Discovering that your partner has cheated can, overnight, make a relationship feel as though it has changed.

You may be angry. You may be devastated. You may feel betrayed, confused or simply unable to understand what happened. Sometimes there is also a question that feels impossible to answer:

Can we ever trust each other again?

For LGBTQ+ couples, the situation can be particularly complicated. Same-sex and LGBTQ+ relationships do not always have the same models, expectations or sources of support that heterosexual couples can draw upon. Many of us have had to work out what relationships mean for ourselves rather than simply following a familiar script.

Shocks such as “my boyfriend has cheated on me” or “my girlfriend has had an affair” are not the kinds of conversations we want to have with our friends.

Our experiences of dating and sex can also be different. Meeting people through gay or lesbian clubs, LGBTQ+ social spaces, apps, hook-ups and wider communities can create opportunities for sexual or romantic encounters that may not exist in quite the same way for heterosexual couples.

Cheating Discovered

None of this excuses cheating. But it can be important when trying to understand how something happened, what it meant to each partner, and whether the relationship can recover.

Cheating does not automatically mean that your relationship has to end. Nor does staying together mean that you have to simply forget what happened in the past.

Rebuilding trust is possible for many couples. It requires honesty, patience and a willingness from both partners to understand not only the betrayal itself but also the relationship around it.

What counts as cheating in an LGBTQ+ relationship?

There is no single definition of infidelity that applies to every LGBTQ+ couple, and that is because relationships can have very different agreements.

One couple may consider kissing someone else to be cheating(Power, 2019). Another may regard it as acceptable but consider sex outside the relationship to be a betrayal. A couple may have an open relationship in which sex with other people is permitted, but emotional relationships are not.

So, the first important question to ask is NOT:

“Did you have sex with someone else?”

It is:

“What did we agree our relationship meant, and was that agreement broken?”

Infidelity can include:

• Having sex with another person (when this was outside the relationship agreement).
• Kissing or other sexual contact that a partner would reasonably understand to be outside the agreed boundaries.
• Having a secret romantic or emotional relationship with someone else.
• Using dating or hook-up apps secretly.
• Sexting or exchanging sexual photographs without a partner’s knowledge or agreement.
• Developing an intimate online relationship that is deliberately concealed.
• Repeatedly flirting with someone while hiding the extent of the relationship.
• Paying for or using sexual services where this breaches the couple’s agreement.
• Lying about where you have been, who you have seen or what you have been doing.
• Breaking specific agreements about safer sex, sexual health or disclosure.

For couples in consensually non-monogamous or open relationships, recognising situations of “cheating” can be even more nuanced.

An open relationship agreement does not mean that anything goes (see: LGBTQ+ Open Relationship Counselling).

A couple might have agreed that sex with other people is acceptable but that certain people, places or activities are off-limits. They may have agreed to tell each other beforehand, afterwards, or not at all. They may have agreed that particular emotional boundaries should remain within the primary relationship.

Breaking those agreements can be experienced as infidelity even when sex outside the relationship itself was permitted.

The betrayal may therefore be about the broken agreement and the secrecy, rather than simply about the sexual act.

See also: Challenges in LGBTQ+ Relationships…

Why can cheating happen in LGBTQ+ relationships?

There is no single LGBTQ+ explanation for infidelity.

Cheating happens for many different reasons, and it is important not to turn someone’s sexuality or gender identity into an explanation for their behaviour. However, LGBTQ+ couples can face particular circumstances that are worth understanding.

Many LGBTQ+ people grow up without seeing their relationships reflected positively in family life, education, religion, television or wider society. We may reach adulthood having had to discover for ourselves how relationships work.

For some people, sexual experiences may begin through environments where casual sex and hook-ups are normal parts of the social scene. Gay clubs, lesbian and LGBTQ+ venues, dating apps, online communities and social networks can all provide opportunities to meet other people.

Again, opportunity is not the same as inevitability because being presented with an opportunity to cheat does not make someone cheat.

When a couple is trying to understand an affair, it can be useful to look at the circumstances in which the boundary was crossed rather than reducing the explanation to “they wanted someone else”.

Other factors can include:

• dissatisfaction or loneliness within the relationship;
• difficulties communicating about sex;
• different levels of sexual desire;
• uncertainty about whether the relationship is monogamous, open or something in between;
• a desire for validation or reassurance;
• difficulties with intimacy or vulnerability;
• unresolved relationship conflicts;
• fear of ending the relationship;
• seeking excitement or novelty;
• alcohol or drug use;
• difficulties establishing or respecting boundaries;
• personal experiences of rejection, shame or low self-worth;
• a relationship that has gradually become disconnected.

None of these factors removes responsibility from the person who cheated, and understanding is not the same as excusing.

It is simply much more useful to ask:

“Why did this happen?”

than to stop at:

“How could you do this to me?”

The difference between a mistake, a pattern and an affair

Not every experience of infidelity is the same.

For one couple, there may have been a single sexual encounter that was immediately regretted and disclosed. For another, there may have been months of deception involving a second emotional relationship.

The distinction matters; a single incident does not necessarily have the same impact as a prolonged affair involving repeated lies.

Similarly, repeated cheating may indicate a pattern that needs considerably more attention than an isolated breach of an otherwise secure relationship.

Counselling can help a couple explore questions such as:

• What happened?
• How long did it happen for?
• What was concealed?
• What agreements were broken?
• Was this the first time?
• What was happening in the relationship before it happened?
• What does each partner need to understand about it now?

These questions are not about putting the person who cheated on trial; they are about establishing enough understanding for the couple to decide what happens next.

The first stage: dealing with the shock

Relationship Shock

After discovering an affair or other form of infidelity, couples who are not immediately broken apart will often want to solve everything very quickly: make the bad event go away.

That is understandable.

But the person who has been betrayed may initially experience something closer to emotional shock. Their understanding of their relationship may have changed suddenly, and they may repeatedly go over events in their mind trying to make sense of them.

There can be intense anger, anxiety, sadness, jealousy and uncertainty. There may also be practical concerns about sexual health, particularly where agreements about safer sex have been broken.

During this early period, couples may benefit from slowing things down.

The immediate objective does not necessarily need to be deciding whether the relationship will survive. It may simply be:

Can we create enough safety to have a conversation without causing further damage?

Rebuilding trust starts with honesty

Kintsugi Pot – Rebuilding the Broken

Trust cannot normally be rebuilt while significant deception is continuing.

That does not mean that the betrayed partner necessarily needs every intimate detail of every sexual encounter. In fact, an exhaustive account can sometimes create additional distress without helping the relationship.

What matters is developing an honest understanding of what happened and establishing whether there is anything else that the betrayed partner needs to know in order to make informed decisions about the relationship.

The person who cheated may need to accept that their partner’s questions are part of the process. The betrayed partner may need to recognise that repeatedly searching for increasingly painful details does not necessarily produce reassurance.

It matters to take responsibility

One of the most important steps after infidelity is for the person who cheated to take responsibility for their behaviour.

That does not mean accepting responsibility for every problem that existed within the relationship.

There may have been serious difficulties before the infidelity. Perhaps sex had disappeared. Perhaps communication had broken down. Perhaps one partner felt neglected or rejected. Those issues can and should eventually be explored.

But they are not a justification for secretly breaking an agreement.

Both may be true.

Taking responsibility allows the couple to work on the second without pretending that the first did not exist.

The betrayed partner may need more than an apology

“I’m sorry” can be important.

It is rarely sufficient on its own.

Trust is rebuilt through repeated experiences of honesty and reliability.

That might involve:

• being open about contact with the other person;
• answering reasonable questions honestly;
• ending an affair or inappropriate contact where appropriate;
• respecting newly established boundaries;
• being consistent rather than defensive;
• allowing the betrayed partner time to process what happened;
• discussing sexual health and safer-sex arrangements;
• understanding what contributed to the decision to cheat;
• making meaningful changes rather than promising that it will never happen again.

The goal is not to create a relationship in which one partner becomes a permanent investigator.

It is to create circumstances in which neither partner needs to be one.

Couples counselling after cheating

LGBTQ+ couples counselling can provide a structured environment in which both partners can begin to talk about what has happened.

This is particularly valuable when conversations at home have become repetitive, hostile or impossible.

An LGBTQ+-affirming couples counsellor can help partners explore several areas.

See: How LGBTQ+ Couple Counselling Works…

1. Understanding the betrayal

The couple can establish what happened, what agreements were broken and what each person understands about the events.

