marriage counseling in Indore – FAMILY THERAPY INDIA

Everything you wanted to know about couple therapy..

December 17, 2020December 17, 2020 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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Post Infidelity Traumatic Stress Disorder

October 22, 2020October 24, 2020 Ramneek Kapoor

The revelation that her husband has been having an extramarital affair for past three years with one of his office colleagues came as a big traumatic shock to Shalini (name changed) and her two children.

She had been devastated, traumatized stressed and depressed .She felt as if someone had hit her with a big stone on her head. She felt dizzy as she could foresee a tough time ahead for her and her two children .Her heart sank. She could see her marriage of twenty years, falling apart at that instant.

Shalini and Amit (name changed ) have been married for twenty years .They have a son 11years and a daughter who had just completed her 18th birthday last week .So far they have had an acceptable level of understanding within the family, like any other middle class educated family. There have been occasional arguments and some fighting incidents between husband -wife or mother in -law and daughter in law, but none could have expected that one of them could be going astray in an age when it is often felt that marriage has withered all storms and it will be all smooth sailing from here. The kind of traumatic stress that had befallen all members of family after the revelation of extramarital affairs of the head of the family needs to be understood in the larger context here.

It has often been assumed that such an unfortunate situation affects the couple and it may not have much impact on other members of the family. But that is only a myth; in fact it leaves very deep scars on all members of the affected family.

The traumatic shock of such revelation of infidelity by (either spouse), brings about profound stress levels to all members of the family. The impact of such revelation of the infidelity perpetrated by the spouse can be as potentially and severely traumatic as the trauma brought about by a natural disaster uprooting entire family, mentally, socially, emotionally and financially. The post infidelity traumatic stress disorder unlike the other PTSD needs to be assessed on entire family as a whole and on each individual family member individually .

PITSD mentioned in the above case can be seen as it affected all members of the family, in the following manner.

The wife has lost total confidence in her and has ever since been suffering from low self esteem. She has not been able to find reasons for the infidelity brought about by her husband, around whom she had built her world of twenty years.

She often complains of somatic pains and sleeplessness. At times her memory gets affected .She forgets attending to smaller details about herself. Frequent visits to her psychiatrist /psychologist do help .Yet the gnawing pains and the thought “why” come back repeatedly. Seems she will take a long time to recover from the PITSD.

The young ones too suffer from PITSD .A sense of impending breakup of the parents’ marriage hurts them all the time. Their son not being in a position to side with any parent ,has gone into silence .He speaks in low tones and uses very few words to ask for anything needed by him This has resulted into his neglected of studies and self care. It has however brought both siblings closer to each other.

Daughter of the family doesn’t like such a situation .She believes that this could have been avoided if she had paid more attention to the family environment over the years. She has been in the process of self remorse .Any discussion in the family on the subject matter triggers her severe depression and she would start crying in no time .She believes her father has been her infallible hero and should have been more careful with his conduct. She ends up fighting with both her parents a few times a day. She refuses to listen to any reason by her father. She suffers from eating disorder and her physician has diagnosed her for IBS

Post Infidelity Traumatic Stress Disorder as such doesn’t happen to one individual .It virtually affects the complete family system. As a family therapist we have been focusing on the couple #both the spouses as a single system but in such cases it becomes obvious that the systems within the system too need as much attention and intervention/therapy as we give to the main couple.

The impact of such revelation/disclosure/finding is no less traumatic to the spouse who has been wayward and promiscuously adventurous .He feels miserable now thinking that his children know everything about him. He faces the wrath of his partner always feeling guilty. A defiance attitude was fine so long as he had been dealing with the spouse. But the reaction of both, the daughter (who’s an adult) and the adolescent son has been a little stronger to be taken lightly .Resultantly business suffers, nightmares occur and visit to family therapist occur frequently now.

Is your uncontrolled anger damaging your relationship with your spouse ?

September 28, 2020December 9, 2020 Ramneek Kapoor

Nothing else can be as fatal for the marital relationship as your anger. An uncontrolled anger is like a slow poison to the strong threads of relations between husband and wife .The uncontrolled anger virtually eats into the very roots of love,trust and respectability of both the partners .

I have observed while counseling estranged or opposing spouses that couples would often express their anger and resentment towards each other and after a while they tend to cool down when educated about their misplacement of their emotions or expectations from each other.

However heavens may help in situations where one of the spouses happen to have an uncontrolable anger . Such expression of constant complaints and anger often leads to physical abuse ,emotional accusations against each other and ultimate separation.

