Relational Life Therapy for Couples in San Francisco
Transform Your Relationship Through Deep Healing
Are you a high-achieving couple who has given everything to your careers and children while your relationship slowly deteriorated? Perhaps you're facing the reality of divorce, dealing with infidelity, or feeling like strangers after years or decades together. If traditional couples therapy hasn't provided the breakthrough you need, Relational Life Therapy (RLT) may be the answer you've been searching for.
As a certified couples counsellor specializing in Relational Life Therapy, I help couples in San Francisco and beyond transform their relationships through online sessions that address the root causes of relationship issues rather than just surface-level symptoms.
What Is Relational Life Therapy?
Relational Life Therapy, developed by renowned therapist Terry Real through the Relational Life Institute, is a direct, transformative approach that cuts through surface-level issues to address core relational dynamics. Unlike traditional couples counseling that can feel passive or overly gentle, the relational life therapy model combines compassion with pragmatic intervention to create rapid, lasting change.
The RLT approach recognizes that most of us were never taught essential relational skills. Society often strips away our capacity for healthy connection early in childhood, leaving us to navigate our most important relationships using outdated patterns and defensive behaviors. For high-performing couples who excel in their professional lives but struggle in their marriage, this lack of relational education becomes particularly apparent when life forces you to face your relationship directly.
Life therapy focuses on three fundamental pillars that transform relationships:
Accountability: Taking genuine responsibility for how your actions and patterns affect your partner and your relationship, going far beyond simple apologies to understand the deeper impact of your behaviors.
Empathy: Developing the ability to truly feel with your partner, letting their emotional experience matter as much as your own, creating space for genuine understanding and connection.
Vulnerability: Finding the courage to let your partner see your fears, needs, and tender places without demanding they fix or rescue you, fostering authentic intimacy and meaningful connections.
Who Benefits from Relational Life Therapy?
My ideal clients are couples who share specific characteristics and challenges:
High performers and perfectionists who have invested heavily in careers and children while neglecting their relationship
Couples on the brink of separation or divorce who are committed to giving their marriage one final, serious attempt
Partners with trauma histories who recognize that past wounds are affecting their present relationship
Empty nesters discovering they no longer know each other after focusing on parenting for years
All relationship configurations, including LGBTQ+ couples seeking affirming, specialized care
Whether you're dealing with infidelity, chronic conflict, emotional distance, or the accumulated stress of high-achieving lifestyles, relational life therapy provides the tools for genuine transformation.
Relationship Issues I Address Through RLT
As a counsellor using the relational life therapy model, I specialize in helping couples navigate complex relationship issues that require more than surface-level intervention:
Couples Therapy After Infidelity: Rather than just addressing the betrayal's aftermath, RLT examines the relational dynamics that created vulnerability to infidelity, helping couples build a stronger marriage than what existed before.
Last Resort Marriage Counseling: When you're considering divorce, you need direct, honest intervention. I help couples understand exactly what's required for their relationship to survive and thrive.
High Conflict Couples Therapy: Transforming destructive patterns into opportunities for deeper understanding through improved communication skills and emotional regulation techniques.
Intimacy Counseling for Couples: Addressing barriers to both emotional and physical intimacy by developing the vulnerability and authentic connection that meaningful relationships require.
ADHD Couples Therapy: Understanding how ADHD affects relational dynamics and developing strategies that honor both partners' neurological differences while building stronger connection.
LGBTQ+ Couples Therapy: Providing affirming care that addresses unique challenges while building the authentic self-expression and intimacy that all couples deserve.
Executive Couples Therapy: Helping high-achieving professionals apply their leadership skills to their relationship challenges without creating power dynamics that damage intimacy.
Premarital Counseling: Equipping couples with relational skills before marriage challenges arise, creating a foundation for lifelong partnership success.
My Relational Life Therapy Approach
My therapeutic style reflects the core principles Terry Real established: direct but kind, trauma-informed but not paralyzed by it. I believe most people are far more resilient than they've been taught to believe, and I'm willing to challenge couples to stretch beyond their comfort zones when growth requires it.
The relational life therapy process begins with identifying the specific patterns and dynamics creating problems in your relationship. This involves examining communication styles, emotional triggers, power dynamics, and how family of origin issues continue to influence your present behaviors and choices.
I integrate several complementary modalities with relational life therapy:
Internal Family Systems (IFS): Helping you understand the different parts of yourself that show up in relationship, developing better internal relationships that naturally improve your capacity for external connection.
Brainspotting: Processing stored trauma that may be affecting your capacity for intimacy and vulnerability, creating space for the emotional availability that life therapy requires.
