DBT for Couples
Do intense emotions make your relationship feel overwhelming?
You're not broken—you're caught in patterns of invalidation that DBT skills can change
Maybe every conversation feels like walking through a minefield. One wrong word and everything explodes. You're frequently triggered by each other, and neither of you knows how to de-escalate once things get heated. The intensity is exhausting—screaming matches, slammed doors, days of cold silence. You love each other, but the relationship feels chaotic, unstable, and sometimes unbearable.
You've probably tried couples therapy before, maybe multiple times. Therapists taught you "I statements" and active listening, but those tools evaporate the moment emotions spike. When you're flooded with anger, hurt, or panic, you can't remember communication techniques. The intensity overwhelms everything, and you fall back into the same destructive patterns.
You might have one or both partners struggling with emotional intensity, past trauma, anxiety, depression, or borderline personality disorder. Standard couples therapy wasn't designed for this level of emotional dysregulation, and you need something different—something that addresses the emotional storms, not just the communication problems.
Do small disagreements escalate into explosive fights?
What starts as a minor issue—who forgot to pick something up, a misunderstood text, a casual comment—quickly spirals into a full-scale war. Within minutes, you're yelling, saying things you don't mean, bringing up past hurts, and attacking each other's character. The original issue gets lost in the chaos.
One or both of you might struggle with emotional regulation. When upset, emotions go from 0 to 100 instantly. Anger becomes rage. Hurt becomes devastation. Fear becomes panic. The emotional intensity feels intolerable, and you do whatever you can to make it stop—which often means lashing out, shutting down, or doing things that damage the relationship further.
Maybe one partner has a history of trauma, abandonment, or invalidation that makes relationship conflict feel life-threatening. When your partner seems distant, critical, or upset, your nervous system interprets it as danger. You might pursue frantically, demand reassurance, or explode to force connection. Or you might withdraw completely, shut down emotionally, or leave to protect yourself from overwhelming feelings.
Your partner doesn't understand why you react so intensely. You don't understand why they can't see how much pain you're in. The disconnect feels unbearable, and the fights keep getting worse because neither of you has skills to manage the emotional intensity that fuels them.
Does invalidation frequently show up in your interactions?
Invalidation—having your thoughts, feelings, or experiences dismissed, minimized, or criticized—might show up frequently in your relationship. One partner shares their feelings, and the other says they're overreacting, too sensitive, or wrong to feel that way. Or maybe both of you invalidate each other, each feeling unheard and misunderstood.
Invalidation sounds like: "You're being dramatic." "That's not what happened." "You're too sensitive." "You're making a big deal out of nothing." "Why can't you just get over it?" "Other people don't have this problem." These messages—even when not intentionally cruel—communicate that your inner experience is wrong or unacceptable.
When you're regularly invalidated, you start to doubt yourself. Maybe your feelings are wrong. Maybe you are too much. Maybe the problem is you. Or you swing the other way: you know your feelings are valid, so your partner must be “gaslighting” you, attacking you, or refusing to see the truth. Either way, intimacy dies.
You might also invalidate yourself or your partner without realizing it. You minimize your own needs to avoid conflict. You tell yourself you shouldn't feel hurt when you do. You dismiss your partner's concerns because they seem illogical or excessive. Neither of you feels seen, heard, or accepted for who you are. Without validation, emotional connection becomes impossible.
Are you stuck in pursue-withdraw or other destructive patterns?
You can predict exactly how conflicts will unfold because you repeat the same dance every time. Maybe one partner pursues—reaching out, demanding to talk, following them room to room, needing resolution now. The other withdraws—shutting down, leaving, refusing to engage, needing space. The more one pursues, the more the other withdraws. The more the other withdraws, the more desperate the pursuer becomes. Both feel misunderstood and both feel harmed by the other's behavior.
Or maybe you're both high-conflict—you escalate together, matching each other's intensity until things get out of control. Voices get louder, words get harsher—you frighten yourselves with how bad it gets, but you don't know how to interrupt the pattern once it starts.
