Discernment Counseling Services will begin the week of January 5, 2026. The first step is for couples to schedule a New Couples Consultation in the new year. Please use the “Schedule Now” button. I look forward to helping you soon.

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Are you at a crossroads regarding the future of your relationship?

Or is your partner at this crucible moment, but they are not willing to try Couples Therapy one more time?!

• Do you feel like you’ve tried everything to revive your marriage and are now at a place of despair considering separation or divorce, but are not completely sure of the direction?
• Are you feeling the weight of your world on your shoulders with your decision since it will impact many people besides your spouse and you? (eg. children, in-laws, friends, neighbors, etc.).
• If you have children… Are you also worried about the negative legacy you’re handing down to them if you stay unhappily married?

Discernment Counseling is designed for you.

It’s a chance to slowdown… take a breath… and look at your options for your marriage.

This evidenced-based model is highly structured to give you the safety and trust you need in making one of the most significant decisions in your life.

You will each be treated with compassion and respect no matter how you are feeling about your marriage at the moment.

No bad guys and good guys.

What exactly is Discernment Counseling?

It is a new way of helping couples where:

• One partner is “leaning out” of the relationship—and not sure that regular marriage counseling would help
• The other partner is “leaning in”—that is, interested in rebuilding the marriage

The counselor will help you decide whether to try to restore your marriage to health, move toward divorce, or take a time out and decide later.

The goal of Discernment Counseling is for you:

To gain clarity and confidence about a direction for your relationship, based on a deeper understanding of what’s happened to your marriage and each person’s contributions to the problems.

The goal is not to solve your marital problems, but to see if they are solvable.

You will come in as a couple, but the most important work occurs in the one-to-one conversations with the counselor.

Why? Because you are starting out in different places.

If you’re wondering, “Why not seek out individual therapy if the most important work occurs in the 1:1 conversations?” This is an excellent question!

There are significant advantages of choosing Discernment Counseling instead of Individual Therapy

• I will have essential information about your relationship by meeting equally with both partners. (Eg. interactional patterns/each person’s contribution to the problems in your marriage as well as each person’s commitment to invest wholeheartedly in Path 3/Couples Therapy by assisting partners in creating a personal agenda for change)
• Individual Therapists are only able to gather information from one partner’s perspective. Even with the most sincere, personal and relationship growth-oriented client, there will be missing information, which will limit the effectiveness of this type of therapy.
• For a decision that has such high stakes and to have an opportunity to learn (raise one’s “RQ” = relationship quotient) the most possible, it makes sense to strongly consider Discernment Counseling.

As a Discernment Counselor:

I am a support and guide for BOTH partners as you work through this extremely challenging time.

I will respect your reasons for divorce while trying to open up the possibility of restoring the marriage to health. I do not get a vote for the future of your relationship!

I will also emphasize the importance of each of you seeing your own contributions to the problems and the possible solutions. This will be useful in future relationships even if this one ends.

Afterall, you can’t divorce yourself!

Therefore, you will take with you any relationship areas of needed growth and your enduring vulnerabilities to your next relationship.

You can do the work now to gain a greater awareness and deeper understanding of your relationship interactional patterns or address these in a future relationship.

Number of Sessions: A maximum of 5 counseling sessions. The first session is usually 2 hours and the subsequent are 1.5 or 2 hours.

Is Discernment Counseling helpful for all couples?

No. Discernment Counseling is not suited for these situations:

• One spouse has already made a final decision to divorce
• One spouse is coercing the other to participate
• There is danger of domestic violence
  

• More information will be added soon…