Best Marriages

What is Marathon Couples Therapy?

BestMarriages.com offers Intensive Marathon Therapy through our organization. Arrangements can be made with one of our Certified Gottman Therapists to provide extended sessions consisting of several hours or occurring over several consecutive days to provide Intensive Marathon Therapy.

Couples who have experienced this modality and have been in typical counselling sessions said they would never have made the breakthroughs they did without being able to work through their issue in one extended sitting. They felt that by not being rushed, the needed safety to share was built as they went on in the session.

What does Marathon Couples Therapy Involve?

Marathon Couples Therapy is an intensive and focused therapeutic modality for couples in high distress or simply in need of a Marriage expert. What you can expect from a Marathon session with one of our counselors is to foster respect, affection, and closeness to build and share a deeper connection with each other’s inner world; to keep conflict discussions calm; to facilitate breakthroughs; to resolve conflict grid-lock; and to strengthen and maintain the gains in your relationship.

We start out by identifying the goals and intentions of the therapy process right from the start. We help couples come to a compromise on their “gridlocked” issues: many times couples do not always have the same aspirations, hopes or goals, yet they need to come to some sort of resolution. We do our best to honor both individuals’ hopes and dreams. Our goal is to facilitate clients in accessing new strengths, learning new skills, and gaining new insights, which  moves them in the direction that they want their relationship to go.

Prior to coming in, you will complete an assessment packet that you can do online through our website. In this assessment packet you will be asked several questions about the current state of your relationship, as well as what it is you hope to achieve during therapy. These goals will become our objective, and we will review your assessment packet prior to meeting with you.

We are available for Marathon sessions almost any day of the week, depending of course, on scheduling availability. You will first meet together with your therapist(s), and then each partner will have the opportunity for an individual session as well (Often we do the individual sessions by phone prior to the couple attending the sessions). After that, the therapist(s) will meet with both partners and discuss the current state of your relationship, how it got there, and the establishment of a plan for moving you toward your goals. Once we believe that we are all on the same page, the therapy begins in earnest.

Please review the Counseling Services section of our website to get a better description of what therapy will include.

Who Would Benefit from Marathon Couples Therapy?

Who would Not be a Candidate for Marathon Couples Therapy?

Couples who have already determined to leave their relationship and cannot commit to the therapy process are unlikely to derive significant benefit from this process, and are therefore not candidates for this type of therapy.

How Does this Work?

If you live out of town, you will book several hours in a row, and/or two to three consecutive days of therapy. You would stay in a local hotel or commute back to your home, depending on travel distance. Depending on how the therapy evolves, you may choose to return for followup sessions every few weeks or months. You will pay in full prior to attending sessions, and due to our scheduling commitments, there is a 3 week cancellation policy. Your therapist has to make themselves available and arrange their schedules for these sessions, so it is imperative that you keep your appointment and commit to this process.

Our rates are $150 per hour, plus HST.

Please contact our office at 604-539-5277 and we will answer any further questions you may have, including scheduling possibilities.