Our Rotherham team offers couples therapy for depression. It helps people suffering from depression by using the relationship as a resource to help support the individual and their partner.
It’s an ‘evidence-based’ therapy, which means research has shown that this kind of therapy works. There are other types of talking therapies that can help individuals suffering from anxiety and depression; however, this focuses on the relationship in the context of depression.
Depression and its effect on relationships
People who are depressed often find their relationships suffer. Sometimes, problems in the relationship can lead to a partner becoming depressed or anxious. Couples therapy for depression deals with both the depression and the relationship distress.
Why consider couples therapy?
People might benefit from couples therapy for many different reasons. It may be that the relationship has broken down or that there is anxiety that it might. Sustaining a fulfilling and stable relationship is never easy.
Pressures from work, money, children, family tensions and ill health can all contribute to creating problems which can lead to depression and other difficulties for one or both partners.
Sometimes couples can’t talk to each other, and meeting with a couples therapist can open the way to better communication, which is a key part of a relationship.
Our Rotherham counsellors aim to help you to achieve the following through couples therapy:
- recovery from depression
- better communication and ability to work together
- greater awareness of each of your needs
- greater understanding of your partner and yourself, and of the differences between you
- a better sense of closeness between the two of you
- being less stuck in repeating patterns in your relationships
- help with feelings of anxiety and stress in facing the challenges of your relationship and family life
- help with coming to terms with life changes such as the arrival of children, bereavement or separation
- a more stable family life
- greater confidence about the future
- an improved sexual relationship if this is needed.
How does it work?
Couples therapy helps those who are suffering from depression by reducing the kinds of things that make partners feel alone and distressed, or which push partners apart and make them feel angry with each other.
It improves your relationship by helping you both work together on the things that create unhappiness and to move on from hostile patterns of interaction. It helps you to understand each other at an emotional level as well as a practical one (how you feel and what you do). It gives you skills as well as understanding.
This can lead to a happier and more fulfilling relationship in which differences between you are not so problematic. This relieves depression which in turn improves your relationship. This positive cycle improves mood and emotional wellbeing.