Anger is not so bad if used momentarily and allowed to subside and defused once it has been expressed. The message that the angry person has been upset over certain issues or acts of either spouse can be conveyed and thereafter both would do better to come to the levels of finding ways to negotiate peace and make amends .

There comes a stage when the partners need to involve a professional family therapist who can help them look at their differences or different perceptions in new light to sort out the disputes .Such intervention is arranged with a view to evolve newer and better emotional understanding amongst the couple ,even though the previous hurt still remains at the background. But the seething anger has been overcome as the partners give each other opportunities to grow their new closeness and understanding.

But many a times the harmed partner particularly wife finds it difficult to let go of the past and forgive her husband. Her anger seethes like a wild fire that knows no direction ,hovering over the relationship and destroying everything that comes in its path .Such situation finds no retrieval and the couple sooner or later ends up parting ways through legal separation,or finding it difficult to stay together peacefully.

A partner with such an uncontrolled anger often brings to the fore the mistakes of the other partner,by shaming him or her at every available opportunities,refuses to listen to any explanation by the partner and believes no compromise can be big enough to solve the problems which have arisen in their relationship.

An understanding partner can help coverup many shortcomings ,mistakes and at times blunders of the other partner unless it happens to be a complete erosion of trust and faith.But in the event of such a situation too,the partners need to sit together by letting the anger go and understand how to proceed with their relationship further or even give it a break by inflicting the minimum damage to the family and partners themselves.

It is important that both husband and wife should pay attention to their anger control and if they find that their relationship is getting affected by such frequent bursts of anger. They should consult a counseling psychologist and family therapist .A trained professional counselor and family therapist would help them with relevant anger management therapies including perceptive breathing exercises .

Family therapist during meeting with unhappy, married couple

While there are enough advisors in every social circle to guide and help the estranged or fighting couples but such unprofessional approach unknowingly out of their ignorance can ignite more anger or mistrust towards each other often leading to frequent accusations. As far as possible couples should avoid such agony aunts for their own betterment .Repeated complaints, frequent bickerings and trying to put down the partner or staging a show down for your partner just because you are angry with him or her can on the contrary take the love out of relations,resulting into the damaged partner finding solace elsewhere .No partner in the right mind who values relationship would like to be in such an embarrassing situation .Anytime you feel angry with or at your partner ,give yourself sometime to think over if the confrontation can be through anger or matters can also be discussed without losing control and being firm in your tone and body language.

,If you have such uncontrolled anger /domestic violence 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: 09179383554,917314263087

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

How effective is the marriage counseling in saving my marriage?

May 16, 2019May 16, 2019 Ramneek Kapoor

2017_1image_11_54_079681812newly-married-couple.jp-ll “I have always had a very problematic marriage and all efforts to make things right have been of no use. I have been advised by my friends to seriously think of consulting a marriage and family therapist .But every time I think of reaching out to one, “the only thought that comes to my mind is, “What if this too does not help. Let, me ask you a simple question, “does marriage counseling really work?’.

Priti (name changed) had expressed apprehensions about the process of marriage counseling when she had, asked me this question.

Experts differ on the effectiveness of marital issues in marriage and family therapy. Some of them will simply say no to any external intervention in a marriage. They are of the opinion that “marriage is sacrosanct and privacy of the bed room should stay within your bedroom. Most of them however will speak in favor of getting a professionally trained family therapist’s help. Marriage is often an adjustment of two different personalities who come together to raise a new family in their wedlock. In this journey some distance can be smooth, some part of journey could be rough too, where an external help can smoothen the edges and provide the necessary cushioning.

advice-newlywed650x325 Your life can be difficult and beautiful both at the same time. The life of the newly married couples is like a baby conceived in the womb of a mother, giving tough time to the mother all through nine months of its growth from the embryo to delivery but once the baby is born life becomes joyfully beautiful, yet bringing with it challenges everyday of raising a child. The joy of watching your baby grow always is greater than the challenges that come in the process of being a mother.

photo-1523975989600-f61068b1a4b3 Marriage offers similar such journey of smooth ride and rough road of mutual problems .The partners to a marriage love each other and at times hate each other but they continue with the journey of matrimonial bliss. Sushant and Daisy (names changed) are in one such relationship. They have had fights; yet they have been living into their marriage despite all odds for ten years. “It had never occurred to me even once that I should walk out of this marriage. I am from a conservative Christian family and Sushant belongs to a kind of liberated Hindu family. Our marriage had not been accepted by our respective families for almost five years. There were issues of social norms, of cultural differences, of devotions and faith. My mother has been a devout Christian and it was difficult for her to conceive that her daughter will not follow a religion of the family”. “Both I and Sushant had made a pact that we would always refer our matters to a third unbiased arbitrator in case of any of the differences that might crop up into our marriage. We found one such unbiased opinion and advice in Family Therapist and Marriage counselor Dr Ramneek Kapoor and all our differences get resolved to our mutual interest”.

