High Conflict Couples Therapy
What if repair didn’t feel out of reach?
Working With High-Conflict Couples
I specialize in working with couples who feel like they’re barely hanging on.
Maybe everything feels like a fight.
Maybe you’re stuck in a loop of yelling, stonewalling, chasing, blaming, or silence.
Maybe someone’s already halfway out the door.
This is the part of the relationship where most people start to wonder:
Are we too far gone? Are we just toxic?
But what I see is something different.
High conflict doesn’t usually mean there’s no love.
It usually means there’s too much pain—and no safe way to talk about it.
Underneath the fighting, there’s often heartbreak that’s never been named.
Stories about being unwanted. Rejected. Not good enough. Like nothing you do will ever be right.
I help couples get out of survival mode and into something more honest.
Not by forcing apologies or handing out blame, but by helping each partner see what they’re really fighting for—
and what they’re terrified of losing.
I’m not afraid of strong emotions, old wounds, or sharp defenses.
I know what it’s like when everything feels like too much.
And I know how to help you find the way back to each other—without losing yourself.
When Conflict Starts Running the Relationship
High-conflict couples usually aren’t arguing about one issue. They’re caught in a pattern: A small moment triggers hurt. One partner pushes for engagement or explanation. The other becomes defensive or shuts down. The more one partner pushes, the more the other retreats. Soon the conversation stops being about the original issue. It becomes about being heard, respected, or safe.
Over time, this pattern can make partners feel like they’re on opposite teams instead of the same one. Even simple conversations start to feel risky because both people expect the interaction to escalate.
High-conflict couples therapy focuses on slowing this pattern down and helping partners understand what’s actually happening underneath the reactions.
For many couples, that work begins in weekly sessions. But when the pattern feels intense, repetitive, or close to breaking the relationship apart, a different format can sometimes be more effective.
When High-Conflict Couples Need More Than Weekly Therapy
For some couples, weekly therapy works well. It creates space to slow things down and begin understanding the patterns driving conflict. But high-conflict relationships often move faster than that. Arguments escalate quickly. Hurt accumulates between sessions. Conversations that start in therapy can unravel again at home before there’s time to fully process what happened. In those cases, couples sometimes benefit from a more concentrated format.
Couples therapy intensives provide extended time — often several hours or multiple days — to slow the conflict cycle down and examine it more carefully. Instead of stopping just as a difficult moment begins to surface, the work can continue long enough for both partners to understand what’s happening underneath the reactions.
For couples who feel stuck in constant escalation or on the brink of separation, this focused format often creates clarity more quickly than traditional weekly sessions.
You can learn more about how intensives work and whether they might be a good fit here:
Is it too late for therapy if we’re already talking about breaking up?
No. It’s not too late. But we have to work differently.
When a couple comes in already considering separation, I treat the relationship like it’s in the ICU. That means we slow things down, strip away the noise, and get honest—fast.
Sometimes you’re here to fight for the relationship.
Sometimes you’re here to figure out if it can be saved.
Sometimes you're just here because it’s the only next right step that makes sense.
My job isn’t to convince you to stay or go. It’s to help you understand what’s really happening between you.
Why I Use EFT (Emotionally Focused Therapy)
When couples are in distress, they don’t just fight about chores or text messages or who said what.
They’re fighting for connection—usually in ways that make connection harder to reach.
Emotionally Focused Therapy (EFT) helps couples understand the cycle they’re stuck in—what happens under the surface when one person gets louder and the other pulls away, when anger masks fear, or when silence is mistaken for not caring.
EFT doesn’t just teach couple communication therapy.
It helps you feel safer with each other.
And when people feel safe, they soften. They listen. They risk being honest again.
That’s why EFT works—especially in high-conflict relationships. It’s not about behavior management.
It’s about helping you see the pain and protection underneath the pattern—and learning how to reach for each other in a new way.
High conflict couples therapy is structured, it’s research-backed, and it works even when couples feel like they’ve tried everything else.
This topic is also available as a conference talk or retreat workshop.
