Couples Therapy in Toronto Doctoral-Level Psychological Care

Couples therapy at Laksman Doell Psychology is delivered by doctoral-level registered psychologists, both in person at our office in the Annex neighbourhood of Toronto and virtually across Ontario.

What Couples Therapy Looks Like

“We know what it looks like when two people who love each other have stopped being able to reach each other. That is not just a communication problem. That is a clinical presentation.”

Real connection takes work, and you don’t have to figure it out alone. Strong and committed relationships require closeness, intimacy, and the ability to repair. Those things can erode quickly under the weight of unresolved conflict, communication breakdown, infidelity, life transitions, illness, or the slow drift that happens when no one is paying attention.

Couples therapy, done well, is not just giving advice. It is not simply having a referee in the room. It is not about teaching you to use “I statements” and then sending you home. It is a structured clinical engagement with the cycle that has taken hold between you, that helps you to understand the patterns that drive it, and the layers that live underneath. The fight that you keep having is almost never about the thing that you keep fighting about. The work is to identify what it actually is, and to do something different with that information.

Couples therapy involves helping you to recognize the patterns in communication breakdown and the roles that you both play in these cycles, and it is about finding the tools to help you build new, more constructive, patterns.

It is about understanding the attachment styles, the cultural and familial influences, the personalities, the learning histories and the individual differences that you each bring into the relationship, and how these interact with one another. It is about understanding the ruptures and the injuries, and the influence of significant life events and transitions that you have navigated both independently and together, including those that have gone unacknowledged for far too long.

Sometimes couples therapy is about exploring ways to increase intimacy, trust, connection and closeness. Or it is about finding the right balance for each of you between togetherness and independence. Sometimes couples are wanting a space to examine whether they even want those things anymore and to explore the idea of no longer staying together, or of staying together but with different expectations.

Whatever your couples therapy goals may be, it is important to find a therapist that you can trust will be able to hold them with the skill and the seriousness that they deserve.

IF YOU ARE READING THIS

You may not be sure what you need, but something brought you here…

You and the person who you love can’t stop having the same fight. You know the moves. You know the moment it tips. You know what you want to say. It comes out wrong every time, and the recovery takes longer than it used to.
The affair changed everything. You don’t know yet whether the relationship can survive it. You don’t want to decide alone, and you don’t want to decide quickly. You want a space where what happened can be looked at honestly, and with skill.
You have quietly become roommates. You’re not in active conflict. You’re not really together either. The desire eroded somewhere, but you can’t pinpoint when. Neither of you wants to be the one to say it out loud, and neither of you wants to live this way for another five years.
Life has hit you with something difficult. Both of you need to make some accommodations, and you’re trying to take care of each other, but you aren’t actually talking about the difficulty of what is going on and so you keep missing the mark.

This is what has brought you here. And you are in the right place

COUPLES THERAPY IN TORONTO

The relationship concerns that we treat:

At Laksman Doell Psychology, we work with couples who are experiencing distress, or who are navigating difficulties, in a wide range of different areas. We work with couples who are dating and who are looking to get out ahead of issues before they develop, and who want to make sure that their relationship is solid before they make a lifelong commitment to one another. We work with couples who have been together for decades, and who are finding themselves caught in entrenched relational patterns that they are having difficulty unentangling from, no matter how hard they try. And, we work with everything in between.

Our doctoral-level psychologists treat a wide variety of different couples concerns, including:

Difficulties in Communication

Communication difficulties often lay beneath many of the different issues that bring couples into therapy, but can also be a presenting issue all on their own. Communication breakdown, unresolved conflicts, patterns of escalation that are difficult to break out of, and inability or unwillingness to repair, are some of the most common dynamics that couples seek help for. Understanding these patterns and building additional skill in communicating constructively, listening to understand one another, and reducing criticism and defensiveness, are the backbone of effective couples therapy.