couple therapy “I have had many cases of family differences, husband wife disputes, cohabitation problems and other adjustment issues and working through their disputes and differences can really be worth it. Most such married couples come to us when they face communication issues, marital discords and even the personal ego matters, at the breaking point of their marriages, but they are benefitted by consulting a professional family therapist and marriage counselor who help them in dealing with those difficulties, look at their disputes from a much wider point of view and different perspective. The couples are encouraged to sort out the difference, take them on to find satisfactory resolution instead of being judgmental and giving up on the relationship. They are made to work hard to eventually come to an understanding of the beneficial fruits of making their marriage a success.

download “Much of the ideas people get about their marriage counseling at times can be wrong. It is not necessarily the bed room story that is talked about in the counseling. A marital life holds many other points of discord and differences of opinions. There can be personality issues, adjusting with other members of the extended family, household issues, individual career matters, spouse behavior concerns, children growth subjects, older parental care concerns and of course faith and trust fears . Only a third party intervention may not solve these issues but a detailed worked out therapeutic strategy and planning with the help of a qualified professional Family Therapist and Marriage Counselor can definitely go a long way in resolving all such matters.

“It sounds good. It makes sense to me” said Dinesh(name changed) when he had walked into our clinic for consulting us on his broken marriage of fifteen years. “The problem is my wife feels it usually doesn’t work. We had gone to a traditional matchmaker to help us reconcile a broken marriage. Their process is not very professional”.

counseling-clipart-marriage-family-therapist-16 You really have to be careful when dealing with a delicate matter of marital compatibility and communication breakdown. It cannot be resolved merely by advice of do’s and don’ts. All matters need to be handled in a manner that the counseling given has to achieve the outcome, the couple and the family looks forward to. An untrained and non professional marriage counselor has no idea what he or she is faced with and how this needs to be analyzed and resolved.

In a complex family therapy situation counseling an estranged couple may be the hardest thing to do .It takes longer to resolve their differences and the couples are advised to be patient and cooperate with the therapist ,whose basic aim is to help the client come to agreement and understanding within them.

Surveys indicate that many of the match makers, social activists and soothe Sayers undertake family therapy and couples therapy. They do not possess the professional qualification and they never got their training into marital counseling and family therapy.

We need to understand that couples coming for family therapy and marriage counseling are mixed agenda couples. Often one or the other party will have thought of either divorce or separation. Traditional matchmakers or even normal psychologists will not prove effective in dealing such marriage counseling as they do not know the professional way to deal with those problems.

Much of the advice couples get from family advisors or traditional matchmakers sounds good to the ears but it doesn’t work in real life. When it comes to marriage counseling, one solution cannot be applied to all situations. Each marital discord will have its own unique dynamics and a professional Family Therapist and Marriage Counselor takes into account the uniqueness of each dynamic while dealing with a husband and wife disconnect.

Couples can at times become disconnected emotionally for various reasons. Their passion and excitement can wear out faster than expected out of their marriage if their fights and day to day quarrels continue. Their novelty can finish sooner as monotony creeps in into their partnership. It happened to Nidhi (name changed) who admitted in a session

images (12) “I decided to call our marriage off because I felt like I have been living with a rival roommate not a husband, after we got married his attitude and tone changed towards me. His true nature comes to the fore as he sheds the facade of pretended love.”

What can married couples do if they’re having some difficulties?

I would advice, “one person in the marriage doesn’t have to wait for the other to start working on the reconciliation .Either of the spouse could begin with positive changes in the marriage. Don’t wait for your partner to agree, you can initiate the process of contacting a trained professional Family Therapist and Marriage Counselor.Do Not say to yourself that things will improve with passage of time. That’s the wrong ideation. The key to succeeding in your marriage is to sort out the differences at your earliest. What better time to begin doing this than now. Now is the time to find the right therapist; who will help you to connect with the person you married .You do not have to wait to be lucky in love .You make it your choice to be happy in your marriage, the love will flow thereafter. Get in touch with us today, and take control of your marital bliss. Let’s make it happen.

One last advice though, as far as possible stop discussing with your friends about your marital problems. You must not break the unwritten code of privacy of your marriage. Many a times it’s fatal to talk about your marriage or your spouse to family or friends. It’s a mockery marriage’s privacy and it’s not the done thing.

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.

Tag: marriage counseling in Indore