Perhaps one partner is "walking on eggshells," managing the other's emotions, avoiding topics that might upset them, or sacrificing their own needs to keep the peace. The other partner might not even realize the impact—they just know they feel angry, anxious, or misunderstood most of the time. Resentment builds on both sides.
These patterns don't mean you're bad people or doomed to fail. They mean you're using ineffective strategies that made sense given your histories, but they're destroying your relationship. You need specific skills to interrupt these cycles and create new patterns that actually work.
We understand that high-conflict relationships require more than traditional couple therapy—they require specific skills for managing emotional intensity, validating each other effectively, and interrupting destructive patterns. We offer DBT for Couples, an evidence-based approach that teaches both partners the emotional regulation, distress tolerance, and interpersonal effectiveness skills needed to transform conflict into connection.
How DBT for Couples transforms high-conflict relationships
DBT Couples Therapy, based on the work of Dr. Alan Fruzzetti and outlined in his book High Conflict Couple, adapts Dialectical Behavior Therapy skills specifically for couples. Unlike traditional couples therapy that assumes both partners can stay emotionally regulated during conflict, DBT Couples Therapy recognizes that emotional dysregulation is often the core problem—and teaches specific skills to address it.
When you're ready to get started, we work with you as a couple (and sometimes individually when needed) to learn and practice DBT skills together. This means you'll both develop the same skill set, speak the same language, and be able to coach each other through difficult moments. Treatment focuses on reducing invalidation, increasing validation, managing emotional intensity, and creating new patterns of interaction that serve your relationship.
We start by assessing your relationship patterns and teaching you about DBT principles. In initial sessions, we explore what cues conflicts, how they typically unfold, and what patterns keep you stuck. We identify specific behaviors that damage your relationship—criticism, defensiveness, contempt, stonewalling, invalidation—and begin to understand the emotional vulnerabilities driving them. We also introduce core DBT concepts: dialectics (both/and thinking instead of either/or), validation, and the biosocial theory that explains how emotional sensitivity develops. Understanding these foundations helps you see your relationship problems through a new lens.
Next, we teach you validation skills—the antidote to relationship conflict. Validation is the most powerful tool for relationships. It means communicating that you understand your partner's perspective, that their feelings make sense given their experience, and that they're not wrong or broken for feeling what they feel. We teach you the six levels of validation, from being present and paying attention to radical genuineness where you're completely authentic. You'll practice validating your partner even when you disagree, even when their reaction seems disproportionate, even when you're hurt or angry yourself. Validation doesn't mean agreement—it means acknowledging your partner's reality. This skill alone transforms relationships.
We teach you mindfulness and emotional regulation skills you can use during conflict. When emotions spike, traditional communication skills fail because your prefrontal cortex goes offline. DBT Couples Therapy teaches you to notice when you're becoming dysregulated and use specific skills to get back into your "wise mind." You'll learn mindfulness techniques to stay present instead of getting hijacked by emotions or worst-case scenarios. You'll learn to observe and describe emotions without acting on them impulsively. You'll practice opposite action—doing the opposite of what your emotion urges you to do when that urge isn't effective. These skills help you stay in control even when emotions are intense.
We help you identify and interrupt destructive patterns in real-time. During sessions, when you start falling into old patterns—escalating, invalidating, pursuing, withdrawing—we pause and help you see what's happening. We coach you through using skills in the moment: taking a break when flooded, validating before problem-solving, using "I feel" statements instead of blame, or practicing radical acceptance when you can't change something. You'll learn to recognize what activates your emotion, notice early warning signs of dysregulation, and intervene before conflicts spiral. Between sessions, you'll practice these skills in daily life and track what works and what doesn't.
We address the specific issues in your relationship while using DBT skills. Whether you're dealing with trust issues after infidelity, parenting disagreements, financial stress, or extended family conflicts, we help you approach these topics using DBT skills. You'll learn to use interpersonal effectiveness skills to ask for what you need without demanding or attacking, to say no while maintaining the relationship, and to negotiate conflicts where both people's needs matter. We also teach distress tolerance skills for managing the pain of relationship problems you can't immediately solve—because some issues take time, and you need ways to tolerate distress without making things worse.
