emotional wounds

power struggles

separation anxiety

trouble focusing

sibling rivalry

disruptive behavior

defiance & disrespect

When couples hit roadblocks, therapy provides a path forward. By fostering trust, understanding, and empathy, partners break free from conflict cycles and reconnect. As insight deepens, barriers fade, making space for healing and change. If your relationship is at a standstill or you're unsure how to improve or salvage the relationship, couples counseling can really help.

Emotionally Focused Therapy (EFT) helps couples identify and express underlying emotions and needs in a safe space. Sessions lead to recognizing and reshaping negative patterns, fostering emotional intimacy, trust, and security. Imago Relationship Therapy (IRT) uncovers dynamics and patterns driving conflict and disconnect. By exploring attachment styles, couples gain insight into relational patterns and learn communication and problem-solving skills to foster deep empathy, understanding, and connection.

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Explore Our Specializations

Couples Therapy

in Pleasant Hill and Alamo, CA

frequent conflicts

broken trust

growing apart

infidelity

parenting styles

resentments

intimacy

Relationships can be challenging, while also bringing immense joy, connection, and growth to life. When couples seek therapy, they are often facing obstacles that feel insurmountable. Healing begins with understanding, which is why each perspective is heard and validated. Creating an atmosphere of trust allows each partner to feel understood. Through building mutuality and empathy, couples can dismantle the barriers that have kept them stuck in cycles of conflict and disconnection. As insight into themselves and each other grows, the barriers that once seemed insurmountable begin to fade.

Emotionally Focused Therapy (EFT) helps couples identify and express their underlying emotions and needs in a safe and supportive environment. Guided conversations and exercises lead to recognizing and reshaping negative patterns, fostering emotional intimacy, trust, and security. Imago Relationship Therapy uncovers the dynamics and patterns driving conflict and disconnection. By exploring early life experiences and attachment styles, couples gain insight into relational patterns and learn communication and problem-solving skills to foster empathy, understanding, and connection.

If your relationship is at a standstill or you're unsure how to improve or salvage the relationship, couples counseling can really help.

Practice better listening and fighting fairly
Rebuild the friendship, respect, and trust
Manage a crisis such as infidelity or addiction
Identify and change unhelpful patterns
Regain your intimacy and passion
Communicate needs clearly without blame or shutdown
Feel seen, heard, and valued in the relationship
Heal from past hurts and learn how to repair after conflict
Design a shared vision for your future together

We Help With:

Harville Hendrix

we are born in relationship, we are wounded in relationship, and we can be healed in relationship

Our Preferred Evidence-Based Treatments

Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) is an empirically supported treatment that helps change distressing thought patterns that contribute to anxiety and depression. Through CBT, you'll learn to identify and challenge negative thoughts, reframe irrational beliefs, and replace them with healthier, more realistic perspectives. CBT also focuses on breaking patterns of self-doubt and worry by learning how to re-evaluate situations and adopt more constructive thinking. These tools empower you to make lasting changes in how you think and respond.
Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT) combines cognitive-behavioral techniques with mindfulness principles to help individuals manage emotions, navigate challenges, and improve relationships. It focuses on four key areas: mindfulness, distress tolerance, emotion regulation, and interpersonal effectiveness. By building these skills, DBT empowers individuals to replace destructive patterns with practical, lasting strategies that promote resilience, balance, and a greater sense of control in daily life.
TF-CBT helps by combining practical coping skills with gradual exposure to difficult memories. It starts by teaching relaxation techniques, emotional regulation, and ways to challenge unhelpful thoughts. Once a strong foundation is built, individuals slowly and safely process their trauma with the support of a therapist. This approach reduces fear and distress, strengthens personal resilience, and fosters healthier ways of thinking and relating to others.
Motivational Interviewing (MI) is a proven, client-centered approach designed to help individuals overcome ambivalence and create lasting change. It focuses on exploring personal motivations and values, guiding clients to take actionable steps toward their goals. MI is highly effective in treating issues like addiction, unhealthy behaviors, and low motivation by strengthening confidence and commitment, empowering clients to drive their own positive transformations.
Emotionally Focused Therapy (EFT) is a proven approach that that helps couples break negative cycles and strengthen emotional bonds. In therapy, partners identify patterns of conflict and learn techniques like emotional validation and replacing reactive behaviors with empathetic responses. EFT targets underlying emotional triggers, promoting healthier attachment while deepening intimacy. It’s particularly effective for couples facing disconnection, insecurity, and trust issues, leading to genuine understanding and lasting change. This therapy is effective with treating emotional withdrawal, fear of abandonment, and attachment wounds, creating stronger, more secure relationships.
EMDR helps your brain reprocess stuck memories so they no longer feel overwhelming or intense. Unprocessed experiences can trigger or worsen anxiety, shame, distress, and physiological reactions. After EMDR, difficult experiences often feel neutral, distant, or easier to manage. We use techniques like eye movements or handheld tappers to activate both sides of the brain, supporting your brain’s natural ability to heal and make sense of the distressing experiences. Sessions follow a structured 8-phase protocol to help you build resilience and process memories, while fully awake and alert. EMDR is effective for distress related to loss, illness, trauma, childhood wounds, and relationship pain.
ERP is a structured therapy that helps reduce distress from obsessive thoughts and compulsive behaviors. It involves gradual, guided exposure to feared situations or thoughts without doing the habits or rituals you usually do to feel better. This process helps decrease anxiety over time and breaks the cycle of obsessions and rituals. You remain fully present and supported throughout, learning new ways to tolerate discomfort and regain control. ERP is especially effective for OCD, skin picking, hair pulling, and related anxiety challenges. Sessions are available in person and via telehealth throughout California.