How a Couple Counsellor Thinks – Integrated Systemic/Psychodynamic Framework

This is a blog post about how a couple counsellor uses an integrated systemic (holistic systems thinking, circular causality (circular questioning), context, strengths and support, etc.) and psychodynamic (unconscious processes, defences, past/childhood experiences) theoretical framework. An integrated framework assists the couple counsellor in comprehending and forming hypotheses about the couple’s deteriorating relationship in order to assist them in developing their own understanding and resolution.

A Systemic / Psychodynamic Framework for Couples

How does a Couple Counsellor Think when he’s meeting with a relationship in therapy?

ℹ️ Note that my opening sentence deliberately avoids specifying the number of individuals (i.e.”when he’s working with two people for therapy…”). My integrated theoretical framework recognises the relationship as my client, rather than as the two individuals. 

When listening and preparing interventions with a client, counsellors must employ a framework to support their work. There’s work to be done; we cannot simply listen to stories and only reply with a sympathetic-sounding “hmmm”.

But what knowledge do we use to help us navigate the counselling work?

Theoretical Framework

So, when we’re thinking, we’re applying our theoretical (or therapeutic) framework, learned during our qualifying training. The framework can be thought of as a significant database stored in our heads of knowledge and theoretical ideas about human relationships.

Couple counsellors, such as Dean Richardson MNCPS (Accred/Reg), employ an integrated systemic (family systems) / psychodynamic theoretical framework.

You may be curious as to what’s going on inside a couple counsellor’s head when he’s working with your distinct relationship (and, perhaps, what a systemic/psychodynamic framework is).

Our aim: to help improve a couple’s sense of their behaviour.

We attempt to assist a couple or group to make more sense of their behaviour than before they walked into the room. The counsellor tries to help them make sense of the stories the partners are telling us about their relationship.

Couple counsellors are not there to give advice nor to prescribe solutions (as if anyone’s personal experiences or fund of knowledge could provide a verbal “do this and you’ll be cured” prescription!). We’re there to help the couple learn about their relationship in ways they hadn’t noticed before. And nothing more.

At the same time, we’re not there to simply listen and sympathetically utter sympathetic “hmm” sounds. That would be people paying us a lot of money in return for what appears to be very little.

No, what is happening in our heads is that we’re using years of training, knowledge and experience to make sense of the client’s story around our theoretical framework; we’re attempting to bring comprehension first to ourselves and then to the client (using layman’s terms). 

Curiosity can lead to new ideas, and then to new comprehension. At a place of comprehension, the couple can take this as an opportunity to make (prepare, experiment with…) relationship transformations – transformations which are welcome to be discussed within couple counselling sessions.

Paradoxically, the unhappy relationship system that the couple is in may be more familiar (and, hence, less scary) than the transformation they wish for.

Making changes to a relationship is often not easy – but this is what counselling sessions provide a safe space for: curiosity, discussion, planning and experimentation.

And I say “invitation” deliberately, because a counsellor doesn’t tell a couple what to do, doesn’t make them do tasks, and doesn’t judge their relationship (e.g. comparing it to those “other” couples who are more successful). The couple’s autonomy is paramount.

Let me share some of the things that go on in my head during a relationship counselling session.

Aims of the Counsellor’s Theoretical Framework

So, you’ve just poured out your hearts to the counsellor…

…and he replies: “hmm”.

You might  think:“that’s it?!!?” You might be curious about why it’s costing you lots of money to pay the counsellor, and that all he appeared to do was to say “hmm”.

You may be wondering whether the couple counsellor is actually doing any work. Is there anything going on inside of his head? What does the couple counsellor consider prepares him to say something so simple or so profound that the couple is taken aback (because they observed behaviour that they were not observing for themselves)?

Unlike some other therapeutic approaches, this is not a one-size-fits-all approach (what some refer to as: manualised therapy). Couple counselling is a facilitated approach with an experienced counsellor who is thinking via a systemic/psychodynamic framework integrated with knowledge of human development. It’s kinda science-ey when you think about it! 🤔👍🏻

“Hmm” may mean that the counsellor is working hard in his head; he’s thinking. He’s making sense of what the couple/group have told him according to his theoretical framework (and other matters). He’s working on several jigsaw pieces in his head, preparing to put things in terms that the couple or group might comprehend and make use of, which may inspire an “aha” moment or assist them in recognising what change they may want to make.

This ‘stuff’ I’m describing is what we might call making use of the counsellor’s theoretical framework.

There are actually quite many theoretical frameworks, and it’s perfectly common for a counsellor to be qualified in applying just one, or a few of them.

A counsellor must apply the frameworks that (a) he is skilled at working with and (b) which of those frameworks inform him to offer the most effective intervention at any one time.

Let’s start with a simple framework based upon the Milan Associates’‘ discoveries about families and their behaviour. 

An Example of Systemic Thinking

As you read this section, keep in mind that my core theoretical models for relationship counselling are: systemic/family and psychodynamic.

• The couple tell me a story.
• I’m listening to one partner speak.
• I’m observing the other partner’s behaviour in response to what the first partner is saying.
• I’m noticing the interaction between the partners (I’m learning about the relationship).
• I’m also paying attention to my feelings and thoughts and putting them on a shelf in my head so I don’t have to come to a decision right away.
• Alternatively, if I hear something strikingly serious, I’ll note that in my head too.

