Dating and Relationships Counseling

Healthy relationships involve honesty, trust, respect and open communication between partners and they take effort and compromise from both people. There is no imbalance of power. Partners respect each other’s independence, can make their own decisions without fear of retribution or retaliation, and share decisions. If or when a relationship ends, there is no stalking or refusal to let the other partner go.

• Trust is something that is built in time and even through working through difficult times.
• Be vulnerable and open in your relationship but do it gradually.
• Remember the role of respect.
• Give the benefit of the doubt.
• Express your feelings functionally, especially when it’s tough.
• Healthy relationships look like the recycling symbol, what you put in you get back.

See our post on “Rebuilding Trust in Relationships” by Emily Stone, PhD.

• You start have spent some time alone and worked on taking care of yourself.
• You are willing to be vulnerable.
• You aren’t bitter about past relationships.
• You start to feel excited about dating again.
• You are making the choice to date for the right reasons.
• You have insight that’s come out of past relationships.
• You feel you are emotionally available and willing to date.

Knowing when to date isn’t an exact process. Sometimes casual dating can help us move on from the past and help us to figure out what we want in the future (and be fun). Pay attention to your gut. If you feel like you are dating to try and avoid pain, then that is likely what you need to work through first.

Assessing when you are ready to commit can take some time and it’s different for everyone. Below are 10 questions to help you consider if you are ready to commit to a relationship:

1. Do you feel that you are still unresolved from a past break up? Sometimes it can take some time before you are ready for new committed relationship and that’s not a bad thing.
2. Are you aware of your emotional triggers and know how to cope with them on your own?
3. Do you have the ability to present who you are and want to become clearly and honestly?
4. Does the idea of committing feel exciting or confining to you?
5. Are you able to be vulnerable with someone new?
6. How resilient do you feel to relationship challenges?
7. Do you understand that love and commitment need constant reinvestment of time, energy, and love?
8. Can you view a committed relationship as an ever-transforming entity?
9. Knowing your emotional triggers, are you screening for this in assessing your relationship prospects?
10. Do you still believe that great long-term relationships are possible?

• Take your time with this. If people have differences in their past, it can bring up a lot of anxiety or shame.
• If their past has been painful, validate their pain.
• Sometimes it can be more productive to focus on your sexual preferences in the current relationship instead of what it has been historically.
• Realize that there is a reason the past is in the past.
• Everyone has a past – including you.
• Focus on making the present better.