2. Understanding the relationship

The counselling process can explore what was happening between the partners before the infidelity.

This does not mean blaming the betrayed partner. It means looking at the relationship as a whole.

3. Understanding individual motivations

The person who cheated may need to understand their own behaviour more deeply.

• Why did they cross the boundary?
• What were they looking for?
• What did they avoid talking about?
• What did they tell themselves at the time?

4. Re-establishing boundaries

Couples sometimes discover after infidelity that their relationship agreements were never as clear as they thought. Couple counselling can provide an opportunity to discuss what monogamy means to them, what an open relationship means, what sexual boundaries exist, and what needs to be disclosed.

5. Rebuilding communication

Many couples become trapped in a cycle where one partner repeatedly asks questions and the other becomes increasingly defensive. Understanding this pattern can be an important part of changing it.

6. Deciding whether to continue

Counselling does not have to be about preserving the relationship at all costs. Sometimes the work leads a couple towards rebuilding their relationship, sometimes it helps them recognise that separation is the better choice for them(Block, 2026).

Either outcome can involve meaningful therapeutic work.

LGBTQ+ partners do not have to follow a heterosexual model

One of the difficulties LGBTQ+ couples can encounter is the assumption that there is one correct way to have a relationship.

There isn’t!

A healthy LGBTQ+ relationship might be monogamous. It might be consensually non-monogamous. It might involve a particular division of emotional, domestic or sexual roles. It may change over time.

What matters is that the relationship is based on genuine agreement rather than assumption.

Infidelity can sometimes expose agreements that were never actually discussed. One partner may have assumed that flirting was harmless. The other may have experienced it as a serious betrayal. One may have believed that an open relationship included emotional connections. The other may have believed that it applied only to sex.

These differences are not necessarily evidence that either partner is unreasonable.

They are evidence that the couple needs to talk about what their relationship actually means.

Shame can make everything tough

Infidelity can produce considerable shame.

The person who cheated may feel ashamed of what they have done. The betrayed partner may wonder whether they were somehow not attractive, interesting or sexually desirable enough.

For LGBTQ+ people, those feelings can sometimes become entangled with existing experiences of rejection or stigma.

A partner may ask:

“Was I not enough?”

But someone else’s decision to cheat does not provide a reliable measurement of their partner’s attractiveness, worth or value.

Equally, the person who cheated needs to be able to take responsibility without becoming so overwhelmed by shame that they cannot engage honestly with what they have done.

Shame tends to close conversations down. Responsibility can open them up.

Can trust ever be completely restored?

Perhaps the more useful question is:

Can a couple develop trust again?

Trust after infidelity may not feel exactly like the trust that existed before (see: rebuilding the broken after damage). The relationship has changed; the betrayed partner now knows that something they believed was secure was capable of being broken.

But that does not mean that the relationship can never become secure again.

For some couples, the process of rebuilding trust leads to a relationship that is more honest because subjects that were previously avoided can finally be discussed. They may become clearer about sex, boundaries, jealousy, emotional intimacy and what they actually want from their relationship.

Trust is not rebuilt through one conversation.

It is rebuilt through many small experiences of “You said you would do this, and then you did.”

Over time, consistency can become more reassuring than promises.

What if you are the person who cheated?

If you have cheated, it may be tempting to focus on whether your partner will forgive you.

There is another question that may be more important:

What do you need to understand about yourself so that you can make different choices in the future?

That may involve looking honestly at the circumstances surrounding the infidelity.

• Were you unhappy?
• Were you afraid to ask for something?
• Were you avoiding an important conversation?
• Did you want the relationship to end but not know how to say so?
• Did you want something sexually or emotionally that you had never discussed?
• Or was the behaviour part of a pattern that you had not previously confronted?
• Taking responsibility means being willing to examine those questions without turning them into excuses.

What if you are the person who was cheated on?

You do not have to decide immediately whether you can forgive your partner.

You also do not have to decide immediately whether the relationship is over.

• You are allowed to need time.
• You can ask questions.
• You can establish boundaries.
• You can seek support.
• And you can decide that rebuilding the relationship is something you want to attempt — or that it is not.

Couples counselling can help you make that decision without requiring you to know the answer before you begin.

When rebuilding the relationship may not be possible

Not every relationship can or should be repaired after infidelity.

Rebuilding trust becomes particularly difficult when there is continuing deception, repeated infidelity, coercion, intimidation or an unwillingness to take responsibility. Sometimes the relationship has reached a point where the healthiest decision is to separate.

Counselling can still be valuable in these circumstances.

A couple can work towards ending a relationship with greater understanding and less hostility, particularly where they share a home, finances, friendship groups or wider LGBTQ+ communities.

A relationship can change without being destroyed

Cheating can be one of the most painful experiences a couple faces.

It can also force questions that may have been avoided for years.

• What do we actually want from each other?
• What does commitment mean to us?
• What are our sexual boundaries?
• What does honesty look like?
• What have we been afraid to say?
• And, perhaps most importantly:

Do we both want to build something different from what we had before?

There is no universal answer to whether an LGBTQ+ relationship can recover after cheating.

• Some couples separate.
• Some remain together but fundamentally change their relationship agreements.
• Others rebuild a committed monogamous relationship.
• Others discover that consensual non-monogamy better reflects what they both want.

The important point is that recovery does not mean pretending that the betrayal never happened.

It means deciding, honestly and together, what happens next.

How LGBTQ+ couples counselling can help

As an LGBTQ+ relationship counsellor, I work with couples whose relationships do not necessarily fit conventional assumptions about what a partnership should look like.

My approach draws on systemic and psychodynamic thinking, which means looking both at the relationship between partners and at the less-conscious emotional patterns that can influence how we behave within relationships.

After infidelity, this can involve understanding the immediate crisis while also exploring the deeper patterns underneath it.

The aim is not to decide who is the “good” partner and who is the “bad” partner.

Dean Richardson MNCPS (Accred/Reg)

It is to create a space where both people can speak honestly, understand what has happened, and consider whether and how their relationship can move forward.

If cheating has left you questioning your relationship, LGBTQ+ couples counselling can provide a confidential space to explore what happened and what you want to do next.

LGBTQ+ Couple Counselling was established in 2010 by Dean Richardson MNCPS (Accred/Reg) (that’s me! 👋) specialising in online video counselling for LGBTQ+ relationships. I’m an accredited, postgraduate-qualified systemic and psychodynamic couple counsellor^† with more than 27 years’ counselling experience. My private counselling service provides specialist relationship counselling online through secure video, allowing couples to work with a counsellor without, say, having to travel to a counselling office each week.

† sounds technical, but it means I work with your relationship’s past events, untangling what happened to you, and helping you plan your future.

Find out more about LGBTQ+ Couple Counselling for Couples…

Bibliography

3 References

1. Block, H. (2026). Can a Relationship Survive Cheating (Love in Conflict). https://loveinconflict.com/can-a-relationship-survive-cheating/

2. Power, C. (2019). How Cyber-Cheating can threaten your Relationship. https://clintonpower.com.au/2019/09/cyber-cheating/

3. Zdrale, G. (2026). Counselling does not have to push you towards one answer (Find your Way). https://www.findyourway.world/articles/relationship-marriage-and-the-children-stay-together-or-separate/

The post How to Rebuild Trust After Cheating: Can an LGBTQ+ Relationship Recover? appeared first on LGBTQ+ Couple Counselling | Video Therapist.

Understanding Repeating Patterns in LGBTQ+ Relationships

“Why do we keep having the same argument?”

When you and your partner find yourselves returning to the exact same argument time and again, the same sharp exchange over chores, the same familiar silence after a night out, or the exact same shift in tone during a conversation about the future, I can tell you that you are far from alone in this experience.

Introducing Dean Richardson

Hi, I’m LGBTQ+ Couples Counsellor Dean Richardson MNCPS (Accred/Reg), and as a couple counsellor working with gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, and queer partners for almost three decades, I regularly meet couples who feel completely exhausted by these recurring loops.

Couples can arrive in counselling wondering why two people who love each other deeply can so easily become trapped in the same script, reciting lines they both know by heart, and yet feel powerless to change the patterns.

You’re not Broken

So, firstly, I want to reassure you that having the same argument over and over does not mean your relationship is broken. Nor does it mean you are incompatible.

