Face-2-Face Counseling

Counseling in person has the great advantage of chemistry. In addition to the close attention that you would get from either phone or e-counseling, with f2f there will be the added rapport that only in-person therapy can give. I am located in Hollywood, just 2 min. off I-95; I am in my office from 10:30AM to 9PM Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. If you are coming in as a couple or family, I recommend 1 1/2 hours for the first visit. The cost is $300. I will do a thorough intake and you will leave my room with some ideas as to where we are going in therapy. After that, or if you come in alone, the cost is $200/1 hour.

For a taste of what counseling is like, read on:

Is YOUR story anything like that of Rachael and Robert?

Rachael and Robert were very much in love when they met and married six years ago. What happened? There have been nothing but fights. And I mean fights. Their loud voices could be heard in the streets outside the house in their quiet South Florida neighborhood. When the windows were open in the glory days of winter, the neighbors made those cluck-clucking sounds and hurried to their own homes.

Behind those doors, the fights were always the same. It was as if a stupid recording kept rewinding and playing the old garbage again and again. They couldn't get out of the same old routine. It always began with the accusations. Robert couldn't understand why Rachael wasn't home when she was supposed to be. Twenty minutes seemed like a lot to him and as the minutes ticked by, his anxiety level went up. If it went to a half-hour or more, forget it. By the time she walked in, he was steaming.

This really left Rachael in a trap. If there was the usual South Florida traffic, she was ready to enter a state of road rage trying to get home on time to prevent his anger. If her boss needed her at work, she couldn't put her heart into the project because of her worries about the time. If a friend wanted to stop for coffee, she became really angry at Robert in her heart for controlling her life like that. Why shouldn't she go for coffee, for Pete's sake?

And the accusations were particularly galling because they were plain false. She was too heartbroken, angry, and scared to cheat. Why can't we get back to the days when we trusted one another? She asked herself again and again. Every attempt she made to be sweet and change the mood backfired because Robert took that as a sure sign of guilt and got angrier instead of calmer.

So it was only natural that a point came that she yelled back. I mean, from her perspective, her dignity was on the line. That was no good either because sometimes those fights escalated--as they frequently do. One time, he pushed her the wrong way and her head hit the corner of the bed. Her face got bruised and she told everyone at the office that she fell, which was partially the truth. She was afraid to contact the police, because although South Florida is progressive in its understanding of domestic violence, for her that would be a psychological defeat. It would mean the relationship had really gone down the tubes. She wasn't ready to admit that (as is frequently the case with abuse victims).

They tried everything. Or so they thought. Of course, they tried counseling first. Two years after they married, they found a therapist on their insurance plan. (That was a lucky break for them because South Florida has a diminishing number of insurance plans that pay for mental health benefits.) Because Robert always felt his anxieties more under control when he took control, he did just that at the session. It didn't take him long to explain to the therapist his concerns. He came across as a concerned husband. Rachael said very little. She was afraid of him starting up with her all over again at home. She prayed that this therapist would let him know how smothering his behavior was.

Rachael could not believe her ears when the counselor turned to her and asked, "Rachael, don't you have a cellphone? Why don't you just call when you're going to be late?"

[This is frequently a problem with therapists trying to work with couples. They are not trained for couples counseling. It is also frequently a problem with therapists on insurance plans. Since "providers" are so poorly compensated by the insurance companies, plans frequently have beginning therapists on them, working for large, impersonal agencies.]

Her heart sank. How could she explain how this was only the tip of the iceberg? How if she called, he wouldn't believe what she said anyway? How she was allowed no freedom? How he demanded sex? How he put her down? And on and on.

She heaved a deep sigh. It was as if all the heart had gone out of her. Six months later, one of his "episodes" got worse. He started to hyperventillate and told her he thought he was going to die. They went to the emergency room of the nearest hospital. The medical staff there told him it was "just" a panic attack and suggested he see his doctor to get "something" for it.

[America has been brainwashed by the pharmaceutical industry to think of medical interventions as the first course of treatment when, actually, it will, in the long run, be the worst choice.]

Scared for his health, Robert followed the advice. He got an appointment with his family doctor and got a prescription for an anti-anxiety medication. He started to feel better in a few weeks. He reported not feeling so panicky; he was more relaxed. Rachael was thrilled. The new Robert lasted a good five months. He would ask her casually what had taken her so long. He would listen to her answer and if he didn't like it, he would become cold and withdrawn. But he didn't erupt at her. Rachael still felt like she had to walk on eggshells, but at least the fighting had diminished. Then, one day, some friends urged her to stop with them after work for a break before heading home. Rachael felt like she needed that break. And, if she had to admit the truth, she hated coming home any more. She threw caution to the wind. And paid for it later.

When she got home, Robert lashed out. He broke a vase right near her just to scare her. He was absolutely out of control. Terrified, Rachael screamed that if he didn't stop, she would call the police. That actually worked. He stopped and slammed out the door. She was shaking and crumpled up on the floor crying her heart out. On his part, Robert was frightened of himself. He was particularly shocked that he would feel the way he did while taking his medication.

