According to research by John Gottman, the average couple waits six years from the time they first notice serious problems before reaching out for couples therapy. By the time they arrive, the patterns are deeper than they need to be. Here’s how to spot the signs earlier.
Sign 1: You’re having the same argument over and over
Healthy couples disagree. Even healthy couples have recurring conflict – Gottman’s research shows that 69% of couples’ problems are perpetual, not solvable. The problem isn’t recurring disagreement. It’s recurring disagreement that ends in the same place, with no progress, every single time.
If you can predict exactly how a fight will unfold from the first sentence – what they’ll say, what you’ll say back, how it’ll end – therapy can interrupt that pattern. Once you see the script, you can write a new one.
Sign 2: You feel more like roommates than partners
Long-term relationships go through phases. There are seasons of disconnection – after a baby, during a stressful work period, when caretaking elders. Those usually pass.
What’s worth attending to: prolonged disconnection that has become the new normal. You care about each other, you share a household, you coordinate logistics. But the intimacy – emotional, physical, intellectual – has faded and you’ve stopped trying to bring it back.
This is the kind of drift that often goes on for years before anyone names it. By the time one partner finally says something, the other has often been quietly waiting for the conversation.
Sign 3: Communication has shifted into criticism and defensiveness
Gottman identified four communication patterns that strongly predict relationship breakdown:
- Criticism: Attacking your partner’s character (“You never…”) rather than describing the behavior (“I’m frustrated that…”).
- Contempt: Mockery, eye-rolling, sarcasm directed at your partner. The strongest single predictor of divorce.
- Defensiveness: Counter-attacking instead of acknowledging your partner’s point.
- Stonewalling: Shutting down, withdrawing, refusing to engage.
If you regularly recognize two or more of these in your interactions, the relationship has shifted into a destructive pattern that’s hard to reverse without help.
Sign 4: You’re considering or having an affair, or your partner is
Affairs almost never come out of nowhere. They typically reflect months or years of disconnection that the couple couldn’t or wouldn’t address. Whether the affair has happened or you’re noticing the conditions that could lead to one (emotional intimacy with someone outside the relationship, the urge to share with them what you used to share with your partner), this is a sign to act.
For couples in the wake of an affair, therapy is hard but often transformative. Most couples who do successful affair-recovery work emerge with a stronger relationship than they had before – not because the affair was good, but because the work it required was deep.
Sign 5: You can’t make a decision together without it spiraling
Money. In-laws. Parenting. Where to live. Whose career takes priority. These decisions are the meat of long-term partnership, and they’re hard for everyone.
But if you’ve reached a point where major decisions can’t be discussed without conflict – or worse, where you’ve stopped trying to discuss them and are quietly making unilateral decisions – the partnership infrastructure has eroded. Therapy can help rebuild it.
Sign 6: One or both of you keeps saying “I don’t know if I can do this anymore”
This one is straightforward. If either partner is regularly saying or thinking they’re not sure they want to stay, that’s not a phase to wait out. It’s a signal worth taking seriously.
The earlier you bring this to therapy, the more options you have. Couples who arrive in active crisis usually have less room to maneuver than couples who come in when the doubts first start.
What couples therapy is and isn’t
Couples therapy is not:
- A space to prove your partner wrong while the therapist takes your side
- A guarantee the relationship will survive
- Quick – most couples come weekly for 12 to 20 sessions
- Pleasant in every session – some are hard
Couples therapy is:
- A structured space to understand the dynamics driving conflict
- A way to learn skills – communication, repair, conflict, intimacy – that you weren’t taught and may not have modeled growing up
- An opportunity to make decisions about the relationship with more clarity
- Sometimes the difference between drifting apart and rebuilding
Research on evidence-based approaches like Emotionally Focused Therapy (EFT) and Gottman Method shows about 70-75% of couples report significant improvement, with many sustaining gains years later.
What if my partner doesn’t want to come?
This is common and rarely a deal-breaker. Many partners are skeptical going in and end up valuing it more than the partner who initiated. We’re also happy to start with just one of you – sometimes the work of clarifying your own goals shifts the dynamic enough that the conversation becomes possible.
Couples therapy that works around real life
Sanare Counseling Group offers virtual couples therapy across Maryland – so you can attend together from your living room, or separately from different locations. EFT and Gottman-informed approaches. In-network with major plans.
Check Coverage Book NowThe Direct Answer: When Should a Couple Consider Therapy?
A couple should consider therapy when the same painful pattern keeps returning, repair attempts do not restore trust, or one or both partners are beginning to avoid honesty to keep the peace. You do not need to wait for a crisis, a separation threat, or complete emotional distance. Earlier support can make it easier to describe the pattern while both partners still have access to curiosity and care.
The useful question is not whether your relationship looks serious enough from the outside. Ask what happens after a difficult moment. Can you return to the topic without collecting new injuries? Can each person name a need without expecting ridicule, shutdown, or retaliation? Do apologies lead to a different response next time? If the answer is repeatedly no, the pattern may deserve structured support.
A Practical Readiness Check for Couples
Notice these signs over the next two weeks. One difficult day does not define a relationship. Repeated patterns give you more useful information.
- Recovery: Arguments end, but the emotional distance lasts for hours or days.
- Safety: One or both partners edit honest concerns because the reaction feels harder than the issue.
- Repetition: Different topics keep producing the same pursue, defend, withdraw, or shut down cycle.
- Connection: Most conversations have become logistical, while affection, play, or curiosity keeps shrinking.
- Trust: Promises sound sincere, but the response in the next similar moment does not change.
These observations are not a scorecard. They help turn a vague sense that something is wrong into a specific pattern that both partners and a therapist can examine together.
Questions Couples Ask Before Starting Therapy
Do we need to agree on the cause of the problem first?
No. Partners often enter therapy with different explanations for the same conflict. A therapist can help slow the cycle down, clarify each person’s experience, and identify where both accounts overlap. Agreement about every detail is not required before the work begins.
What if only one partner wants to go?
You cannot force meaningful participation, but you can make a clear invitation and explain the pattern you hope to change. Individual therapy may also help you clarify your needs, boundaries, and next step while you decide what support is realistic.
Does starting therapy mean the relationship is failing?
No. Starting therapy means the current pattern has become difficult to change without structure. Some couples seek help during a crisis. Others start because they want to protect connection before resentment becomes the main way they communicate.
Virtual couples therapy across Maryland
If the same argument keeps returning or quiet distance is becoming the default, you do not have to wait for the relationship to reach a breaking point.
By Juliann Siwicki, LCPC