In fact, repeating arguments are rarely about the superficial trigger, whether that’s a sink full of dishes, a delayed text, or a disagreement about social plans. Instead, these loops are dynamic patterns created between you. They are emotional feedback systems where both partners are usually trying to protect themselves or seek reassurance but doing so in ways that trigger the other person’s defences.

(That’s going to be on the examination at the end, by the way: triggering the other person’s defences! 😉)

In LGBTQ+/same-sex relationships, these behaviour patterns can carry unique layers of meaning. Minority stress, past experiences of rejection or hiding, hyper-vigilance, and internalised shame can quietly sit in the room with us, shaping how we interpret a partner’s tone or distance.

The Mechanics of an Argument Loop

Let’s talk about the mechanics of the argument loop. I’ll introduce you to two ways of thinking, each from a systemic and psychodynamic perspective (this stuff isn’t on the test 😁).

I’ll not talk all theoretical framework-ey, but stick with plain English.

If we’re going to help you break out of an argument loop, I have to help you understand how such loop patterns form in the first place.

A Psychodynamic Perspective

From a psychodynamic perspective, into our adult partnerships we (helplessly) bring in our earlier life experiences, attachment histories, and defensive mechanisms.

For example, if we grew up feeling that our emotional needs were a burden or that love was conditional, a minor sign of distraction from our partner might feel to us like abandonment (without us knowing why).

A Systemic Perspective

From a systemic perspective, relationship behaviour is usually a circular system rather than a linear one. It isn’t a case of “Partner A causes Partner B to react.” Instead, it’s more of a case of: “Partner A’s protective response activates Partner B’s vulnerability, which then prompts Partner B’s protective response, which in turn reinforces Partner A’s original fear (and so on).”

When both partners feel unsafe and act out of self-defence, their relationship system (make a note of that phrase!) gets stuck in a dance where nobody gets what they actually need. Relationship conflict cycles are a predictable “dance” that partners join in without thinking; they react to each other’s behaviour (words, mannerisms, etc,) in the same way every time.

I’m going to help you alter the dance!

Now you’re ready

With these two pieces of knowledge, we’re now ready to introduce you to three brief techniques for breaking out of an argument loop.

Three Approaches to Breaking Out of Repeating Arguments

Breaking an argument loop

This advice is going to sound strange, but breaking a repeating pattern doesn’t require “winning” the argument or getting your partner to admit that they were wrong.

Nope, instead it requires changing your position in the cycle. Do you see the clock images attached to this section? That’s a clue for you!

Here are three practical approaches rooted in systemic and psychodynamic couple counselling practice that you can begin exploring together.

1. Alter ONE Step in the Sequence

Stepping from the Cycle

Sticking within the Cycle

Because relationship systems operate like clockwork, changing even one minor response disrupts the entire mechanism.

If Partner A always pursues and Partner B always withdraws, the loop continues automatically.

But, if either partner recognises that they’re in the loop again and then consciously alters their next step, the old script can no longer play out as written.

• HOW TO TRY THIS: Identify your typical automatic response in the argument. If you usually raise your voice, try lowering your volume or taking a slow breath. If you usually walk away immediately, try staying present for two extra minutes while acknowledging your distress with your partner. If you usually defend yourself with logic, try acknowledging your partner’s emotional distress first before explaining your perspective.
• WHY IT CAN WORK: A pattern requires both participants to play their habitual roles (Step 1 leads to Step 2, which leads to Step 3, etc.). By changing your input into the relationship system, you force the system to adapt, creating a new opening for a genuinely new conversation to take place.

2. Externalise the Pattern (Name the “Third Entity”)

Externalise the behaviour pattern

In systemic therapy, we often view the argument itself as an external force operating between the partners, rather than assigning blame to either individual.

When a dispute arises, it is natural to view your partner as the adversary.

However, when you both step back and look at the cycle together, the adversary becomes the pattern itself.

• HOW TO TRY THIS: Give your recurring argument a neutral, descriptive name, such as “The Pursuit and Retreat” or “The Freeze.”  When you feel the familiar tension rising, practise calling it out together: “Do you see that we’ve made ‘The Freeze’ happen again, right now?”
• WHY IT CAN WORK: Naming the pattern shifts you from fighting each other to standing side-by-side to observe a process that is affecting both of you. It creates psychological distance and reduces defensiveness, allowing you to step out of the argument trap.

3. Identify the “Under-the-Iceberg” Emotional Drivers

Under the Iceberg

Psychodynamic thinking reminds us that the primary emotion we display during a fight (often anger, frustration, or cold detachment) is usually a secondary defence. Beneath the surface lie primary vulnerabilities: fear of inadequacy, fear of rejection, shame, or feeling invisible.

In queer relationships, these primary feelings may often be linked to historic experiences of not feeling safe or fully accepted.

• HOW TO TRY THIS: The next time you feel the urge to voice a familiar complaint or retreat into silence, take a brief pause and ask yourself: “What primary emotion am I actually feeling right now beneath my anger or defensiveness?” Is it sadness? A fear of being cast aside? A feeling of not being good enough? Share that feeling with your partner.
• WHY IT CAN WORK: Expressing a primary vulnerability (“I felt afraid that I don’t matter to you when that happened”) invites connection and comfort from a partner, whereas expressing a secondary defence (“You never listen to me!”) invites a defensive counter-attack back at you.

Moving Forward Together

Unpicking long-standing relationship patterns takes some curiosity, a little patience, and a willingness to look beyond the immediate source of friction.

Reaching a point where you recognise the loop while it’s happening, even if you can’t always stop it immediately, will be a significant step forward for you together.

The above three techniques aren’t magic, but they are “thinking outside of the box”. They won’t resolve your stuck cycles on their own; they need you both to invest a little and go with what they’re trying to achieve.

By shifting your focus from “who is right?” to “what is happening between us?”, you make room for deeper understanding, softer interactions, and a relationship that feels safer and more connected for both of you.

The post Why Do We Keep Having the Same Argument? appeared first on LGBTQ+ Couple Counselling | Video Therapist.

Every relationship has its difficulties. Couples may argue about money, sex, household responsibilities, family, communication or how much time they spend together.

Same-sex relationships can experience all of these ordinary relationship challenges too. Being gay, lesbian, bisexual or queer does not automatically create relationship problems.

However, there can be additional pressures surrounding the relationship that heterosexual couples may not encounter in quite the same way. Challenges same-sex partners face can include pressures that may influence how the partners communicate, experience intimacy, make decisions and understand what their relationship is supposed to look like.

Understanding those influences and pressures can be an important part of resolving difficulties in their most significant relationships.

External Pressures Can Become Relationship Pressures

No couple relationship exists in isolation. Family attitudes, social expectations, previous experiences of discrimination and concerns about being visibly LGBTQ+ can all become part of the relationship’s emotional landscape.

For some LGBTQ+ couples, this might involve:

• An unsupportive or rejecting family member;
• Different levels of acceptance from friends or relatives;
• Anxiety about being visibly affectionate in public;
• Previous experiences of homophobia or discrimination;
• Different expectations about marriage, children or family life;
• Pressure to conform to heteronormative expectations;
• Concerns about whether a partner will be accepted by family or social networks.

Sometimes these pressures are obvious. At other times, they become woven into everyday disagreements.

For example, one partner may interpret another’s reluctance to attend a family event as a lack of commitment. The other partner may actually be trying to protect themselves from rejection or conflict.

The disagreement is real, but it may not be the whole story.

This is one reason specialist LGBTQ+ couple counselling (oh hai! 👋) can be useful. Rather than assuming that an argument is simply about the immediate subject, counselling can explore what is happening around the relationship as well as between the partners.

When external messages become internal

Social stigma can also become internalised.

Internalised homophobia or other negative messages about LGBTQ+ relationships can sometimes affect how someone experiences themselves, their partner or their sexuality. This does not mean that a person consciously dislikes being LGBTQ+. Rather, years of receiving negative messages can leave emotional responses that are difficult to recognise.

These experiences can sometimes influence confidence, vulnerability, sexual intimacy or the ability to believe that a relationship can be secure and lasting.

Exploring these influences is not about blaming either partner. It is about understanding what may be contributing to the patterns between them.

Creating a Relationship Without a Roadmap

Reading the Relationship Roadmap

Many couples expect there to be a ready-made template for how their relationship should work. These expectations may come from media (TV, magazines, social, etc.) or assumptions about how their friends’ relationships are working just fine.

