you stop standing up for yourself. You stop vocalizing your opinions. Ultimately no interaction can exist without open communication and the relationship breaks down.

Such an aggressive abuse can be quite negative. It can be as cruel as the abuser telling you that you are useless, time and again thus killing your sense of self worth completely.

Making one feel unwanted

A relationship evolves and flourishes when one person makes the other feel wanted and reciprocity is maintained. This is golden rule to sustain all successful relationships, be it parent-child relationships, lover- beloved relationships and or husband -wife relationships, and even siblings. When the child is accused, abused punished for no fault of the child, the entire sense of self esteem in the child’s mind suffers. The child feels insulted, demeaned, and feels threatened of being abandoned. Such a behavior by the parent, guardian causes emotional, psychological and mental damage to the child, cause extreme mental harm. This also occurs in intimate relationships in which the abuser continues to stay but repeatedly calls the victim names and makes character assassination or other such social personal insults to show that they have no respect for them. In any such relationship, the result is that the victim feels like no one else would want them either and that they are themselves responsible for such a grim situation.

Isolating the victim

The abuser makes sure that the victim is kept apart from friends or other family members .This is another form of emotional abuse. A child or partner may not be allowed to interact with friends. An elderly parent may be denied visits to and from family and friends. Without other healthy relationships, the victim becomes more and more dependent upon the abuser to fulfill his or her needs.This is unhealthy and destructive to their lives.

Partners or parents may keep the victim from getting a job, meaning they don’t form relationships with peers and they have no financial independence. Ultimately, losing the abuser would mean losing everything, even if the victim sees that the relationship is not.

Shifting the blame:

main-qimg-fb5d01aa8cb68a295113832883654288 Passing the onus of doing everything and anything wrong on to the victim is one more of emotional abuse. Emotional blaming is a severe form of mental torture that results into emotional abuse. making the victim feel responsible for the acts , behavior not committed by him or her in another form of abuse, whether physical, sexual, or emotional. The perpetrator will make the victim assume or aver specifically that things that happened are his or her doing. Such acts behavior often takes place in privacy and hence none is in a position otherwise to refute the claim made.

How do I stop it?

The only way to stop such emotional abuse is to raise your voice against the abuse even when the others initially may not understand why you have complaints against such a nice person (remember the perpetrator will be always on the right side with others that matter) in the relationship.

Seeking a Family therapist

couple therapy Reaching out and seeking a professional advice is away helpful. It is not necessary that your partner will agree but mere discussion with a professional family Therapy counselor will be empowering to identify your issues. Such professional counseling reaching out for help can show you a way ahead to deal with the emotional abuse.

Refusing to bow down to the tricks of the abuser and putting your foot down for such emotional abuse with firmness and finality will help. If it doesn’t, at least it will make the abuser clear that the games played by her or him have been seen through and exposed.

If you have such an abusive situation You should come to us at Family Therapy India and we will help you resolve all issues of your marriage in more amicable manner .Find us @ http://www.familytherapyindia.com.

Email us @mansikpramarsh@gmail.com

Call: 09179383554,917324263087

–Ramneek Kapoor – Family Therapist, Psychologist Counselor and Science of Living Expert.

Energising your Relationships

March 14, 2019March 14, 2019 Ramneek Kapoor

I love to go to a garden nearby to look at the plants growing and to savor their fragrant breeze full of oxygen and greens. And let me tell you I do love to speak to the plants in the morning as they open up their lovely flowers to the rising Sun and rebuild their energy which they gather from the sunlight .At home we do not have a lawn where we could grow these plants (we live in an apartment) . But on the top of the building where we have managed to rent a terrace we do have a few pots with plants. These plants have very tenderly been reared by my daughter with great care and love. I have seen the fresh flowers of white, red and yellow colors bloom to the plants virtually growing from little buds to the full blown beautiful flowers. Whenever I go the terrace I water them, talk to them and make sure they feel loved and taken care of by me and feel happy about this. I feel my conversing with my plants exactly is the reason these plants have grown from tiny saplings to the full grown plants adorning their smile into these flowers.
Similar to these little saplings and plants all kinds of relationships need constant communication, love, tender care, nurturing and sunshine of trust and admiration. If any of the same is missing our relationships tend to get withered away just as all those seedlings died which had not been attended to by me.
We would often take our relationships for granted once we have formed them. We allow the novelty and the freshness of each other’s company wear of, thinking, “now that we have each other where the hell can the person go”. It is easy to do that as you get busy with the daily grinds of life. But like the delicate plants that were given extra care by me to grow, each relationship too needs to be handled with full involvement and care.
In a relationship or in a friendship, we need to regularly spread the showers of mutual understanding, of admiration the nurture and love. Not all relationships may require you to go out of your way to attend to them. A periodic touch of getting to know about each person as to how he or she is living life ensures we do not feel cut off and likewise the other person too feels in touch. In the current age of internet and social media though people are always available online, yet the lack of personal touch and physical presence of good listeners is felt by one and all. People living under the same roof and sleeping in the common bedroom become strangers as they remain occupied in their own virtual world of WhatsApp.Facebook,instagram,twitter and other online social media apps.
I have many a times met such husbands and wives who do not have either time or an empathetic ear for each other to give at least a hearing to the partners when they need to talk. Being there with an empathetic attitude and listening with patience to the other’s point of view can go a long way in solving many compatibility issues the couples face in their marital life.
I am currently meeting and counseling quite a few numbers of families, where all family members have agreed to spend at least two evenings in a week on working days and every alternate weekend in a month together on family outing or family dinner and they have shown wonderful results in their understanding of each other. The faces of the family members more especially the younger members beam smiles as big as the rose in the picture above after they find their parents spending a quality time with them in such a positive manner.