Infidelity and Ruptures in Trust

When there has been an infidelity or an affair, couples often benefit from a skilled partner to help them navigate the complexities of understanding, forgiveness and finding a path forward. The same is true whether couples are trying to navigate the aftermath of a physical affair, an emotional infidelity, a financial infidelity, or other forms of secrecy or betrayal that have left an impact on the relationship. The rebuilding of trust and connection following major ruptures is rarely easy, and often requires guidance from someone who can understand the complexities at play.

Navigating Life Transitions

Life hits us with all sorts of challenges, whether we are ready or not. Some major life events, like graduations and moves, engagement and marriage, becoming parents, or transitions to retirement can be reasonably foreseen and planned for. Others, like major losses, traumatic events, diagnosis of a serious or chronic illness, or a major mental health disorder tend to hit us when we aren’t looking. Whatever the case, couples sometimes benefit from help in communicating more openly and honestly with one another, so that they can navigate these transitions more successfully together.

Intimacy and Sex

Sex and intimacy are notoriously difficult for many couples to talk about. And that can be true even when things are going well. When you add in difficulties related to discrepancies in sexual desire, past trauma, or sexual pain or dysfunction, the barriers to open communication can sometimes feel insurmountable. Couples who are looking to work on improving their sex or intimacy tend to benefit from approaching these conversations with a skilled therapist who can help to promote acceptance, openness and curiosity.

Living with Serious and Chronic Illness

The experience of serious or chronic illness can have a huge impact on our relationships. The stress associated with diagnosis, treatment, and recovery, the changes in partner roles as we try desperately to care for each other and for everyone else around us (while sometimes forgetting to care for ourselves), and the changes in how the body feels and functions are all very real. Each of these can impact both emotional and physical intimacy in ways that are hard to talk about, but they are conversations that matter, and they deserve a safe space.

Supporting Each Other Through Mental Illness

Couples who are living with, or who have made it through, the experience of a serious mental illness, often find themselves feeling as if they have lost a part of one another or a part of their relationship. Difficulties in communication can breed fear, mistrust, misunderstanding and resentment. It can also lead partners to feel like caregivers, and can erode intimacy in ways that are sometimes deeper than appreciated. Finding your way back to one another is possible, but sometimes it requires help in processing emotional ruptures and in reestablishing communication, trust, and openness.

OUR APPROACH

Treatment that starts with understanding you.

At Laksman Doell Psychology, we work with couples in real distress, with the kind of presentations that other practices sometimes redirect, and those who present with the kind of everyday erosion that no one prepared them for. We work with couples who love each other and yet who cannot stop hurting each other. We work with couples where an affair or an illness feels like it has changed everything, and they are uncertain whether their relationship can survive. We work with couples where the connection has slipped away so gradually that neither partner can pinpoint when they became more like roommates. The couples that we treat are not here because they’ve given up. They are here because they haven’t.

Couples therapy is inherently collaborative. It is about helping both partners to better understand themselves, their partner, and the relationship dynamics that play out between them. It is about understanding the attachment styles, the individual and cultural differences, and the history and shared experiences that shaped you both individually and as a couple. We will meet with both of you together for most sessions, though some couples benefit from individual sessions woven in, and we structure that carefully when it serves the work. We will be honest with you about what we see, and we will not let either of you carry the cycle alone in the room.

Our psychologists work with couples using evidence-based approaches that have been refined over decades of research and clinical practice. Emotion Focused Therapy (EFT) for couples works directly with the emotional cycle that lives underneath the conflict, the part of the dynamic that is most vulnerable and that the words almost never touch. Gottman-informed methods draw on the largest body of research regarding what keeps relationships together over time. Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) is brought in where the patterns involve specific behaviours, beliefs, or expectations that need to be challenged and understood.

We are also one of the few practices in Toronto with the depth of training and skill to support couples where one partner is living with a serious mental health condition, a chronic illness, or both. This intersection is rarely held well, and it is an integral part of what we built this practice to do.

OUR DIFFERENCE

Specialist training.
Private practice access.