As I listen, I’m keeping an eye on my neutral position, noticing if it shifts towards one partner or the other. If I detect a shift, I’ll be quietly curious with myself: what is causing my shift out of neutrality, and what am I learning?

I choose to move back to my neutral position because this is the position from which I can relate to the relationship/couple in front of me. I’ll stay neutral even when, for example, one partner tries to convince me the other partner is to blame for the situation they’re describing.

I’m waiting for the other partner to speak so that I might hear the story from a different perspective. As I do, I’ll notice within me confirmation and opposition (versions of a single story are rarely the same because they’re told from different perspectives).

Is it surprising that, with all this work going on in my head, sometimes the only thing I can acknowledge about the couple is, “hmm”?!

Meanwhile, I’m pondering how the two versions of the story relate to each other, because the relationship is my client (not one partner or the other, nor both together: it’s their relationship).

I’m looking at the story bearing in mind the client-relationship system (when partner 1 does “Behaviour A”, partner 2’s response is “Behaviour B”… which leads to partner 1 doing “Behaviour C” and so on). Do I notice any patterns in the behaviour? Have I heard versions of this behaviour process from the couple before? Might the relationship behaviour be being used to support a crisis or neurosis?

The Story Lived vs. The Story Told

But there’s another version of the story I haven’t mentioned yet: the story lived versus the story told.

The couple, one or both partners, may have a version of the story they tell themselves and a version that they actually act out in reality. So now the count of versions of the relationship “story” is growing.

Feedback to the Relationship

When I have something new in my head to share with the couple, I’ll offer it to the client-relationship for the partners to consider (or reject). If I have nothing new, I may tell the partners their story back to them (as they may not have felt heard in their relationship before). I may ask them to notice the holes in the story that I don’t yet have information about… or to hypothesise what might be going on in the system (with new knowledge comes new understanding and new options).

Some Couples Decline Help

Unfortunately, some relationships decline a counsellor’s help.

One partner may be stuck in their belief system (“they’re the problem, not me”) – when, from a systemic perspective, both partners play a part in being ‘the problem’.

Such stuck partners are unlikely, probably for good personal reasons, to consider a shift in their thinking or to entertain an invitation to build a pathway that helps the relationship walk forward out of conflict. Defensively, and for understandable reasons, they must hold on to their view and the expense of the relationship shifting.

But there’s more in my thinking process… lots more…!

How does the Counsellor not Blame the Partner whose Fault this is?

An interesting question put to me by a non-couples counsellor (i.e. someone whose training focuses on individual clients) was asking about “how do couple counsellors stop themselves from blaming the partner who’s at fault?”

Here’s the misunderstanding: when the couple counsellor is thinking systemically, the counsellor is not observing one partner’s behaviour in isolation. There is no “one person who is the fault”.

There are two partners in a couple relationship, and – on a long enough timeline – both will have contributed to every event that has, is, and will occur to them.

Blaming one partner for an event nullifies the contribution that the other partner made before the “fault” and in response to, or after, the “fault”.

Consequently, as a couples counsellor, I don’t find myself thinking “blame”; I find myself thinking “precedences, events, responses”.

This approach can be very helpful to a couple experiencing difficult behaviour, including domestic abuse (where a layman might want to point blame solely at the identified abuser). However, with this way of thinking, and assuming both partners wish the abuse to stop, we can bring the skills of both partners into addressing and resolving the behaviour.

My Approach for LGBT/QIA+ Couples

I’m about to share an outline of my work as a couple counsellor with you. When I write “couple” I am also referring to “partners within any intimate partnership”. This can include intimate (polyamorous) couples as well as groups in an established relationship and family members.

So, let’s talk a little of the science-ey bits of how the counsellor makes use of integrated, theoretical frameworks (based, at its core, upon systemic/family therapy, psychodynamic understanding of the mind, and integrated with human development) to help relationships in counselling.

Here’s a section from my marketing page:

In Conclusion

So, what is really happening in a couple’s counsellor’s head?

The counsellor listens to more than just two individual stories.

The counsellor is trying to understand the relationship between those stories: the patterns of behaviour, the responses each partner has to the other, the differences in how each person experiences the relationship, and the processes that may be maintaining the difficulties.

An integrated systemic/psychodynamic approach provides a way of making sense of this complexity.

Systemic thinking considers the relationship as a whole and explores the circular patterns between partners, while psychodynamic thinking considers the less conscious processes, defences and experiences that may influence how each person behaves within that relationship.

The purpose is to understand and support, not to find someone to blame or to provide instructions. Instead, counselling creates an opportunity for the couple to become curious about what is happening between them, discover information they may not previously have noticed, and consider different ways of responding to one another.

Ultimately, the aim is for the couple to become better able to understand and manage their relationship. The counsellor’s role is therefore not to become indispensable but to help the couple develop the understanding and confidence to continue without them.

In that sense, the most useful outcome of couple counselling is not simply to resolve today’s problem. It is helping the couple understand their relationship well enough to recognise, discuss and work through future difficulties together.