It’s a shock to discover our relationships aren’t working as expected – as if an unwritten roadmap wasn’t working as intended.

Traditional relationship expectations can provide an apparently straightforward sequence: dating, exclusivity, engagement, marriage, children and so on.

But as LGBTQ+ couples, we may find ourselves asking different questions.

None of these questions has a universally correct answer – no matter how very much we would like one.

So, difficulties can arise when partners have different answers to such questions but have never explicitly discussed them between themselves.

This is where creating a relationship roadmap can be particularly valuable.

A roadmap does not prescribe what a relationship should look like. Instead, it gives partners an opportunity to decide together what works for them.

For couples exploring an open relationship, for example, that might involve discussing boundaries, safer sex, communication, privacy, dating and what happens when agreements need to change.

For a monogamous couple, it might mean defining what each partner understands by emotional and sexual fidelity.

The important point is that the relationship’s rules and boundaries need to belong to the people within it!

Counselling can provide a space to explore those differences without imposing an external model of what a “normal” relationship should look like. This fits the non-normative approach of specialist therapy for queer couples, where the aim is to understand the particular relationship rather than measure it against a predetermined template.

When Partners are at Different Stages of a Sexuality Journey

Different by Congruent Relationship Stages

Another source of difficulty can occur when partners are moving through their sexuality-identity at different speeds.

One partner may be completely comfortable being open about their sexuality. The other may still be deciding who they want to tell, how they want to identify themselves or how comfortable they feel being visible.

These coming-out dynamics can create painful misunderstandings.

The more-out partner might experience their partner’s caution as embarrassment or rejection:

“Why don’t you want people to know we’re together?”

Meanwhile, the less-out partner may experience pressure, fear or a loss of control:

“I’m not ready for everyone to know.”

Neither response necessarily means that the relationship is failing, but they may simply represent two different experiences of safety, identity and readiness.

This can become particularly complicated when families, workplaces, friendship groups or social environments are involved.

Couples may need to negotiate questions such as:

• Who knows about the relationship?
• Who can be told?
• How are partners introduced to family?
• What happens in social situations where one partner is not out?
• How can one partner feel acknowledged without forcing the other to disclose?
• What does privacy mean, and when does privacy begin to feel like secrecy?

There is no universal timetable for these decisions.

The challenge is finding a way for both partners’ needs to be heard without either person’s experience being dismissed.

Communication and Intimacy Are Often Connected

Communication problems in same-sex relationships can look much like communication problems in any couple. Partners may become defensive, withdraw, criticise one another or repeatedly have the same unresolved argument.

But the underlying emotional meaning can be more specific.

A disagreement about sex might involve much more than sexual frequency. It might involve rejection, insecurity, changing attraction, body image, shame, anxiety or uncertainty about what a partner wants.

Similarly, what appears to be a gay relationship communication issue may actually involve a repeated emotional pattern.

Neither person necessarily intends to create this cycle, yet both can become caught in it.

An integrated systemic/psychodynamic approach to couple counselling (as integrated by Counsellor Dean Richardson MNCPS (Accred/Reg)) looks at these behaviour patterns rather than simply asking “which partner is the problem?”. This perspective can also consider whether previous experiences, anxieties or less conscious emotional responses are influencing what happens between partners.

Intimacy can change too

Lesbian couple intimacy problems, gay male relationship difficulties and intimacy concerns in other LGBTQ+ partnerships can involve emotional or sexual changes that deserve more than generic relationship advice.

Sexual intimacy can change because of:

• Stress or conflict
• Changes in attraction
• Anxiety or self-consciousness
• Previous experiences
• Relationship resentment
• Different sexual needs
• Difficulties discussing desire
• Changes in the wider relationship

The important question is not simply “How often are you having sex?”

It may be:

What has happened to the meaning of intimacy between you?

Counselling can create a space where partners can discuss subjects that have become difficult to approach privately, without either partner being told what their relationship “should” look like.

Moving Beyond the Idea of a “Normal” Relationship

Couple Counselling Outcomes

There is no single model for a successful same-sex relationship, especially when we’ve attempted to integrate the model we (unconsciously) observed in our parents’ behaviour and found (much to our surprise) that it just doesn’t work in our own partnership.

A healthy partnership might be monogamous, open, married, unmarried, child-free, parenting, long-distance or structured in ways that are entirely individual to the people involved.

What matters is whether the partners can develop a relationship that they understand, negotiate and genuinely consent to.

Sometimes couples become stuck because they are trying to solve the wrong problem. They may repeatedly argue about behaviour without understanding the pattern underneath it.

Specialist therapy for queer couples can offer a different opportunity: to slow things down, understand what is happening between you and consider what you both want to change.

The purpose is not for a counsellor to decide who is right. It is not to impose a conventional relationship model. And it is not to turn every LGBTQ+ relationship difficulty into an issue about sexuality.

Instead, counselling can help a couple become more curious about their own relationship, recognise recurring patterns and develop their own ways of responding differently. This reflects the systemic and psychodynamic approach used by LGBTCoupleCounselling.co.uk.

When a Specialist LGBT Couple Counsellor Could Help

Couple Counselling

You do not need to wait until your relationship is in crisis before seeking support.

Counselling may be worth considering when you are experiencing:

• Repeated arguments that never seem to resolve
• Communication that has broken down
• Differences about monogamy or opening the relationship
• Difficulties around coming out or visibility
• Family-related conflict
• Emotional or sexual intimacy problems
• Feelings of distance, resentment or insecurity
• The same relationship pattern repeating despite attempts to change it

You also do not necessarily need to arrive with a clearly defined problem.

Sometimes the starting point is simply:

“We know something isn’t working, but we don’t understand why.”

That can be enough to begin exploring what is happening.

A confidential space for your relationship

Same-sex relationship challenges are not necessarily caused by being in a same-sex relationship. But the social, cultural and personal experiences surrounding LGBTQ+ lives can sometimes become part of the relationship’s difficulties.

Recognising those influences can make it easier to understand what is happening between partners.

If you and your partner are struggling with communication, intimacy, identity differences, family pressures or another recurring relationship difficulty, LGBT couple counselling can provide a confidential space to explore it together.

LGBTCoupleCounselling.co.uk provides specialist, relationship-affirming counselling for LGBTQ+ couples, using an integrated systemic and psychodynamic approach. The work is tailored to the particular relationship rather than assuming that one model fits everyone. You do not need to have everything worked out before making contact; the first step can simply be talking about what is happening and deciding whether counselling feels appropriate.

Interested in a Counselling Appointment?

Dean Richardson [dar_professionaltitle]

LGBTQ+ Couple Counselling was established in 2010 by Dean Richardson MNCPS (Accred/Reg) and specialises in online video counselling for LGBTQ+ relationships.

Dean is a postgraduate-qualified systemic and psychodynamic couple counsellor with more than 27 years’ counselling experience. His private counselling service provides specialist relationship counselling online through secure video, allowing couples to work with a counsellor without, say, having to travel to a counselling office each week.

Find out more about LGBTQ+ Couple Counselling for Couples…

The post Challenges in Same-Sex Relationships: Beyond Common Couple Struggles appeared first on LGBTQ+ Couple Counselling | Video Therapist.

Finding the right couple counsellor for an LGBTQ+/Queer couple relationship means balancing specialised therapy skills with appropriate neutrality.

But what does this mean in plain English to a couple who are looking for a professional to help them repair their broken partnership?

Recognising red flags (potential warning signs) early ensures you both protect your emotional well-being and, instead, can invest time in a genuinely productive therapeutic experience.

Warning Signs of a Red-Flag Counsellor

Counsellors trained to work with couples have advanced knowledge of how relationships work (and don’t work), what problems a partnership dynamic has, how to work with a couple’s relationship, and how to keep two people safe in the room (three, if we include the counsellor).

But not all couple counsellors understand LGBTQ+ partnerships.

The simple, immediate red flags of your couple counsellor include:

Qualifications/Training

• Lack of specialised couples training:
  In the UK, initial training in counselling typically focuses on individuals. Individual counselling is very different from relationship counselling (whether for couples, throuples or groups). A practitioner without explicit (post)graduate training or accreditation in couples work (e.g., systemic, psychodynamic, EFT, or Gottman methods) will be unprepared to work with a couple’s relationship, can accidentally allow conflict to escalate, and lack fundamental relationship theoretical frameworks that help them navigate through your relationship problems.
• Continued professional development (CPD):
  Qualified counsellors are required to continue their professional development by a mix of attending additional training or workshops or reading and watching additional educational material (a minimum of the equivalent of 30 hours per year) in appropriate subjects that assist and enhance their practice.