Deep Healing Couples Intensives: Concentrated therapeutic work that allows us to address multiple layers of relationship challenges without the interruptions of daily life.
This multi-modal approach ensures that both individual healing and relational skills development happen simultaneously, creating comprehensive transformation.
What to Expect: My Therapeutic Process
Initial Consultation: We begin with a complimentary call to discuss your specific relationship issues and determine whether my relational life therapy approach fits your needs. This conversation helps ensure you understand what this work involves and feel ready for the level of honesty and commitment required.
Assessment Phase: During initial sessions, I work with you to identify specific patterns creating problems in your relationship. We examine communication styles, emotional triggers, and how past experiences influence current dynamics.
Active Intervention: Using relational life therapy techniques, we interrupt old patterns and develop new skills for accountability, empathy, and vulnerability. This isn't just talk therapy, it's experiential work that helps rewire your brain for better connection.
Skills Development: You'll learn practical communication skills, conflict resolution techniques, and emotional regulation strategies that serve your relationship long after our work together ends.
Ongoing Support: Between sessions, I provide homework assignments to practice new skills in daily life. I'm also available for brief check-ins when you're struggling to implement changes or unexpected situations arise.
Why Choose My Approach to Life Therapy?
As a certified couples counsellor trained in Terry Real's methods, I offer several unique advantages:
Specialized Training: My certification in relational life therapy means I'm equipped with sophisticated skills to facilitate significant, lasting relationship transformations that generic couples counseling often can't achieve.
Compassionate Directness: My approach combines loving firmness with practical intervention. I care deeply about your relationship's success while maintaining clear expectations for the work required.
Trauma-Informed Care: Understanding how past wounds affect present relationships, I help couples address trauma's impact without using it as an excuse for harmful behaviors.
Online Accessibility: Offering secure online sessions means you can access specialized relational life therapy regardless of your location, perfect for busy executives and high-achieving couples.
Integrated Approach: Combining RLT with complementary modalities ensures comprehensive healing that addresses both individual wounds and relational patterns.
High-Achiever Understanding: Having worked extensively with successful professionals, I understand the unique challenges that come with high-performance lifestyles and how they affect intimate relationships.
The Reality of Transformation Through RLT
Relational life therapy isn't about creating a perfect relationship or eliminating all conflict. Instead, it develops the skills and awareness needed to navigate inevitable challenges in ways that deepen rather than damage your connection.
The goal isn't returning to your honeymoon phase but developing what Terry Real calls "mature love", a way of being together that handles the full reality of two complex people building a life together. This includes disagreeing without devastating each other, maintaining individual identity while being part of a couple, and continuing to grow and change together over time.
Many couples discover that the crisis bringing them to therapy was actually an opportunity for their relationship to evolve to a new level. The relational skills developed through RLT don't just solve current problems; they create a foundation for handling whatever challenges life brings.
Couples dealing with major transitions: children leaving home, career changes, aging parents, health challenges; find that life therapy provides tools for navigating these changes together rather than growing apart. The approach recognizes that long-term relationships face multiple transitions, each offering opportunities for either growth or deterioration.
Getting Started with Relational Life Therapy
If you're recognizing your relationship in these descriptions, you may be ready to explore whether relational life therapy can provide the breakthrough your marriage needs. The couples who benefit most from my approach are ready to examine their patterns honestly, willing to take responsibility for their role in relationship problems, and committed to creating the meaningful connections they truly desire.
This work requires courage, commitment, and willingness to be uncomfortable in service of growth. For couples ready for this level of engagement, the results can be transformative; not just for your relationship but for your individual lives as well.
Ready to Transform Your Relationship?
The first step is reaching out for a consultation call where we'll discuss your specific situation and determine whether my relational life therapy approach would help your relationship. During this conversation, we'll explore what's happening in your marriage, what you've tried before, and what you hope to achieve through our work together.
I believe most relationships can be healed when both partners commit to the necessary work. Even marriages that seem beyond repair often have potential for renewal when approached with the right therapeutic skills and sufficient commitment. Whether you're dealing with infidelity, chronic conflict, emotional distance, or accumulated wear and tear from years together, pathways exist for rediscovering connection and creating the relationship you both desire.
Your relationship brought you together for a reason. With proper support and guidance through relational life therapy, it can become a source of strength, joy, and deep fulfillment for both of you. The question isn't whether change is possible, it's whether you're ready to do what it takes to create that change.
Contact me today to schedule your complimentary consultation and take the first step toward transforming your relationship through the proven principles of relational life therapy.