Couples Therapy

Offered virtually in Ontario 

with Jazmine Juarez, RSW, MSW

An attachment-based, body-informed approach to couples therapy that attends to the bond underneath the arguments.

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An attachment-based, body-informed approach to couples therapy that attends to the bond underneath the arguments. •

You did not get here because you stopped caring. If anything, the opposite is true.

You are here because you have both been trying. Trying to communicate more clearly, to be more patient, to find the right words, to manage your own reactions so the conversation does not go where it always seems to go.

And despite all of that effort, something between you remains stuck. The same distance. The same arguments that loop without landing anywhere new. The same quiet ache after a conversation that should have brought you closer but somehow left you further apart.

It may not look like crisis from the outside. You may still function well together, still co-manage your lives with the competence that has always come naturally to both of you. But between the logistics and the daily rhythm of keeping things running, something essential has gone quiet. The ease that used to live between you. The feeling of being genuinely known. The sense that when you reach for each other, someone is actually there.

Underneath the frustration and the distance, something quieter is usually happening. Something more vulnerable than the argument on the surface. Beneath the words, beneath the reactions, there is almost always a more tender question that neither of you has quite been able to say aloud.

Is it safe to let you in? Do I still matter to you? Are we still in this together?

Those questions are not signs of weakness. They are what every intimate relationship is built around. And when they go unanswered for long enough, the body begins to respond in ways that have very little to do with whatever the surface argument is about.

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What keeps happening

The cycle underneath most relationship conflict

What brings most couples to therapy is not a single event but a pattern.

What is often harder to see from inside the relationship is that most of the pain is not really about the content of the conflict. It is about the emotional bond between you, and what happens when that bond begins to feel uncertain or unsafe. When it does, something in us responds automatically, in ways that have nothing to do with conscious choice or intention.

It often begins small. A moment of disconnection, a bid for closeness that goes unmet, a comment that lands differently than it was intended.

From that moment, a cycle can begin to move.

One partner reaches, needing to feel heard, to feel seen, to know the connection is still there. When the reassurance does not come, the reaching grows more intense. The body has been involved all along, but it is now responding from a place of survival. The heart rate climbs. There is an urgency that feels physiological, not just emotional. Frustration surfaces. The bids become louder.

The other partner, feeling the heat of that intensity, becomes defensive, trying to manage what now feels like an attack. Their body is also in survival mode, responding to a threat before the thinking mind has any chance to weigh in. From that place, defending or withdrawing can feel like the only options available.

And the more defended they become, the more distant they seem. The more distant they seem, the more urgently their partner reaches.

Until eventually something shuts down entirely. One person goes quiet. This is the body's last resort. No longer fighting or fleeing, it moves into stillness. But stillness here is not peace. There is often a great deal still happening on the inside, held beneath a surface that has gone completely quiet.

And the quiet, rather than bringing relief, amplifies everything for the person still reaching.

Neither person intended this. What is happening is not about who started it or whose fault it is. Both people are caught inside the same cycle, each responding to the other's pain in ways that make complete sense from the inside, and that keep the cycle turning from the outside.

My approach

How I approach couples therapy

Couples therapy is not about deciding who is right or wrong. It is about repairing the bond between you. My role is to help both partners feel supported enough to explore what has been difficult, with more openness, curiosity, and care.

My approach is grounded in a systemic and relational understanding of couples, developed through post-graduate certificate training at the University of Guelph. Building on that foundation, it evolved toward Emotionally Focused Therapy, an evidence-based model developed by Dr. Sue Johnson that sits at the heart of my practice with couples. Informed by EFT Externship training, I bring an experiential focus to our sessions, where you can begin identifying and interrupting the cycle that has been pulling you apart, and start building a more secure and connected way of being together.

That experiential quality is not incidental. The body responds to the person across from you, to the history you carry, to the broader terrain of your life together. Attachment Theory and Applied Polyvagal Theory shape how I understand those responses. That is why a somatic and body-informed awareness threads through all of it.

Rather than moving past those physiological responses, we slow down enough to attend to them. What is happening in your body in this moment. Where you feel the tension, the shutdown, the urge to reach or withdraw. Learning to notice these responses, and to stay present with them long enough to make a different choice, is a central part of how the cycle begins to shift. The body becomes not just a record of the pattern but a place where something new can begin to happen.

This is an integrative, trauma-informed, anti-oppressive, and culturally responsive space. This space honours the full context each of you brings, and it is offered with care and without judgment to all couples, including married and unmarried partners, 2SLGBTQI+ couples, and couples of all cultural backgrounds.

Couples therapy may be a good fit if:

  • You may not be in crisis, but something between you has shifted and you cannot seem to find your way back to each other.

  • You keep having the same conversations without them ever quite landing anywhere new, and you are both tired of it.

  • You tend to pursue connection while your partner pulls back, or the other way around, and the pattern has become exhausting for both of you.

  • You have been managing your relationship the way you manage everything else, efficiently and carefully, and you are beginning to sense that managing is not the same as connecting.

  • You are moving through a life transition, a career change, a health challenge, a season of sustained stress, and your relationship has absorbed more of the strain than either of you expected.

  • You have noticed something quietly shifting since becoming parents, and between the logistics of family life, the two of you have slowly drifted further apart.

  • You both want this to work, and you are both willing to look honestly at your part in what has been happening, even if one of you feels more ready than the other.

