Therapy for Relationship Problems in Washington State
Whether it’s your partner, your teenager, or the same painful pattern across every relationship — there’s help.
Maybe you and your partner keep having the same fights, cycling through the same patterns, saying things you regret and then struggling to repair afterward. Maybe the distance between you has grown so gradually that you barely noticed until you realized you feel like strangers. Maybe you’ve never been able to sustain a relationship that feels safe and stable — they either fall apart quickly or become intensely painful.
Relationship problems rarely come from bad intentions. Most people in troubled relationships are doing the best they can with the behaviors they learned — from their families, from past relationships, from experiences that shaped how they understand closeness, conflict, and trust. But behaviors that made sense in one context can be destructive in another. And without help, it can be very hard to change.
Effective, evidence-based therapy for relationships exists. The goal isn’t to assign blame or declare someone the problem — it’s to understand the behaviors that keep you stuck and learn new ones that actually work.
What Brings People to Therapy for Relationship Struggles
Relationship struggles take many forms. You might recognize yourself in one or more of these:
Recurring conflict that doesn’t resolve. You have the same arguments over and over — about money, intimacy, parenting, household responsibilities, how you spend time — and nothing ever changes. Conversations escalate into fights, and repairs feel temporary. Each unresolved conflict adds to a growing backlog of resentment.
Emotional disconnection. You live together, share responsibilities, maybe raise children together — but the friendship and intimacy have faded. You don’t know what your partner is really feeling or thinking anymore. Bids for connection go unnoticed or unmet. You feel lonely inside a relationship.
Intense conflict and emotional dysregulation. Arguments escalate fast and get ugly. Voices rise, cruel things get said, one or both of you shuts down or storms out. The intensity is frightening, and you don’t know how to stop the spiral once it starts. Afterward, you feel ashamed, and repair seems impossible.
Trust ruptures. Infidelity, deception, broken promises, or other betrayals have damaged the foundation of your relationship. You don’t know whether repair is possible, or how to begin.
Pattern recognition without the ability to change. You can see exactly what you’re doing — the pursuing, the withdrawing, the defensiveness, the criticism — but knowing the pattern doesn’t stop you from repeating it.
Difficulty in relationships more broadly. Perhaps it’s not one relationship but a pattern across relationships — friendships, family, romantic partners — that tends toward conflict, instability, or painful endings. You want to understand what’s driving the pattern and how to change it.
How We Help
We offer two evidence-based approaches to relationship therapy, each suited to different kinds of relationship struggles:
Gottman Method Couples Therapy is grounded in four decades of research on what makes relationships succeed or fail. It focuses on rebuilding friendship and emotional connection, replacing destructive communication patterns (criticism, contempt, defensiveness, stonewalling) with their research-backed antidotes, and developing skills for managing conflict constructively and repairing afterward. The Gottman Method is particularly well-suited for couples experiencing communication breakdown, emotional disconnection, or conflict that has become entrenched but where both partners are fundamentally committed and emotionally regulated enough to engage in the work. Learn more here.
DBT Couples Therapy, based on the work of Dr. Alan Fruzzetti, integrates Dialectical Behavior Therapy skills into couples work. It is designed specifically for relationships where emotional intensity is the central problem — where one or both partners struggle with significant emotional dysregulation, where BPD or trauma histories are affecting the relationship, or where standard couples therapy has failed because emotions derail the process. Learn more here.
For individuals experiencing relationship difficulties — whether or not they’re currently in a relationship — DBT individual therapy directly addresses interpersonal effectiveness skills, helping you learn to communicate needs, set limits, navigate conflict, and build and maintain relationships that feel more stable and satisfying.
Who We Treat
We work with adult couples and individuals experiencing relationship difficulties, in-person in Ruston, WA near Tacoma and via telehealth across Washington state. For adolescents and parents struggling with high conflict at home, our DBT for adolescents program includes significant family skills training and can include parent guidance to help improve interactions. Learn more here.
Frequently Asked Questions
Do you offer couples and relationship therapy via telehealth in Washington state?
Yes. We provide couple therapy and individual therapy for relationship problems via telehealth to clients anywhere in Washington state, including Seattle, Spokane, Olympia, Bellingham, the Tri-Cities, and communities throughout the state. Both partners can join from home — together or from separate locations when needed. In-person services are also available at our office in Ruston, WA near Tacoma.
Do you work with adolescents who are struggling with relationship and family problems?
Yes. For teenagers, relationship and family conflict is best addressed through our DBT for adolescents program, which directly involves the family in treatment. Teens attend individual therapy, and parents and teens attend skills group together and learn the same DBT skills — communication, validation, distress tolerance, and interpersonal effectiveness — which can reduce conflict and improve connection at home. We also offer parent training to support parents in navigating the relationship and interactions with their teen. Learn more about our adolescent program here.
What approaches do you use for relationship therapy?
We offer two primary evidence-based approaches: the Gottman Method, which is grounded in decades of research on relationship success and failure and is well-suited for couples experiencing communication breakdown and emotional disconnection; and DBT Couples Therapy, which is designed for relationships where emotional intensity, dysregulation, or trauma histories are the central challenges. We will help you determine which approach is the better fit during your initial consultation.
How do I know whether Gottman therapy or DBT couples therapy is right for us?
Gottman therapy is particularly well-suited for couples where both partners can stay reasonably regulated during conflict but have lost connection, developed destructive communication patterns, or become gridlocked on recurring issues. DBT couples therapy is the better fit when emotional dysregulation — explosive arguments, emotional flooding, patterns related to BPD or trauma — is the primary driver of relationship problems. If you’ve tried couples therapy before and found that emotions derailed the process, DBT couples therapy is likely the better fit. We will discuss this with you during your free consultation.
Can therapy help if only one of us is willing to come?
Yes. Individual therapy can significantly improve relationship patterns even when only one partner is in treatment. DBT individual therapy directly teaches interpersonal effectiveness skills — how to communicate needs clearly, set limits while preserving relationships, and respond to conflict differently, and emotion regulation skills to help prevent emotions from derailing effective communication. Changes in one person’s behavior reliably produce changes in relationship patterns, even without the other partner present. That said, couples therapy is generally more effective than individual therapy for relationship problems when both partners are willing to participate.
Can therapy help after infidelity or a major betrayal?
Yes. Both Gottman Method and DBT Couples Therapy can support couples navigating the aftermath of betrayal. This is extraordinarily difficult work — the pain is real, the damage is real, and there are no guarantees. But many couples do repair after infidelity when both partners are committed to the process and willing to do the hard work. Therapy provides a structured, supported way to navigate the acute pain, make a clear-eyed decision about whether repair is possible, and if so, begin rebuilding trust step by step.