Considering Divorce? Read This First.
The choice of whether or not to divorce is one of the biggest decisions most people will make in their lives. Most people take this very seriously, and want to know that they have exhausted their options before choosing a path, knowing that either the choice to stay or leave can have a significant impact on children, finances, and life satisfaction. If you’re thinking about divorce, we at CTC highly recommend that you consider Discernment Counseling first.
What is Discernment Counseling?
Make your decision with confidence.
Discernment Counseling is a protocol developed by William Doherty, PhD, to help couples on the brink of divorce make better decisions about the future of their relationship. It was inspired in part by research that indicated that many people involved in the divorce process still had ambivalence about whether they actually wanted a divorce (including those that had initiated the divorce!). Doherty and his team of researchers wanted to develop a process that helped people making this decision have a greater sense of clarity and confidence about the direction of their relationship, based on a deeper understanding of the problems of their marriage, and their own contributions to these problems.
Discernment Counseling is not Couples Therapy
The goal of couples therapy is to improve a relationship or a marriage. For many people considering divorce, the prospect of entering couples therapy is not appealing - they don’t want to be disingenuous, or they feel that the relationship is too far gone to be helped by couples therapy. However, they may still feel that they need some kind of help to get clarity about the next steps, or to truly feel clear about their decision to divorce. The field of couples therapy has historically not had a lot of options for people in this situation - not clear on divorce but not ready to be a full participant in marriage counseling. This is the gap that Doherty and his colleagues sought to fill - a protocol to support people in their discernment process about the future of their marriage, that didn’t require them to be all-in for couples therapy, but didn’t leave them alone in their decision-making process.
Isn’t Individual Therapy Where You Should Process Ambivalence?
While individual therapy can certainly be helpful in a person’s decision-making process about their relationship, it has some obvious limitations. For one, your therapist only gets your side of the story. They may not have all the information they need to effectively help you see your own contributions to the problems of your relationship, and therefore have a limited ability to help you see the ways you could improve the relationship. A discernment counselor has the benefit of working with both you and your spouse to get a fuller picture of the relationship. They can use this to challenge both you and your spouse to see the bigger picture and the relational patterns fueling disconnection, but in a context of mostly one-on-one work in which you are not asked to be vulnerable with each other in the same way as you would in couples therapy.
Discernment Counseling is Low Commitment
Discernment counseling only requires you to commit to one session at a time. In each session, you will decide whether you want to do another session. Most people find the space helpful and end up doing multiple sessions. However, you won’t do Discernment Counseling forever! It is meant to be a maximum of five sessions, in which time you will hopefully have developed clarity about whether divorce is right for you, you want to stay the course in your relationship as it is, or whether you are ready to commit to couples therapy.
Feel Confident About Your Decision.
The initial research is promising that whatever people who do Discernment Counseling ultimately decide to do, they feel more at peace with their decision and feel better about their process. Divorces tend to be less conflictual, and couples that enter couples therapy do so with a clearer commitment and more likely to be successful.
Get help today.
Colorado Therapy Collective has a team of experienced couples therapists trained in Discernment Counseling. Reach out today for a free, no-pressure consultation to see whether Discernment Counseling is right for you and your spouse,