What is Premarital Counseling?

Premarital counseling is a preventative form of therapy created to help couples prepare for marriage or long-term commitment by developing a repertoire of communication tools, addressing potential areas of conflict before they emerge or become calcified, and exploring various marital themes before they become a reality. It is often time limited to 8-12 sessions and can occur at any juncture in a couples journey—in the early stages of a relationship, right before marriage, or right after marriage. What is great about premarital counseling is that you can also develop a relationship with the couples therapist and utilize this person as a resource down the line when other issues emerge. I’ve now had several couples who did premarital work with me return months or years later to do couples therapy for a short stint when new or old issue emerged.

If I had it my way, I think ALL couples should be required to go through some form of premarital counseling, even just for 2-3 sessions, before being granted a marriage license…kind of like taking a “fitness test” before you launch into one the most difficult and meaningful trek’s of your life. Though divorce is certainly necessary sometimes in order to protect the emotional and physical well-being of individuals or children, if couples can enter marriage with as many tools, maps, and a skillful guide in thinking through potential challenges, the problems that make divorce an inevitability or better option for one’s mental health could be avoided or significantly reduced. In my many years as a psychologist, I’ve only encountered a handful of individuals who told me “my family or origin really helped me identify my emotions, communicated really well, modeled how to effective resolve conflict, and gave me a great template for how to keep my relationships healthy.” Most of us did not grow up in an era or cultural systems that taught us how to do these things. As such, most people end up enacting the same blueprints from childhood or stumble and grow into these skills through their adult relationships if and when they become aware that they don’t want to replicate what they saw growing up.

For couples seeking premarital counseling, I often suggest utilizing the Prepare & Enrich Assessment. This self-report measure covers a wide range of areas of congruence, strengths, and growth areas measured across nine domains: communication, conflict resolution, partner style & habits, financial management, leisure activities, sexual expectations, family & friends, characters traits, and spiritual beliefs. What I also value about this assessment tool is that it zooms in on each partner’s stress profile, perception of closeness and disconnection, and individual personality traits, including assertiveness, self-confidence, avoidance, and partner dominance.

After couples complete this assessment, I use the report to generate a series of questions for each domain. Premarital sessions are more like exploratory conversations where couples can apply results and insights to various experiences and issues they’ve already encountered or are invited to imagine how they might handle future challenges. What I love about premarital counseling is the opportunity for couples to discover deeper and nuanced value differences and things they didn’t know about each other and may not know until the specific issue arises—such as how involved they want their parents to be with their future children, where they want to invest any liquid assets, how they feel about moving cities if someone gets a great job opportunity, or how important physical intimacy needs to be during major life transitions. Being able to have these conversations before ruptures, tension points, and arguments have already eroded the ability to properly learn and understand one another with a clear and more optimistic mindset is truly invaluable.