Why choose DBT Couples Therapy at our clinic?
We specialize in high-conflict and emotionally intense relationships. Our therapists are trained specifically in DBT for Couples and understand the unique challenges of relationships where one or both partners struggle with emotional dysregulation. We've successfully worked with couples where one or both partners have BPD, PTSD, bipolar disorder, and/or significant trauma histories. We don't shy away from intensity—we have the skills and expertise to work with couples other therapists might consider "too difficult." If you've been told you need individual therapy before couples work, or if previous couples therapy failed because of emotional intensity, we can help.
We teach concrete skills, not just insights. Many couples already understand their problems intellectually but still can't stop the destructive patterns. DBT Couples Therapy is different: it's skill-based and behavioral. You'll learn specific, practical techniques you can use immediately. We practice skills in session until they become natural. You'll leave each session with homework—skills to practice, situations to navigate differently, new behaviors to try. This isn't talk therapy; it's skills training that creates measurable change in how you interact. Our clients consistently tell us that learning validation and emotion regulation skills transformed their relationship in ways years of traditional therapy never did.
We address individual and relationship issues simultaneously. Many high-conflict couples struggle because one or both partners have individual mental health issues, trauma histories, or emotion regulation difficulties affecting the relationship. DBT Couples Therapy works on both levels: we help you as individuals develop better emotional regulation while also helping you as a couple create healthier patterns. Sometimes we meet with partners individually to work on personal skills before or alongside couples work. This integrated approach means you don't have to choose between individual healing and relationship healing—you get both.
Frequently Asked Questions
How is DBT Couples Therapy different from regular couples therapy?
Traditional couples therapy often focuses on communication skills, understanding relationship patterns, and resolving specific conflicts. DBT Couples Therapy does this too, but adds a crucial component: emotional regulation and distress tolerance skills. We assume that communication techniques fail when emotions are too intense, so we teach you how to manage emotional intensity first. We also emphasize validation as the primary intervention—research shows that increasing validation dramatically reduces conflict. Finally, DBT Couples Therapy is more structured and skill-focused than traditional approaches, with specific homework and practice between sessions. If you've tried couples therapy without success, especially if emotional intensity derailed the work, DBT Couples Therapy offers something different.
What if only one of us has emotional regulation problems?
Both partners benefit from learning DBT skills, regardless of who struggles more with emotional dysregulation. If one partner has BPD, trauma history, or significant emotion management difficulties, they'll learn skills to regulate their emotions more effectively. The other partner will learn skills to validate, de-escalate conflicts, and not take their partner's dysregulation personally. They'll also learn to manage their own emotional responses to their partner's intensity. The partner without diagnosed issues often discovers they also struggle with validation, emotional awareness, or distress tolerance—these skills benefit everyone. The goal is for both of you to learn the same language and skill set so you can support each other.
Can DBT Couples Therapy help if there's been infidelity or major trust violations?
Yes. DBT skills are particularly helpful for couples recovering from betrayal because they provide structure for managing the intense emotions that arise. The hurt partner learns distress tolerance skills for managing intrusive thoughts, triggers, and waves of pain without constant reassurance-seeking that can push the other partner away. The partner who broke trust learns radical acceptance of the consequences of their actions and practices opposite action—showing up consistently even when faced with anger or mistrust. Both partners practice validation, which is essential for rebuilding trust. We help you navigate this painful process with skills that prevent further damage while you heal.
How long does DBT Couples Therapy take?
Treatment length varies depending on the severity of conflict and how quickly you learn and implement skills. Some couples see significant improvement in 3-6 months, while others benefit from longer-term work over a year or more. We typically meet weekly, though some high-conflict couples benefit from twice-weekly sessions initially. Unlike open-ended therapy, DBT Couples Therapy has clear goals: when you can manage emotional intensity, validate effectively, interrupt destructive patterns, and resolve conflicts without damage, you're ready to reduce session frequency or end treatment. Many couples continue with monthly maintenance sessions to reinforce skills and address new challenges as they arise.