Ignorance of LGBTQ+ Partnerships and Lifestyle

• Treating LGBTQ+ relationship problems as the problem:
  A red flag is when relationship difficulties are routinely explained by a partner’s sexuality or gender identity, rather than exploring the couple’s actual relationship dynamics..
• Assuming heterosexual relationship norms apply:
  Has for assumptions about gender roles, sex, marriage, monogamy or family life that don’t reflect the particular relationship in front of the counsellor.
• Is uncomfortable discussing sex or relationship structures:
  A counsellor should be able to discuss sexual boundaries, consensual non-monogamy and different relationship structures without treating them as inherently problematic.
• Knows the terminology but doesn’t understand the experience:
  Using inclusive language or claims“I work with everyone” is not the same as having relevant experience and skills in working with LGBTQ+ couples.

Session Management

• Taking sides or playing the judge:
  Most qualified relationship counsellors treat the relationship as the client, rather than the two individuals. Other rationales may treat the couple as distinct partners. If the counsellor repeatedly gangs up on one partner, assigns blame, or declares a “winner” in arguments, they compromise safety.
• Secret-keeping and poor boundary management:
  A strong practitioner sets clear rules regarding individual communication between sessions. If they hold major secrets shared by one partner without addressing how that impacts joint work, trust breaks down.
• Poor session management:
  Allowing sessions to turn into unstructured screaming matches without intervention, or doing most of the talking themselves, indicates weak control of the therapeutic space.

Personal vs. Professional Beliefs

• Pathologising or invalidating identity:
  For LGBTQ+, ethical non-monogamous, or kink-aligned couples, a major red flag would be a counsellor who attributes unrelated relationship issues entirely to your gender identity, sexuality, or relationship structure. I wouldn’t suggest they’d say to a gay man: “If you married a woman, you wouldn’t have these problems,” but perhaps they demonstrate their lack of knowledge through clumsy, unhelpful interventions.
• Imposing personal values:
  Counsellors should never impose their personal beliefs on how a couple should behave (example: separating or staying together), nor push their own moral frameworks onto your relationship choices (eample: “I wouldn’t sleep around like you do”).

Red Flags vs. Green Flags – Direct Comparison

Here’s a summary of red flags vs green flags to be aware of in your couple counsellor.

Questions to Ask During an Initial Consultation

Before committing to therapy, use a consultation call to screen prospective practitioners. Key questions to ask include:

• What training do you have in couples counselling?

  Ensure they hold specific and/or recognised (post)graduate qualifications or certifications rather than relying solely on individual therapy credentials.

• In plain English, would you explain your theoretical framework for us?

  This not only informs you on how the couple counsellor will approach relationship counselling, but also, by asking for a plain English description, shows whether the counsellor has sufficient depth of knowledge to translate academic knowledge (required to pass their qualifications) into plain English.

• What is your approach to confidentiality and individual communications between sessions?

  An experienced relationship therapist will have a clear “no secrets” policy regarding private calls or emails, notwithstanding in some exceptional situations (such as domestic violence) communication with one partner may be initiated by one partner.

• How experienced are you with our specific dynamic or identity?

  Ask directly about their familiarity with LGBTQ+ dynamics, neurodivergence, or ethical non-monogamy if relevant to your relationship.

• How do you structure sessions if conflict escalates?

  Listen for a confident strategy aimed at maintaining physical and emotional safety in the room.

Professional Memberships?

Some recommend asking about a counsellor’s professional membership body/bodies, e.g., National Counselling and Psychotherapy Society (NCPS), United Kingdom Council for Psychotherapy (UKCP), British Psychoanalytic Council (BPC), British Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy (BACP), etc. In all honesty, whilst a professional body might provide you with somewhere to go if your complaints are not met by the counsellor, you’re much better off raising complaints directly with the counsellor in order to solicit change, rather than asking a professional body to tell them off long after the experience (notwithstanding, severe professional negligence may best be reported to a professional body or even the police where applicable).

How to Raise Concerns or Change Therapists

If you notice red flags during therapy, you are not obligated to stay. Here is how to handle the situation constructively:

• Address it directly in session: Bring up your observation gently (e.g., “I felt like the focus was uneven today”). A good couple counsellor will welcome feedback and adjust their approach as necessary.
• Evaluate their response: A green-flag practitioner responds with curiosity and openness. If they become defensive, dismissive, or blame you, it confirms the incompatibility.
• Make a clean exit: You can pause or terminate therapy at any point. A brief email stating that you have decided to seek a practitioner whose style aligns better with your needs is entirely sufficient.

Interested in the Specialist LGBTQ+ Partnership Counsellor?

Dean Richardson [dar_professionaltitle]

Making an appointment for an initial session of couples counselling doesn’t bind you to a long contract.

Dean is a postgraduate-qualified systemic and psychodynamic couple counsellor with more than 27 years’ counselling experience. His private counselling service provides specialist relationship counselling online through secure video, allowing couples to work with a counsellor without, say, having to travel to a counselling office each week.

Find out more about LGBTQ+ Couple Counselling for Couples…

The post Red Flags to Look Out For When Choosing a Couple Counsellor appeared first on LGBTQ+ Couple Counselling | Video Therapist.

Preparing for your first couple counselling session is mostly about getting into a collaborative, reflective mindset, rather than doing heavy “homework”.

What you’re not being asked to do is to build a case of all your partner’s faults and everything that (you believe) they are responsible for.

The first session is a mutual assessment: you’re assessing the couple counsellor’s suitability for your relationship and how he works with you. The counsellor is assessing the material you’re bringing and how you’re able to make use of the interventions he’s offering.

If the mutual assessment goes well (even a little bit), further sessions are arranged.

If the mutual assessment does not go well for you as a couple, or the counsellor believes that what he’s offering is not well used by the couple, a referral or recommendation can be made (if the couple finds this acceptable).

Taking a few purposeful steps together ahead of time can help you both feel grounded and ready to make the most of your time with your new couple counsellor.

Core Steps to Prepare

• Focus on your own contributions

  Instead of building a case against your partner, think about your reactions, triggers, and habits within the dynamic. Therapy works best when both people look inward.

• Identify what success looks like

  Ask yourself what you hope to achieve. Is it better communication, making a decision about the future, or rebuilding trust? You don’t need identical goals, but knowing your own priorities helps.

• Agree on mutual ground rules

  Decide together that the session is a safe space. Agree to listen without interrupting and to refrain from weaponising anything said during the therapy session should you have arguments afterwards.

• Handle practical details early

  Log in to the video conferencing session a few minutes early to sort out technical setup.

• Prepare to discuss the session afterwards

  Leave a little time after the session to discuss the pros and cons together. The pros will tell you if the counsellor & approach are good enough for your needs; the cons will tell you what you might need to bring to the counsellor should you return for subsequent sessions.

What to Expect in Session One

¹ An open question that allows you both to set the session’s agenda.

² Use of systemic circular questioning (read more about circularity here) that invites the couple to “compare notes” with their perceptions and recollections.

³ History. May lead to a discussion on “what has changed”? or “what do you think contributed to the changes?”.

⁴ Asking you to contribute to the session – not that what you have tried is no good, but perhaps what you tried might be tweaked or understood better to become more effective for your partnership.

You Don’t Have to Be in the Same Place Emotionally

Couples rarely arrive at counselling with exactly the same expectations.

One partner may be hoping to repair the relationship, while the other is questioning whether it can continue. One may feel ready to discuss difficult subjects, while the other is anxious about what might emerge. These differences are worth acknowledging before your first session.

You don’t need to resolve these differences before attending.

Nor do you need to agree on a single account of what has gone wrong. If you could already agree on everything that matters, there might be less need for counselling.

Instead, try to be honest with yourself about what you want from the process, what you are uncertain about, and what you find difficult to discuss with your partner. You might consider what you would need to experience in counselling to feel that it was worthwhile, even if you remain unsure about the eventual outcome.

If you and your partner have different expectations, resist the temptation to persuade one another to adopt the same position before the session. Bring those differences into the room. Understanding how each of you has arrived at your present position can be an important part of the work.

The first session is an opportunity to explore whether counselling offers a constructive way forward for you both. You do not have to arrive with a shared decision about your relationship; you need only be willing to explore what brings you there.

