Relationship Coaching for Partners and Spouses
Do you feel like your partner doesn’t listen to you?
Are you feeling disconnected and distant from each other?
Are you and your partner arguing too much? Or, are you avoidant of conflict, so it comes out sideways?
Are you having a hard time balancing the needs of the relationship with your individual needs?
Has one partner had an emotional or sexual affair, and you are trying to see if repair is realistic?
Are you both stuck in communication patterns of blame, hurt, misunderstanding, and resentment?
Is past trauma of one or both of you interfering with your communication and connection?
Are you in a polycule relationship and need to sort through boundaries, needs, and improve communication?
Do you repeat versions of the same arguments over and over again?
Are you feeling unappreciated?
Would you like some help clarifying healthy relationship boundaries and identifying codependent dynamics?
Are you having trouble co-parenting or making mutual decisions together?
Do you want to rekindle romance, connection, and sexual connection?
Do you want to do your work in a socially conscious, inclusive setting that affirms your sexual and gender identities or relationship composition?
*Are you trying to decide whether to stay together or transition apart? (I do offer Conscious Uncoupling Coaching.)
Relationship coaching is about action and change: naming and addressing resentments and unmet expectations; identifying and shifting unhelpful communication patterns; developing concrete communication skills; increasing mutual understanding; identifying your triggers; recognizing projections and assumptions; taking responsibility; reducing blame; learning to build healthy connection and mutual appreciation; setting realistic boundaries and expectations; learning to collaborate; addressing stressful issues together; problem-solving; and goal-setting together.
When both (or all) parties are committed to changing their part of the unhealthy, painful relationship dynamics, a wonderful, fresh, and exciting movement forward can occur.
A healthy relationship will foster your individuality while also honoring and nurturing your connection!
Seeking relationship help is a brave and often scary step in a partnership. When partners agree to face their issues together, it can feel challenging, overwhelming, and relieving.
Relationship coaching can help build long-lasting emotional intimacy, increase communication, and strengthen your relationship bond. It is dynamic, fluid, growth-oriented, and strengths-based.
Some benefits of relationship coaching:
Learn new skills to talk and listen (really listen) to each other
Increase mutual understanding
Address and clear out past hurts and unresolved issues
Understand how your family of origin dynamics may be impacting your dynamics
Learn strategies to respectfully and successfully address differences and problem-solve
Balance individual and relationship needs
Increase affection and sexual connection
Work through situations that have caused pain and distrust
Build trust so that you both know you have each other’s backs. Strengthen trust, mutuality, and security
Learn how to genuinely support each other when one or both of you is dealing with past trauma or family-of-origin issues
Work together as a team
Together, you can build the relationship you want.
How I can help
I have over two decades of experience helping adults develop stronger, more honest relationships. I incorporate my training in relationship coaching and positive psychology coaching, my master’s degree in counseling, my certification as a PREPARE/ENRICH facilitator, my certification as a family mediator, and my own personal relationship work.
Coaching humans to build and sustain healthy and happy relationships is one of my work’s most enjoyable, challenging, and humbling parts. The relationship coaching I offer is interactive, fluid, collaborative, challenging, balanced, and sustaining.
As your relationship coach, I am committed to helping you learn to understand, talk, argue, and listen to each other with loving kindness, respect, unity, and openness—even when you disagree.
- You will learn healthier ways to communicate.
- Together, we will review the relationship communication packet I have developed, which includes handouts, templates, worksheets, resources, and tools to increase healthier communication and rekindle your emotional, affectional, and sexual connections.