If any of that felt familiar, here is what it looks like when you arrive together.

Session details

What couples therapy sessions look like

Couples therapy is a different kind of space from individual therapy. There are two of you in the room, two nervous systems, two sets of experiences and protective responses, and a relationship between you that has its own patterns and its own history. There is room for all of it.

What a session holds

Each session begins with intention. A moment to notice how you are both arriving, what you are each carrying, and what feels most present between you before anything else.

Within the session, we slow the conversation down. When something moves between you, we pause there and turn toward it together. Rather than staying at the level of the words, we attend to what is happening internally for each of you in that moment, the emotions and bodily sensations arising in response to the other person, and what those responses are carrying.

From that slower, more attuned place, there is room for something different to emerge between you. What has been hard to say begins to find its way into the room. When it does, the receiving partner can hear it differently. And from that place, a different kind of conversation becomes possible. One that connects rather than disconnects.

Sessions end as they begin, with intention. A moment to notice what has shifted, what may still need tending, and what you might carry into the week together. Not as something to complete, but as a shared awareness that belongs to your relationship.

How therapy unfolds over time

In the early sessions, we slow things down enough to begin mapping what has been happening between you. Not to assign fault or get caught up in the content, but to help both of you begin seeing the pattern from the outside for the first time.

Many couples describe this phase as clarifying in a way they did not expect. Something that has felt chaotic or confusing begins to take shape. And with that recognition comes something important. The beginning of being able to observe the cycle together rather than simply being pulled through it.

As safety grows between you, we begin to move toward what has been most difficult to risk. The partner who has been reaching begins to soften, expressing what is underneath the urgency rather than the urgency itself. The partner who has been withdrawing begins to turn toward rather than away, risking a different kind of presence. These are tender moments. And they are often where the bond between you begins to feel different.

Over time, something shifts in how you move through difficulty together. The cycle that once pulled you under begins to feel more recognizable, something you can both see and name before it takes hold. You begin to find your way back to each other more readily. The relationship starts to feel less like something you are managing and more like something you are both genuinely living inside.

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Frequently Asked Questions

  • Couples sessions are $225 for 55 minutes, paid by e-transfer at the time of your session. Because psychotherapy provided by a Registered Social Worker is HST exempt, no tax is added to this fee. You will receive a receipt after each session.

  • A small number of sliding scale spots are part of my practice. All of them are taken at the moment, though that shifts periodically. Feel free to ask about availability when you get in touch.

  • We begin with a joint session, where I meet you both and hear what brings you in. Each of you then has one individual session with me to share your history, followed by a joint session where we set goals together. From there, we move in stages, beginning with the cycle itself and gradually reaching what sits underneath it. That is where a more secure connection begins to take hold.

  • Most couples work with me for somewhere between 8 and 20 sessions. Where you land in that range depends on what you are navigating, how urgent things feel, and the pace that suits you both. We revisit this together as we go rather than deciding it in advance.

  • Weekly sessions tend to serve couples best in the beginning, while momentum and safety are building. As things start to shift between you, many couples move to every other week. Together we find a rhythm that fits your relationship and your schedules.

  • OHIP does not cover counselling from a social worker, but many workplace benefits and private plans do, in part or in full. Ask your provider two things: whether services from a Registered Social Worker are included, and whether couples counselling is covered specifically, since some plans treat it differently.

  • Direct billing is not something I offer. You pay when we meet, and I provide a receipt you can submit to your benefits provider yourself. No insurance details are kept in my records. Hold onto your receipts in case you need them for your plan or at tax time.

  • All couples sessions happen over secure video through Practice Better, a platform that meets PHIPA and PIPEDA privacy standards with encrypted connections throughout. You can join together from the same room, or sign in separately if you are in different places that day. You will set up a simple client portal account before our first session.

  • Yes. My registration is with the Ontario College of Social Workers and Social Service Workers, which means I can only provide therapy to people who reside in this province. For couples therapy, that applies to each of you, not just one partner.

  • Hesitation is common and workable. It often comes from worrying you will be blamed, or from a past experience of therapy that did not go well. My role is not to take sides, and that tends to matter most to the partner who is least sure. A consultation is a chance for all three of us to get a sense of each other, and to consider whether couples therapy is the right starting point.

  • Cancellations and rescheduling require 48 hours notice, and this applies when either of you cannot make it, since couples sessions go ahead with both partners present. Late cancellations and missed sessions are charged the full fee. Exceptions exist for genuinely extenuating circumstances, though not for workload, scheduling slips, or competing plans.

  • Yes, there is currently no waitlist. The first step is a free consultation with both of you, where we can talk about what is happening in your relationship and whether this space feels like the right fit.

FAQs

Let’s begin

When you feel ready

If something on this page resonated, that matters. Even if only one of you is reading this right now.

Reaching out for couples therapy takes a particular kind of courage. It means being willing to sit in a room with someone you love and let the conversation go somewhere it has not been able to go on its own. You do not both need to feel entirely ready, or arrive in agreement about what the problem is, or even have the same comfort with therapy. One person sensing that something needs to change, and the other being willing to try, is enough to begin.

A consultation is simply a conversation. A chance to share a little about what is happening in your relationship, to ask any questions you have, and to get a sense of whether this space and this approach feel right for both of you. There is no obligation and no pressure to decide anything in that moment.

Whenever you feel ready, I am here.

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