Ready to make an appointment?

Dean Richardson [dar_professionaltitle]

Attending a first session in counselling does not (or aught not!) commit you to further sessions if you feel the fit is not a good one.

LGBTQ+ Couple Counselling was established in 2010 by Dean Richardson MNCPS (Accred/Reg) and specialises in online video counselling for LGBTQ+ relationships.

Dean is a postgraduate-qualified systemic and psychodynamic couple counsellor with more than 27 years’ counselling experience. His private counselling service provides specialist relationship counselling online through secure video, allowing couples to work with a counsellor without, say, having to travel to a counselling office each week.

Find out more about LGBTQ+ Couple Counselling for Couples…

The post Preparing for your First Couple Counselling Session appeared first on LGBTQ+ Couple Counselling | Video Therapist.

Wondering how couple counselling actually works? If you have never experienced counselling for LGBTQ+ relationships, it will be difficult to know what actually happens when you sit down with your relationship counsellor on your computer monitor (i.e. video conferencing therapy).

• Does the counsellor tell you who is right and who is wrong?
• Do you just talk about your arguments?
• Will you be given exercises to complete at home?
• What happens if you and your partner disagree with each other during the session?
• And, perhaps most importantly, can couple counselling actually strengthen your distinct relationship?

These are reasonable questions that any couple would ask, and I, Counsellor Dean Richardson, will do my best to answer them here.

Couple counselling is not simply individual counselling with two people sitting in the same room. A relationship is the focus of the work itself.

The couple counsellor is there to help you both understand:

• What happens between you (using the analogy of a “system” for your relationship);
• To identify patterns that have become difficult to change;
• To help you develop different ways of responding to relationship problems.

For LGBTQ+ couples, this can be particularly important. Your relationship does not have to fit a heterosexual model of what a couple “should” look like. Gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, queer, mixed-orientation, open and non-monogamous relationships can all have their own structures, expectations and difficulties.

At LGBTQ+ Couple Counselling, the approach is specifically designed around LGBTQ+ relationships rather than expecting queer partners to conform to a predetermined heteronormative model (as other counsellors, ignorant of LGBTQ+ lifestyles and challenges, tend to do).

What is Couple Counselling?

Couple counselling is a form of therapy in which the relationship is the focus of the counselling.

You and your partner bring the relationship difficulties you are experiencing, and the counsellor helps you examine what is happening between you.

Relationship problems you might bring could include:

• Repeated arguments that never seem to get resolved;
• Difficulties communicating;
• Feeling that your partner no longer understands you;
• Emotional distance or loss of intimacy;
• Problems with trust;
• Jealousy or insecurity;
• Disagreements about sex;
• Deciding whether to open a relationship;
• Difficulties following a change in your relationship;
• Resentment about responsibilities or behaviour;
• The effects of previous experiences on the relationship;
• Considering separation or whether the relationship can continue.

Occasionally a couple knows that something is wrong but cannot quite explain what it is. Occasionally the couple believe they know what the problem is but cannot resolve it.

The couple counsellor assists the couple in understanding their problems from a deeper perspective – in ways they were not able to observe themselves before. The goal is not necessarily to arrive at an immediate explanation. The process can involve discovering what is happening within the relationship and why particular patterns keep repeating before the couple become autonomously inspired to begin to address their problems in a new, more effective way.

This is why couple counselling can be useful even when you have already talked about the problem many times. You may have talked about it repeatedly without actually changing the pattern.

How does Couple Counselling Work?

There are different approaches to couple counselling, and different counsellors work in different ways.

The approach used by Dean Richardson MNCPS (Accred/Reg) integrates systemic and psychodynamic theoretical models of therapy. Don’t worry, though; he’ll speak in plain English, and you don’t have to understand what these models mean for them to be helpful.

Theoretical Models Simplified

A systemic approach looks at your relationship as a system: what one partner does, how the other responds, and how those responses then influence what happens next.

For example:

One partner becomes anxious… →

They seek reassurance… →

The other partner feels pressured and withdraws… →

The first partner becomes more anxious and seeks even more reassurance… →

The second partner feels invaded and becomes angry…

In this example both partners have become caught in the pattern without either deliberately choosing it.

The question therefore becomes less about “Which one of us is causing the problem?” and more about “What is happening between us, and how are we both becoming caught in it?”

This is the key to the systemic part of couples counselling.

A psychodynamic element can also help explore less obvious influences on the relationship. Previous experiences, anxieties, expectations and emotional responses can sometimes affect how partners interpret and respond to each other in the present.

The purpose is not to diagnose either partner or decide who is psychologically at fault. Instead, counselling can provide new information about the relationship. And when you understand more about what is happening, you have more possibilities for deciding what to do differently.

This is the key to the psychodynamic part of couples counselling.

What’s the first Couple Counselling Session like?

The first session is not an examination that you have to pass. You do not need to prepare a perfect explanation of everything that has gone wrong in your relationship.

Counselling sessions are just conversations (no bringing your homework for marking, nor wafting scarves, nor painting your feelings, etc.).

So, the first session is a conversation; an opportunity to begin understanding the relationship and the reasons you have sought counselling. You’re also evaluating the counsellor: is the counsellor suitable for your needs, and does working with him feel right?

At the beginning, you are likely to talk about:

• What has brought you to counselling;
• The difficulties you are currently experiencing;
• How the relationship works;
• What happens when difficulties arise;
• Things you have already tried;
• What, if anything, have those attempts changed;
• What you would like counselling to help you understand or achieve.

The counsellor will also observe the relationship itself. That means paying attention not simply to what each person says, but to the interactions between you in realtime.

• How does one partner respond when the other speaks?
• What happens when there is disagreement?
• Who pursues a discussion and who withdraws?
• How does an argument begin?
• What happens immediately afterwards?
• Are there subjects that repeatedly produce the same reaction?

These observations can become important information about the relationship.

The first session also gives you an opportunity to decide whether counselling feels appropriate and whether you want to continue. We’ll make sure you understand the terms of the work (what you’re paying, when sessions are scheduled, how to bring counselling to a close, etc. matters that you will have received in a PDF beforehand).

At LGBTQ+ Couple Counselling, the first session includes a review of what has been discussed and consideration of whether continuing together seems like a useful way forward.

What Happens During a Couple Counselling Session?

There is no single script that every couple counselling session follows.

That is important because your relationship is not the same as somebody else’s.

A session might begin by looking at something that happened during the previous week. You may want to discuss an argument, something that has improved, something that has become worse, or a problem that you have been unable to resolve. The choice is up to the couple (and it’s not a test – you’re free to begin anywhere you feel is important).

The counsellor may then help you slow the conversation down.

Instead of simply discussing what happened, you might begin to examine how it happened.

For example:

• What did you say?
• How did your partner interpret it?
• What did they do next?
• How did you respond to that?
• What were you expecting your partner to do?
• What actually happened?
• (asked of both partners simultaneously) What do you imaging your partner wanted to happen?

This can reveal patterns that are difficult to see when you are inside an argument.

The counsellor may ask questions, make observations, reframe something that has been said, identify a recurring interaction or invite you to consider an alternative explanation.

The process is collaborative rather than prescriptive.

You are not simply describing your relationship problems while the counsellor announces the solution.

Instead, the counselling relationship develops into a place where you can examine what is happening and consider different possibilities.

What Does Couple Counselling Feel Like?

This is perhaps harder to explain than what actually happens during a session.

Couple counselling can feel uncomfortable at times.

You may be talking about things that you normally avoid discussing with your partner. You may hear your partner describe an experience of the relationship that is very different from your own. You may discover that something you regarded as insignificant has been important to them.

Difficult Conversations

That does not necessarily mean that counselling is going badly.

In fact, difficult conversations are often part of the reason for coming to counselling in the first place.

There should, however, be a sense that the conversation is being contained and facilitated rather than simply becoming another argument. The counsellor’s role is not to take sides, but to facilitate you both in finding ways to communicate better.

A relationship counsellor working systemically is concerned with the relationship and the patterns within it, rather than deciding which partner is “the problem”. We describe this as maintaining a neutral position while helping partners understand their relationship dynamics.

As counselling progresses, sessions can also become less about explaining what is wrong and more about understanding what you can do with that new understanding.

How can Counselling Sessions help Tackle Relationship Problems?

One of the most useful things you can do with counselling is use the session to investigate the problem rather than simply complain about it.

