Should I Stay or Leave?
Discernment Counseling - In or Out?
Are you on a brink of a Break-up or Divorce?
Any couple who is considering a Break-up or Divorce has probably already exhausted all avenues to improve their relationship between the two. You may also be doubtful that your partner or the relationship can ever change for the better. The tension is high, you feel like you are walking on eggshells, maybe you are suppressing your needs to make it work, you are exhausted, and want to escape, but also feel stuck and trapped.
Discernment Counseling is a time-limited approach for maximum of five sessions to help partners consider all options before they make the decision to work on or terminate a relationship. Discernment Counseling is not a couples therapy. The goal is not to solve relationship issues but to determine whether any problems are solvable or perpetual issues.
Discernment Counseling is designed for couples who are struggling to decide whether they want to continue their relationship especially when they have children together, have shared assets and investments together, and belong to part of the culture where your reputation & keeping the "face" are important and there is a lot of shame and stigma attached to the concept of divorce - things can be complicated. You have a lot to lose with a Break-up or Divorce, but you also realize that you have a lot to lose if you stay as well.
Discernment Counseling is also helpful for "mix-agenda couples" where one partner wants to end the relationship or have one foot "out of the door" already while the other partner hopes to preserve the relationship desperately.
Discernment Counseling leads to one of the 3 paths:
Path 1: Status Quo
Path 2: Make a well-informed, ideally, a mutual decision to Break-up or Divorce
Path 3: Strategize on a detailed reconciliation plan to wholeheartedly work on the relationship or the marriage without any threats of leaving and as an “all out effort” on both sides to saving and renewing the relationship
Couples often feel the sense of closure and clarity even if the couple decides not to stay together. Couples can communicate more amicably and co-parenting becomes better, and they get to save money on attorney fees. Couples can also reignite the sense of hope and see the potential of saving the relationship. Let's have no regrets.