Marriages have their ups and downs. If you have hit a rough patch and separated from your spouse or considered divorce before deciding to give the marriage another chance, you need to work on fixing your marriage. You can fix a marriage without counseling but getting help from a professional can really be beneficial.
How Can A Counselor Help You?
The main role of a marriage counselor or therapist is to act as a neutral third party to guide the discussion between you and your spouse. The counselor or therapist will teach you how to express your feelings without hurting the other spouse. If you feel that you are unable to have a calm discussion with your spouse or that you or your spouse cannot express their feelings or voice their expectations towards the marriage, you should consider getting help from a marriage counselor.
How Can You Fix A Marriage Without Counseling?
You can get back together with your spouse and agree to make things work but you should be ready to go through a few difficult patches again. You also need to have a strategy to prevent another shutdown between you and your spouse. You could for instance schedule some time to sit down with your spouse and talk about your day. If you would rather work on your marriage without the help of a counselor, you need to focus on creating a safe environment where you and your spouse can talk without fighting.
How Can You Improve Communication With Your Spouse?
Start by working on your listening skills and encourage your spouse to work on theirs. You need to be able to really listen to what your spouse is saying and to ask more questions to fully understand their feelings or their point of view. Always acknowledge what your spouse expresses and focus on finding common ground and on making compromises. Do not judge your spouse and expect them to do the same for you. You need to set some clear ground rules so you can have fruitful conversations that will not turn into fights, especially if you fell into a pattern of fighting with your spouse every time an issue comes up.
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How Can You Make Your Marriage Work Again?
You need to develop a plan of action with the help of your spouse. Identify the issues that are causing your marriage to fail and find a way to address these problems. Your plan might include changing the way you communicate with your spouse, finding new things you can do together, socializing more together or spending more time apart so that you and your spouse can work on your personal growth. You really need to have a plan of action that is tailored to your marriage and to the issues you need to deal with.
You should consider getting help from a counselor if you feel that you are not communicating with your spouse in a healthy manner or if you don’t seem to be making any progress. It is possible to save your marriage without professional help but don’t hesitate to contact a marriage friendly counselor, coach or therapist with a high success rate. if needed.
For some reason, often one spouse is more willing to seek outside help than the other. It is a popular myth that you cannot get help for your marriage unless the two of you go together. Many, many times, I have seen a marriage heal by just one spouse coming and changing the way they are interacting with one another.
Waverly Hanson
Marriage Counselor & Author
In my personal life, I have had a long successful marriage and have remarried following my husband's death. I have had three sons and helped raise a niece for three years and have seven grandchildren. I have loved spending time with them as they were growing up.
I also enjoy getting together with family and friends, ATVing in the mountains, photography, hiking, and traveling. I also enjoy reading, creating art, decorating, and serving others by volunteering.
Assisting couples in rebuilding their marriages has been so rewarding as I've had the privilege of seeing hundreds of couples reunite and get back to being positively connected to one another.
I also work with personal development and those who want to move forward by making positive improvements such as goal setting, self-care, boundaries, behavioral improvements, overcoming procrastination, conflict management, etc.