Suppose you have the same argument every week. It might be tempting to use the counselling session to establish who was right and who was wrong during their latest argument.

A more useful question might be:

Why do we keep having this particular argument?

The counsellor can help you identify the sequence of events and the relationship pattern surrounding it.

Once the couple recognises a pattern, they may be able to interrupt it; if they cannot, the couple counsellor will assist them in looking into this newer problem too.

This is one of the reasons counselling is not necessarily about giving couples a list of relationship rules. Instead, you can learn more about your own relationship and develop ways of responding that are appropriate to you.

Counselling can be used to test new approaches

The work does not necessarily finish when the video session ends.

You may agree to try something differently during the following week. Perhaps you decide to approach a particular conversation differently. Perhaps you notice a particular trigger. Perhaps you try to respond to your partner without automatically falling into the familiar pattern. Then you can bring the experience back into the next session.

• What happened?
• Did it help?
• Did it make things worse?
• Did you discover something unexpected?
• What should you change?

This creates a process of trying, observing, understanding and adjusting.

Dean describes this as developing a bespoke process with you rather than simply applying therapy from a manual at you.

Couples can consider alternatives to what is not working, test them between sessions and then discuss what happened when they return.

Does Couple Counselling tell you how to Fix your Relationship?

Absolutely nope.

A counsellor does not simply tell you:

“Having heard your arguments, I’m now going to tell you what to do…”

Relationships are too individual for a universal set of instructions to work for every couple.

Instead, effective couple counselling can help you develop a better understanding of your particular relationship.

That may lead to changes in communication, behaviour, boundaries, expectations or intimacy.

Discovering ways to change not considered before

It may also lead to a more difficult realisation: that the relationship needs to change in ways that one or both partners had previously been avoiding. Counselling therefore does not have to mean saving the relationship at any cost.

Sometimes the useful outcome is discovering that the relationship can develop in a healthier direction. Sometimes it is the couple deciding that their relationship should end.

Counselling can also help couples who are considering separation to understand what has happened and make decisions about the future.

LGBT Couple Counselling specifically offers support around breakups and separation as well as relationship difficulties.

Are Relationship Improvements Guaranteed?

No.

No ethical counsellor can guarantee that couple counselling will save or improve a relationship.

Counselling provides a process, professional expertise and a different way of examining the relationship. It cannot make two people want the same outcome.

There are several reasons why couple counselling may not produce the improvement you hoped for.

• You and your partner may want fundamentally different things.
• One partner may be unwilling to participate meaningfully.
• The relationship may have reached a point where separation is the appropriate outcome.
• You are disinterested in repairing the relationship (instead, maintaining a position of blaming your partner).
• You may discover that the changes required are greater than either partner is prepared to make.
• Or the counselling approach may simply not be a good fit for you.

This is why it is important to ask a potential counsellor about their specific training and experience in couple counselling, rather than assuming that experience in individual counselling automatically means experience in working therapeutically with relationships.

The aim should not be to promise an outcome.

The aim is to create the best conditions for you to understand your relationship and make informed decisions about what happens next.

How Long Does Couple Counselling Take?

There is no fixed number of sessions that every couple needs.

Dean has worked with different couples for fewer than 6 sessions and for longer than 5 years. There is no good average number because every relationship is distinct.

Some couples come with a specific problem and want short-term counselling focused on that particular issue. Other couples have relationship difficulties that have developed over many years and need longer-term work.

The important question is not simply:

“How many sessions will we need?”

It is:

“Are the sessions helping us understand and manage our relationship differently?”

Counselling can be short-term, focused around a particular goal, or continue for longer as the relationship’s needs develop.

The work eventually ends when the partners are sufficiently confident in managing their relationship themselves.

Why Choose Specialist LGBTQ+ Couple Counselling?

A relationship counsellor needs to understand relationships, but LGBTQ+ couples can also benefit from working with someone who understands the particular context in which LGBTQ+ relationships exist.

There should be no assumption that your relationship follows heterosexual relationship conventions.

You may be:

• A gay male couple;
• A lesbian couple;
• A bisexual relationship;
• A mixed-orientation couple;
• Transgender partners;
• An open or non-monogamous couple;
• A throuple or other consensually non-monogamous relationship.

Distinct LGBTQ+ Partnerships

The purpose of an LGBTQ+-affirming approach is not to treat every LGBTQ+ relationship as having the same problems.

It is the opposite.

Your relationship is allowed to be understood on its own terms.

The therapeutic approach is specifically focused on LGBTQ+ relationships and is described as “non-judgemental” and “non-pathologising” – meaning we don’t label and we don’t point fingers.

What should you Expect from Couple Counselling?

Ultimately, couple counselling is a process of understanding your relationship differently.

You bring the problems. You bring your experiences, observations and ideas.

The counsellor brings specialist knowledge of relationship dynamics and a structured therapeutic process.

We work together

Together, you investigate what is happening.

You may discover patterns that neither of you had previously recognised. You may understand why apparently small issues repeatedly become major arguments. You may find new ways to communicate, negotiate difficulties or respond to each other.

And you may discover that some things cannot be changed.

That information is valuable too.

The purpose of couple counselling is not to provide a guarantee about your relationship’s future. It is to help you become better informed about the relationship you actually have so that you and your partner can make better decisions about what you want to do with it.

Couple Counselling is NOT about finding the Guilty Partner

If you are considering relationship counselling because you keep having the same argument, you may already have a strong opinion about who is responsible.

The more useful starting point can be to ask:

“What happens between us that keeps producing this result?”

That shift, from blaming an individual to understanding the relationship, can open up possibilities that are difficult to see when you are both trying to prove your own position.

And that is fundamentally how couple counselling works.

About this Bespoke Counselling Service

Dean Richardson [dar_professionaltitle]

Dean is a postgraduate-qualified systemic and psychodynamic couple counsellor with more than 27 years’ counselling experience. His private counselling service provides specialist relationship counselling online through secure video, allowing couples to work with a counsellor without, say, having to travel to a counselling office each week.

A first session does not commit you to continuing. It gives you an opportunity to find out whether counselling is right for you. You will not be made to attend more sessions than is right for you.

Find out more about LGBTQ+ Couple Counselling for Couples…

The post How Does Couple Counselling Actually Work? appeared first on LGBTQ+ Couple Counselling | Video Therapist.

When loving men are drifting apart… couple counselling can be the surprise resolution, helping identify problems and build plans that bring you to where you want to be.

Love between men, husbands, spouses, significant others, boyfriends, or even just friends can be deep and steady, but occasionally it can begin to drift.

This brief article explains, in plain English, how counselling for gay couples (the science bit: using integrated systemic and psychodynamic theoretical models) can help your most precious relationship – or friendship – rebuild trust, break repeating patterns, and rediscover its real connection once again. When men ask, “How do we stop our relationship from drifting?”, counselling (along with some hard work, too) may be their ideal solution.

Is therapy a form of magic? 🪄

No, it’s simply an effective, easy-to-learn approach that you’ve likely not come across before…

Why Men in Relationships Considers Counselling 💔

Even the strongest of relationships can reach a point where they feel stagnant or even unbearable.

What brings male couples to counselling? (Alanjvm)

Maybe old arguments have started to repeat without ever reaching a resolution.

Maybe the once exciting intimacy has faded into a silence.

Sometimes the problem isn’t about conflicts, but there is a quiet sense of disconnection – a feeling that you’re living side by side rather than together.

Men – friends or boyfriends – who are drifting apart may not know who to turn to for help.

Stress from work or family, rejection, internalised homophobia, having suicidal thoughts or simply experiencing the decline of a gay community to lean on are just some experiences that can hurt men’s relationships with one another.

But when love feels complicated and the conflicts exceed what men can manage alone, counselling for men’s relationships offers partners an opportunity to pause, talk openly, and rediscover what drew them to each other. It works for men either in an intimate relationship or a platonic one .

By caring enough to invest in your relationship, counselling gives you a neutral space to understand each other more deeply, to strengthen your emotional safety, and to help rebuild a partnership that can feel very much alive and worth investing in once again.

An Integrated Approach that helps Men 🔮

Counsellor Dean Richardson MNCPS (Accred/Reg) applies an integrated systemic & psychodynamic approach to couple counselling. This means that he helps you both look at your relationship from at least two really useful angles.