In our work together, I will:
- help you identify problematic communication patterns and teach you concrete communication skills and strategies
- listen carefully to each of your perspectives about your relationship problems and needs
- collaborate with you and your partner(s) to help create a dynamic, safe, balanced, and comfortable setting for you both to address your concerns
- guide, inform, observe, and teach
- encourage you and your partner to envision together the kind of relationship you want
- help you to more respectfully resolve the issues that are interfering with your shared vision
- help you (re)build trust and honesty by learning how to say and hear the hard stuff that otherwise, left unsaid and unheard, erodes connection and builds resentment
- offer observations, specific strategies, homework, worksheets, information, resources, and new ways to look at yourselves and your relationship dynamics
Two unique reasons my conflict communication process is so successful:
(1) Intentional individualized preparation with each person on the front end:
Before we all meet, I will meet with each person individually. The first meeting is a complimentary 30-minute Zoom consultation. The purpose of this consultation is for each person to share a bit about the reasons and goals for seeking relationship help and ask me any questions about my experience and approach. Perhaps more importantly, it is also an opportunity for each of us to decide if we are a good match to do this important work together.
If we all agree, then we will move forward and schedule the individual 50-minute sessions. Before this confidential appointment, I will email each of you a Reflection and Goals Relationship Coaching Worksheet tailored to your relationship, based on the information I received from your 30-minute consultation meetings, as well as a Relationship Values Worksheet. In our first meeting, I will listen closely to each person’s perspective, needs, and goals, and address any questions or concerns about the process. These individual appointments help each person gain clarity about their specific goals for the relationship coaching meetings, discuss their communication strengths and challenges, and identify their helpful and unhelpful coping strategies when they feel escalated and upset. This preparation on the front end of the process helps each person enter the meetings with more clarity and focus
After these meetings, we will schedule the coaching meetings. I request a minimum of four 90-minute appointments. These sessions typically occur weekly or bi-weekly. Together, we will determine if more than four meetings are warranted.
(2) A focus on learning healthier conflict-resolution and communication skills:
We often don’t have the skills or a shared language to express our opinions, perspectives, feelings, and needs or to really listen to others when they express theirs, especially when the situation is emotionally charged. We often get stuck in unhealthy circular communication patterns. I have developed Communication Guidelines for Engagement, conflict-resolution and communication skill-building templates, and a packet of resources that we will discuss during our first meeting together and implement throughout the coaching process. This real-time learning together helps partners develop a shared understanding and language for more productive, healthier communication throughout the coaching and beyond.
For more information: Contact Irene Greene
The Concept of Differentiation as a Relationship Goal
Differentiation in this context is the concept of honoring and balancing each partner’s individual identity and needs with “the needs of the relationship.” It is a dedication to each partner developing a strong enough sense of themself as a separate whole person from the other. Then, each partner can more generously support the other to be the best version of themselves. This, in turn, strengthens the emotional safety, buoyancy, and vitality of the relationship (i.e., boundaries, emotional intelligence, caregiving vs. caretaking, interdependence vs. codependence). -Irene Greene
All are welcome here
I offer relationship coaching to adults who are in open, polyamorous, or monogamous relationships and folks who are neurodivergent, Queer/LGBTQIPA+, cisgender, and heterosexual. I have professional (and personal) experience working with folks where one or both are BIPOC. I am affirming and knowledgeable about kink and BDSM sexual activities and interests.
I offer partner allyship coaching to white people who are in interracial relationships.
The next LGBTQ+ relationship workshop will be offered again in the fall of 20256.
Irene’s Relationship-Related Coaching Certifications & Trainings
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Clinical Foundations in Gottman Method Couples Therapy, Levels I and II, The Gottman Institute, 2021
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Emotion Coaching: The Heart of Parenting, The Gottman Institute, 2021
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PREPARE/ENRICH Facilitator Certification, 2021
- Post-Graduate Certificate in Positive Psychology Well-Being Coaching (PPWBC) National Board Certification Training Program, College of Executive Coaching, 2016 – 2018
- Relationship Coach Certification (RCC), International Association of Professional Relationship Coaches, 2016 – 2017
- Certified Compassion Fatigue Professional (CCFP), 2016 – 2017, International Association of Trauma Professionals, Sarasota, FLA
- The Power of Mindfulness as Practice Certification, Jon Kabat-Zinn, Ph.D., 2016 – 2017
- Family Mediation Certification, Argosy University
To learn about the individual and relationship, group, and training services offered by Irene or to schedule your complimentary 30-minute consultation, contact Irene Greene
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