Every clinician at Laksman Doell Psychology is a doctoral-level psychologist who is registered with, or working toward registration with, the College of Psychologists and Behaviour Analysts of Ontario (CPBAO). Several of our team members at Laksman Doell hold specialist training in couples work, and a number of our psychologists also bring training in sex therapy, and skill in treating the intersection of intimacy and serious illness. All of our psychologists come to this work with the depth of skill and training that complex couples presentations require. Laksman Doell Psychology is a preferred psychology provider for the National Hockey League Players’ Association (NHLPA) for couples therapy, which speaks to the level of trust that the practice has built with people whose relationships are lived under unusual pressure. Our team has trained at Princess Margaret Cancer Centre, Sunnybrook Health Science Centre, The Allan Memorial Institute for Sex and Couple Therapy Services in Montreal, Toronto General, St. Joseph’s Healthcare Hamilton, the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH), the Nova Scotia Health Authority, Alberta Health Services, North York General, and Cleveland Clinic Canada.

We also have extensive experience working with couples where one partner is living with severe mental illness or where the couple has been navigating a serious or chronic medical condition. This is one of the more unique specialties of our practice, and one that we want to name explicitly. Couples where one partner is living with depression, OCD, bipolar disorder, or psychosis, or couples who have been navigating the experience of cancer, diabetes, or an autoimmune condition, face challenges that generalist couples therapy is often not equipped to hold. The dynamics, the cycles, the ways that the illness shapes the relationship and the relationship shapes the illness are complex. All of this requires a clinician who has both the skill and the depth of understanding that both halves deserve. Several psychologists at Laksman Doell carry this combined expertise. If this is your situation, then you can rest assured that you have found a place that takes it seriously.

Sessions are available in person at 27 Prince Arthur Avenue in the Annex neighbourhood of Toronto, or virtually across Ontario via PHIPA-compliant video. All services are available virtually to any Ontario resident. No referral required.

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Life can be complicated, finding support shouldn’t be. At Laksman Doell, we take that seriously.

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Frequently Asked Questions

Do we both need to attend every session?

You can expect that most sessions will involve both of you, though we do like to meet individually with each partner early in the therapeutic relationship in order to inform our initial assessment. After that, individual sessions are sometimes woven in when they are clinically relevant, but we always structure that both carefully and transparently.

What if only one of us wants to come?

If your partner isn’t ready to engage in couples therapy, then individual therapy can still help you to understand the relational patterns that you find yourself in, and can be structured to help you better understand and communicate your relational and emotional needs. Some people begin individually and move into couples work later. We can talk through what makes sense.

Can couples therapy work if the relationship is in serious trouble?

Yes. Serious distress is exactly when the work often matters most. We work with infidelity, disconnection, communication breakdown, and with complex presentations including experience of serious mental illness and significant and chronic physical illness.

Is couples therapy the same as marriage counselling?

The terms are often used interchangeably, but we prefer to use the term “couples therapy”, because the dyads that we work with are not only those in traditional martial configurations. Couples therapy at Laksman Doell is also delivered by doctoral-level registered psychologists using evidence-based clinical approaches, which is distinct from “counselling” in both training level and methodology.

Do you provide LGBTQ2SIA+ affirming couples therapy?

Absolutely. Our team of doctoral-level psychologists engage in ongoing work to ensure cultural competence in the experiences of LGBTQ2SIA+ couples. We also practice with a depth of training and clinical experience that allows for acknowledgment and consideration of the variety of ways in which the experience of relationship difficulties may also be informed and impacted by previous or ongoing experiences of exclusion, marginalization and stigma that individuals within these communities may have endured.

Is couples therapy at your practice covered by OHIP?

Private practice services are not covered by OHIP. Coverage may be available through extended health benefits, as many plans cover the services of a registered psychologist. We recommend confirming with your provider before commencing treatment.

Can I be seen virtually?

Yes. All services are available virtually via PHIPA-compliant video for any Ontario residents.

Life is complicated. We give you clarity.

The first step is a brief consultation to help understand what you are looking for. Email us at [email protected] or complete our contact form online.