Counselling Theories and Models (Gerd Altmann)

• The systemic side shows the patterns you fall into – who withdraws, who pursues, and how conversations spin out. Think of this as zooming out and watching how you behave together.
• The psychodynamic side goes deeper: it explores how past experiences – messages about masculinity, early rejection, or the stress of hiding parts of yourself – can shape how you connect now.

When combined together, these helpful ways of looking at relationships from a psychological point of view can help you, as the couple in conflict, begin to see behaviour cycles more clearly; and once you can see things more clearly, the hidden feelings that have been fuelling unhappy behaviour can become revealed, understood, and attended to.

Healing your Partnership through Comprehension 💡

Many gay men carry emotional weight from earlier years: family rejection, bullying, the effort of always explaining who we are, or the burden of hiding ourselves away from public view.

Healing by Understanding (Alessandro Alle)

Most of us have experienced homophobia, and some of us still feel fear at the core of our lives. Experiences like these can result in a kind of armour that grows, making it harder for you to trust and be close.

In counselling, we create an emotionally safe environment where both partners can take the risk of lowering their defences (aka the “armour”).

The counsellor will help guide your conversations so that both of you feel heard rather than just feeling you’re receiving nothing but blame from your partner.

When defences begin to soften, empathy has room to grow – the first real step toward restoring genuine intimacy in your relationship.

 

Looking for Couples Therapy

ARE YOU LOOKING FOR THE GAY MEN'S COUPLE COUNSELLOR……who understands many of the problems that gay male couples face and who can assist in working through to better times?

Read about Dean Richardson MNCPS (Accred/Reg)'s gay couple therapy services today and begin your journey toward the more connected, more resilient relationship that you both want back.

Learn more…

How Couple Counselling Addresses Stuck Patterns 🧩

Gay male couples can become stuck in repetitive patterns of behaviour. Arguing about chores, sex, or time together is rarely just about those topics, but perhaps these are the topics the couple feel they can argue about without opening the proverbial can of worms (i.e. dealing with the sensitive topics that they really want to).

Stuck Behaviour (Arek Socha)

Often the same emotional pattern keeps playing out: one partner withdraws, the other pushes for closeness, and the loop repeats.

In counselling, the systemic lens helps us recognise the loop, while the psychodynamic lens helps us understand where it came from (and how it developed) in the first place.

Maybe a long time ago, one partner learnt that needing anyone would lead to rejection, and the other partner learnt to defend rather than feel vulnerable, resulting in the relationship becoming helplessly behaviourally stuck.

When learning to detect patterns of behaviour and what they’re really about under the surface, the couple can change how they respond to one another: pain becomes visible, not just provocational, and the couple can manage the actual pain together, rather than argue about who is supposed to be washing the dishes.

Rediscovering Connection between Men’s Relationships 💘

Connection doesn’t always mean complete understanding of their partner, perfect sex, constant romance or holding hands at the cinema.

Rediscover Intimacy (Tyli Jura)

Connection and/or intimacy are about feeling safe enough to be yourself and to share your needs with your partner.

When vital aspects of your relationship are lost, counselling can help rebuild intimacy and safety, and when safety returns, physical closeness can follow naturally.

Couples therapy – especially with an understanding an experienced LGBTQ+ relationship counsellor – encourages curiosity: asking fresh questions about each other’s wants, fantasies, boundaries and history.

By employing curiosity themselves, the couple can learn new information in a safe way – and with such new information comes new choices and new directions in which to the coupke might take the relationship.

These conversations, handled with care, can lead to a more honest and satisfying sex life as well as both partners developing a better relationship with intimate affection.

Beneficial Tools & Exercises to Improve Connection 👨🏻‍🔧

Counselling isn’t just talk. You get to develop your own clear tools that you can use at home:

Relationship Tools (Steve Buissinne)

• How to spot and name your relationship patterns before they escalate.
• Simple communication techniques that prevent arguments from turning personal.
• Ways to ask for what you need without triggering shame or withdrawal.
• Steps to rebuild trust after distance or small betrayals.
• Ways to ask questions that are helpful, and how to reply to questions without becoming wounded or defensive.

These tools – when developed together with your counsellor – can help the couple move from reacting defensively to one another to choosing how they want to be with each other.

Taking Pride in Growth & Achievements 🏳️‍🌈

When two men invest in their relationship, they strengthen more than their bond – they strengthen a partnership that can weather stress, change, and outside pressures.

Pride through Growth

Counselling helps you bring your full selves – resilience, vulnerability, and humour – into your distinct relationship.

By bringing your true selves, your relationship can grow, and you can both take pride in that growth.

Couples in counselling can build a shared confidence and the quiet pride that comes from choosing to work through difficulties to create a more honest, joyful partnership.

Whilst counselling may seem daunting to begin with, many see it as the most satisfying achievement that the both of you experienced together.

A First Step is Simple Conversation 🗣️

It’s normal to hope problems will resolve on their own. But relationships don’t come with instructions, and when they go wrong, there’s no manual to refer to. Asking for professional support doesn’t mean you failed; it means you care about the future of the relationship.

First Steps in Counselling (sayays)

If you want to explore couple counselling, look for therapists (a) experienced with LGBTQ+ relationships and (b) who are qualified to employ an integrated systemic and psychodynamic theoretical model of therapy.

Online therapy for gay male relationships is no different than meeting your counsellor in his office – except you’re using video conferencing devices just like you do for business, and just like you did with family and friends during the 2019/20 Lockdowns.

One honest conversation together in the presence of a skilled, experienced counsellor like Dean Richardson MNCPS (Accred/Reg) could be the beginning of lasting change for you both.

The post When Loving Men are Drifting Apart | Counselling Works…? appeared first on LGBTQ+ Couple Counselling | Video Therapist.

Helping you Tell your Story (once again)

It can help to think of couples counselling as “telling their story together.”

Here’s an example.

A couple comes into counselling carrying an open box. Inside the box are many jigsaw pieces, all mixed up. The pieces, together, represent how the relationship is supposed to “look” to the couple. The couple assumes that all the pieces that should be there are there, and they begin to build the jigsaw together to make the picture. As they do, the following happens…

• One partner pulls out a piece, saying, “a blue piece—this obviously means it’s a piece of the ‘sky’!” and attempts to match their jigsaw piece to others that may also be sky.
• The other partner looks at the piece, saying, “but a blue piece is not ‘sky’; blue is ‘sea’!” They take the piece away from their partner and tries to fit the piece with other pieces that might also be “sea”.

A struggle ensues between the partners. Some pieces are fitting together and others are not; the couple is fighting over whether “blue” means “sky” or “sea” and, therefore, what the overall “picture” is meant to look like.

But there’s a bigger problem with this approach than just the argument…

What Nobody has Noticed about the Jigsaw

… is that no-one brought the jigsaw’s box lid with them.

The couple don’t know what their relationship jigsaw “picture” is supposed to look like.

This can be a BIG problem for the couple!

Each partner in the relationship has an individual assumption about what each jigsaw piece is meant to be. Without the picture, though, they cannot refer to a common image. They aren’t talking or bargaining with each other to figure out what each part of their relationship could mean. They are both forcing the other into accepting their individual meanings.

If this jigsaw puzzle story were analogous to a gay couple’s relationship, what does counselling contribute to helping the couple rebuild (or build for the very first time) the picture of how their relationship is going to look?

Learning your Partner’s Story

During counselling sessions, the counsellor’s role will include facilitating the gay couple into discussing, negotiating, and agreeing/empathising/comprehending what each “jigsaw piece might mean”.

In the above example, blue could mean “sky” (according to one partner) or “sea” (according to the other). But what does “blue” mean in the context of the couple’s relationship?

We’re assisting the couple in learning new information (remember the top of this page: new information →  inspiration, negotiation, compromise). With new information, we may discover new ways for each component of the relationship to fit together. We might learn different attributions for parts of the relationship. We might learn what the relationship picture is supposed to be.

We’re supporting each partner with hypothesising: “if a blue piece could be more than sky or sea, what else could it be?” to empower the couple with newer (piece-fitting…) options to help build their newer relationship picture.

The couple (at their pace) becomes empowered to make their own hypotheses about (and with) each other. As this ebbs and glows, the counsellor steps back and forth, keeping the couple’s relationship in mind. The couple are discovering new information and are making new, informed choices sufficiently for the pieces of their relationship to fit together better than before, and a clearer picture is developing in front of them.

The post Couples Don’t Talk… for Very Good Reasons appeared first on LGBTQ+ Couple Counselling | Video Therapist.

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