[That is the first problem with using chemicals to change behavior. The chemicals produce a different brain environment, but the individual still thinks the same way. The individual has the same beliefs, opinions, values. Robert still didn't like his wife out there in the world, beyond his reach. He still worried that she would eventually cheat on him. He still wondered why she was not happy and hated her for reminding him that her unhappiness was because of him. How could some Medication be expected to change all that? Research shows that pharmaceuticals without good therapy is just about worthless and that with counseling by an experienced professional, you don't need the medication anyway. Research also shows that over a period of months, people's brains do such an efficient job of mopping up the foreign substances put in by the prescriptions that to achieve the same subjective feeling, the person has to raise the dosage. This is called tolerance.]

Robert came back hours later, depressed and nearly in tears himself. "I'm sorry," he blurted out. "I don't know what came over me. I am so sorry. Can we try to make things right?"

Rachael didn't know what to think. "Maybe we should try therapy again?" she asked. She wasn't too enthusiastic but someone told her that a Marriage and Family Therapist would understand couples issues better than just any old therapist. She went through the tedious task of going down the list of providers on her insurance plan and asking each one if he or she was a Marriage & Family Therapist. Eventually, she found Liz. Liz was very young, but Rachael was desperate. This time, she hit a jackpot. When Robert was finished telling his side of things, Liz politely said, "I haven't heard from your wife. Maybe she has something to add here." Now that was a good sign!

With great effort bringing up so many painful memories, Rachael told her side of the story. Liz actually listened!

"Why do you always think she would be cheating?" she questioned Robert.

"Well, if she isn't, then why isn't she happy to just be home with me?" he retorted. He also shared with them that his parents breakup when he was eight years old really scared him. He didn't see his mother much because she could not afford to keep him, so his father took him. But his father had a flock of girlfriends. Some were nice and just as he started to feel close to one, she would be out of their lives. He was always feeling anchorless. When he complained to his father, his father bluntly said, "Get over it. Be a man." He shrugged his shoulders. "Maybe that's why?" he asked.

Liz thought it could very well be. She responded, "You know that is probably right. Do you want to do something different than your father did? Do you want it better than he made it?"

"Of course," he responded.

"Then," she said, "you've got to get that anger under control."

Liz really handled it well. She put Robert on an anger management program. He was to monitor "triggers," that is, thoughts that would start getting him upset. He was to tell himself to stop thinking of them, and then, if the anger got close to being out of control, he was to take a "time out."

Robert worked hard on all this and it started to pay off. The fighting not only diminished but the coldness also did. Things on the surface got better. They got along. The only problem was that Robert, in his heart, could not get over the nagging thought when Rachael was late: where is she?? And for her part, Rachael's warm feelings for her husband had sort of evaporated. Things looked good on the surface and yet she felt disconnected to Robert; her mind started to wander to what life would be like without him.

[What went wrong with the therapy? The problem is that although Liz is a Marriage & Family Therapist, she had no training in abuse and trauma recovery. Robert's childhood history reveals trauma. What for an adult might just seem like "life" gave him a deep sense of insecurity and fear that he would lose the woman in his life as he had lost his own mother and a string of substititue mothers after her. This was brought up but never directly addressed in their counseling sessions.]

The good part of her counseling experience is that something did go right. Rachael had felt heard. She had felt that the therapist did a decent job in working on Robert's problem. She decided that no counselor could repair a broken heart; that if the flame was out, it was out.

She was wrong.

Luckily, in complaining a little bit to a co-worker, Vivian, the co-worker suggested she look up DrDeb on the internet. There was something different about her, she said.

Rachael discovered on DrDeb's website that she not only is a couples therapist but works with abuse recovery. Clearly, she, Rachael, was abused. She took the plunge and emailed DrDeb. She was surprised by DrDeb's response which stated, in part, "Did you ever consider that your husband was also abused? This was his childhood abuse: When you don't attend to a child's emotional needs, that's abuse. When you make fun of a child's emotional needs, that's also abuse. But dealing with couples counseling where one or both has an abuse history is my specialty" she said.

Rachael was a bit concerned here. She emailed her back, "Does that let him off the hook for all I've suffered?"

DrDeb's response again surprised her because she said in the reply, "Absolutely not. Proper therapy must be a combination of helping your husband take responsibility for his current behavior while healing from his old abuse. In fact, if he doesn't heal from the old trauma and abuse, he will never feel better, let alone act better."

Rachael gave this a whole bunch of thought. She had been through enough counseling experiences that she knew to ask good questions. So she replied, "Well, how do you do that?"

"I do healing activities such as hypnosis and guided imagery." DrDeb explained that hypnosis actually changes brain chemistry which, in turn, affects how you feel. "With this combination, we will help Robert." And for the third time, DrDeb surprised--and pleased--Rachael. "You understand that you have been injured from your abuse? You will have to heal, too." So! DrDeb did not overlook her! That was a good beginning for Rachael.

Here is the plan they created: Rachael and Robert would come in together for a session or two so DrDeb could get a sense of where she wanted to go with their counseling, then each would come in individually two times and then they would have a conjoint session again. This way, each person would have her undivided attention to work on personal issues while still putting their relationship at the center of the therapy focus. A Marriage & Family Therapist is trained to keep changing perspective from the individual to the couple and back again as needed.

Will face to face counseling help you? If you live in South Florida, give DrDeb a call.

If you don't live in Florida, consider phone counseling.

Or start by ordering my book The Secret Marriage Killer: Eradicating Verbal and Emotional Abuse

or the book on parenting.