fam din
Just as we need to take care of the plants, saplings and flowers an protect them from all kinds of weeds, strong winds, too much of sunshine, the same way we need to tend to the relationship by giving our empathetic, loving , and understanding physical presence and listening ears to all family members.

-Ramneek Kapoor – Family Therapist, Psychologist Counselor and Science of Living Expert.

Family will survive all storms with a little patience and perseverance

What should you do if your marriage partner is having an affair ?

February 11, 2019February 11, 2019 Ramneek Kapoor

51372915-happy-couple-in-love-dating

Every marital relationship is based on mutual trust and understanding. If ever such a question as mentioned in the headline above arises, your immediate response obviously would be, “I would definitely divorce him/her”, and that being an overstatement, you might get agitated and say, “I shall confront him/her and then ask him either to leave the person or leave me”. It is obvious we cannot tolerate cheating of any kind in our life more so if it comes from a marital partner. Hence the response from many without second thought would be, “I will kick him/her out “.

But what will be your reaction, if I ask you to reconcile with your partner in spite of all the betrayal inflicted.

Some of you will say,”He is talking out of his hat,” but trust me there are many others who would want to reconcile despite being betrayed. They’re willing to forgive and believe they can mend the marriage and bring around their partner to see the reason and come back to the marital fold.

It is true that most of us just cannot accept the idea of forgiving a cheating spouse, but you never know how you’ll react to that situation until it happens to you,

pensive woman

It becomes an altogether a different story when you’re faced with the decision of ending a marital relationship and the consequences thereafter you have actually ended many years long held marriage . You have spent a good part of your life setting up the marital home and then all of a sudden the fairy tale dream turns into a nightmare. It can really be shattering for both partners involved and more so I’d say if you have had kids in this marriage.

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Some of the things that could affect the decision making to either hold on to marriage or move out of the relationship could be —living life without a father for the kids, living life without the kids, living life with lesser money, moving into parental home or moving into a smaller house, a different or lower standard of living, the possibility of looking for a new marriage partner again, and the prospects of your accepting the new life/new partner in your life. In totality it involves tearing up your years of brick by brick built home. Yes cheating is definitely unacceptable as it has undermined your value as a marriage partner and more so as a self respecting individual. But for many people it can be worth it to try to reconcile and rebuild from there. The decision to divorce is a punishment at both ends. It punishes the perpetrator and the victim both ie., The partner who has cheated gets that nightmare too.

sad woman 2

If you have already made up your mind and you are in the process of divorce proceedings, we will advise you to at least give it a good second thought and pay attention to the possibility of reconciliation through the family counseling. If you decide to save your marriage and reconcile your marital relationship, you may want to follow some of the following important steps: advice:

-Do not just spy on your spouse: just expression of doubts can trigger distrust in marriage and if you have asked someone to follow your partner this spells into total betrayal. You have to learn to be a leader of your marriage and not a follower. Your integrity is the key word to your being the leader in your marriage.

-Just hang on to your marriage. The affair your spouse has been indulging into could be a passing fad and may end soon. It had been observed that most of post marriage affairs end up in 9 to 12 months time. Though you do not want to live this torture for so long but it could be worth it to save your marriage for your children.

-Your kindness can become the key factor. You do not have to treat your spouse with disdain, hatred or anger. You can be more accepting, more accessing, more sympathetic and more tolerant towards your spouse during this period. The kind attitude shown by you will bring about a feeling of guilt, repentance sooner than later and act on the conscious of your spouse.

-Use your seductive charms to your advantages.Do Not just grieve over what has happened and neglect yourself. On the contrary now is the time to use your seductive powers and your sexualities to charm the person like the proverbial music played by a snake charmer. Do not withdraw yourself into a shell; rather be more outgoing and more inviting to your spouse.

graphic_couple

Soon you will notice the competition dying down and the vagrant partner returning back to marital fold. Even if it doesn’t happen soon do not give up, extend the rope a little more by your killing charms and soon the effect will take place.

Once the victory is yours, do not celebrate with a war cry. Maintain your dignity self respect and do not have a showdown with your spouse.You don’t want a spouse back with a dented confidence.Act natural and let the spouse gradually become so over a period of time.