Broken Bonds

SUMMARY

Infidelity comes in many forms. Different meanings may be assigned to the various forms. This article discusses not only the different forms infidelity may take, but also the larger issue in the field of couple and family therapy; the meaning frame for understanding the impact of different kinds of events, specific relationship problems, and how to deal with them. This is done through the use of emotion focused therapy and the context of adult attachment.     

The Use of Metaphors with African-American Couples

SUMMARY

There is a dearth of data in the literature on African-American couples. This omission probably reflects the assumption that interventions that are effective with one race are effective with others. This paper explores the use of metaphor as a tool for working with an underserved and neglected population. Since the African-American culture is extensive in its use of metaphor, this medium provides a fertile channel for therapeutic communication.     

Therapeutic Experiences of Lesbian Couples

Abstract

This study explores the therapeutic experience of lesbian couples who had received couples psychotherapy earlier in their relationship. It examines their feelings regarding their own levels of acceptance, disclosure of sexual orientation, and connectedness with the professional providing services using qualitative methodology. The perspectives of both members of the lesbian couple were taken into account and explored. Lesbian couples who had accepted their sexual orientation appeared to have higher levels of satisfaction in their therapeutic experience and reported having an improved sense of self. Couples who had a therapist that portrayed a positive acceptance of homosexuality, low levels of heterosexism, and knowledge of issues relevant to the lesbian community reported an experience that was conducive to growth and development thus leading to an enriched relationship.     

The Journal of Couples Therapy Entelechy Institute CEU Quiz

SUMMARY

The majority of gay male couples are not monogamous. Relationship clinicians can help gay male couples to have a healthy sexually open relationship by working from a family systems perspective. This approach requires the therapist to have an understanding of family systems theory, the Enneagram (a personality topology), gay male sexual culture, as well as being clear of negative countertransference. Assessment of functionality of sexually open gay male relationships is described.     

Assessment and Intervention with Black-White Multiracial Couples

SUMMARY

Effective therapy with Black-White multiracial couples begins with therapist work on self attitudes and with sensitive assessment of the ways racism and race may or may not be connected to a couple's problems. We suggest ways to begin to explore self attitudes and suggest basic assessment questions for work with Black-White couples. In addition, we point out important clinical issues that may come up for Black-White couples in the areas of social support/social network, parenting, and grief.     

Narcissistic Vulnerability in Marriage

Many couples who seek therapy with issues around money, work, sex or children are actually dealing at a deeper level with problems of narcissistic entitlement, vulnerability to emotional injury, or defenses that protect against perceived attacks upon a fragile self. This paper considers the concept of narcissism as it relates to marriage and family issues and suggests some important ingredients in treating a narcissistically vulnerable relationship.     

How Race Matters and Does Not Matter for White Women in Relationships with Black Men

SUMMARY

Drawing on a qualitative research study, this article provides a beginning exploration for how race both matters and does not matter in white women's relationships with black men. As a means of protecting themselves and their families from pathologizing stereotypes about interracial couples, women make claims that race does not matter. At the same time, they describe ways that stereotypes impact their self identities and their couple interactions. Different situations and relationships create shifts in racial interpretations, and contact with extended family members can change racial meanings. The article offers suggestions for how to create a therapeutic space for discussing race without over-determining its significance.     

David and Judith

SUMMARY

This paper begins with a discussion of Dialogicai Psychotherapy-that “healing through meeting” which comes when the relation between therapist and patient is central-and explores inclusion, making present, confirmation, and the “normative limitation of mutuality.” Secondly, it discusses a Dialogicai Psychotherapy particularly important for couples therapy-Ivan Bos-zormenyi-Nagy's Contextual (intergenerational family) Therapy with its emphases on multidirected partiality, trustbuilding, rejunction, and the intergeneration merit ledger. The third part of the paper applies Dialogicai and Contextual therapy to the case of David and Judith, a couple who show clearly the importance of families of origin.     

Resolving the Curious Paradox of the (A)Sexual Lesbian

SUMMARY

Lesbians' erotic lives have been bracketed by opposing sexual narratives. According to a variety of experts, sex between two women is an unnatural and unlikely event. Data from a number of other sources suggest that lesbian sex is both frequent and ecstatic. For many long term partners, these polarized narratives serve as filters, screening out a myriad of middle ground practices and scenarios. Because more subtle possibilities are invisible or discounted, couple's only alternative-after the passionate courtship phase of the relationship has ended-is lesbian bed death. In such cases, renewed erotic contact depends on the restoration of the erased sexual middle-ground. This paper focuses on the strategies clinicians can use to neutralize the hegemonic either/or lesbian sexual narratives and expand their client's erotic repertoires.     

How do humility prototypes affect the association between perceptions of spouse’s humility and depressive symptoms and couple conflict?

ABSTRACT

Relational humility (RH) is associated with positive outcomes (e.g., fewer depressive symptoms; less couple conflict). Traditional conceptualizations of RH rely on other-report measures, but do not account for how one’s perception of another’s humility relates to one’s RH prototype (i.e., one’s expectations of how humble others, such as a spouse, should be). The current study (N = 69 couples; mean age = 30.80 years; 71% white) analyzed the effect of RH prototypes on the association between participants’ perception of their spouse’s RH and their reports of depressive symptoms and couple conflict. RH prototype was tested as both a moderator and a mediator to these associations. Actor-partner independence moderation and mediation models indicated that RH prototype functions as a moderator in the association between perceived spousal RH and both depressive symptoms and couple conflict, wherein greater discrepancies between spousal RH and RH prototype was associated with more depressive symptoms and conflict.