Helping couples discover the why behind the what in their marriage with Chris and Beth Bruno and Tracy Johnson of ReStory Counseling.
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Welcome to the Thrive Marriage Lab with Restory Counseling, where we help you explore the why behind the what. Because guess what? We believe that your marriage is not a problem to be solved, but a mystery to be explored and enjoyed. We believe that the more you explore and know your story, the deeper your marriage connection will be. This podcast is now the audio version of our new YouTube channel, Thrive Marriage Lab.
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where each week you can expect us to help you cultivate connection and belonging without the fixing and tips and common things you often hear in the marriage space. So find us on YouTube or listen in.
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Hey, so I'm working right now with this couple. They're currently in a therapeutic separation and they're doing some good work. They're really trying hard to find one another in the context of this relationship. They're actually living apart right now, but they're working on themselves. They'll then move to the next level in a little bit where they're working together around some of this rupture repair like I talked about in a previous video. So the question that I want to address today is when do we end?
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the therapeutic separation. When do we end it? Welcome to the Thrive Marriage Lab. My name is Chris Bruno and I'm a licensed professional counselor and the founder of ReStory Counseling. And together with my wife, Beth, and our colleague, Tracy Johnson, we post videos to help you understand the why behind the what. Because we believe that when you explore and know your story, the deeper your marriage relationship will be. So when should you end your therapeutic separation? And remember,
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Several videos ago, I talked about having a document that really clarifies the purview of what you're gonna be doing over the course of time. Well, I wanna refer back to that document because hopefully right from the beginning, you had some clear time-bound mile markers, if you will, of what is going to happen on this day, on this day, on this day. And what are some of the expectations that you each have of each other so that you can, in those markers,
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Say, is that happening? Has that happened? Are we moving forward? Is there progress being made? Is he doing, is she doing what they said they were gonna do so that we can go to the next marker? So as we talk about ending a therapeutic separation, this is really important, you guys, because there does need to be an end. An ongoing, open-ended, therapeutic separation ends up not being a therapeutic separation because you have no goal.
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You have no moment. You have no clarity around like, this is what we're actually shooting for. So I'm not against taking that document and recognizing, okay, so these other intervening things have come up. Maybe one of the spouses has, over the course of their counseling, realized that they come from a past situation of abuse that they didn't have an awareness of, that now they're realizing, oh, that is impacting my marriage relationship. And I'm gonna need more time for me to address those things. That's totally fine.
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for you to modify that document over the course of time if you need to. But I also wanna say, hey, there's got to be an ending point to a therapeutic separation. Each couple is gonna be different. Each couple is gonna need a different level of time. Maybe it's, like I've said, a month, two months, three months. I am gonna say that a therapeutic separation should not last more than six months. Not longer than six months.
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Other people can have longer than six months. They might say that that's, you know, totally fine. I have generally found that six month mark is a really good mark. It gives you as the maximum of how long a therapeutic separation should be. Because at the end of six months, if you've not made progress, if you've not done the things you've promised to do, if you've not been able to find one another again in some of those very specific conversations along the way.
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then you need to start thinking about, hey, what is, do we need to just move back in together? Do we need to stop the separation? Are things better than they were? And we can reconvene and move into a different season of healing in our marriage. You know, that is very possible. And I think I would recommend that often for couples who have been doing the work and just as it feel like maybe it's been enough, maybe there is enough for you to step back in into a different way. Rethink through.
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your marriage relationship and what it is you want. Has there been enough movement in your marriage in order for you to say, yes, we're gonna get back together, we're gonna stop the separation, reunite, and then reformulate what the posture is moving forward, what the process is moving forward. I actually really like that because after six months, some other things have begun to happen. Other rhythms have begun to be established. Maybe some things are happening with the kids,
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change things happen, maybe a kid has graduated high school or graduated kindergarten or whatever it is, some things might need to change because life has gone on. Six months, a lot can happen in six months. And there's the things that happen in the marriage, but there's also just things that happen in life. Job changes, deaths in the family, those kinds of things that you need to account for. And probably at the end of six months, if progress has been made, you need to address how much progress has been made.
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If we were to make the decision today based on where we are and the work that we've done, if we were to make the decision today to go into a therapeutic separation, would we do that now? Based on what we know now, based on what our life has been, based on what our growth has been, would we make the decision for a therapeutic separation now, today? If the answer is no, then it is time to end the therapeutic separation.
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And like I said, reimagine what the next steps are in your marriage and in your life. So if you were gonna say, hey, we would still say a therapeutic separation and not enough progress has been made, then I'm gonna say, hey, I wonder if progress is going to be made. Is there going to be enough progress in the next month or two months or whatever? And the fact is that this is not a hard and fast rule. Maybe you need a little extra time. Maybe there is something else.
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that you need to address. That is totally fine. It's not a hard and fast rule, but I would say that generally around that six month mark, you should start to be thinking, hey, we're gonna bring an end to what has been in order for us to enter what still can be. If you're at the point where you're at six months and no progress has been made, he's not done what he's supposed to do, she's not done what she's supposed to do, whatever the story is, then I would say, hey, maybe you need to think through something else.
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Maybe you need to think through an actual separation. Maybe you need to think through more towards moving down the road towards, you know, fully separating and moving towards divorce. Maybe that's time for those things to happen or change the whole idea of separation and going into like a marriage intensive or going into something else. Again, where both of you are agreeing that we're gonna change the process of what we're doing to work on ourselves in order for our marriage to heal, we need to find some other
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other process, other thing that we're going to address so that we can heal. That six month mark, I think is a good one. Now, if you are at a place where you are recognizing, hey, this is just not working for me, this is just not working for me. I want to say that both of you are going to need some one on one support. If you do not have that yet, you need to have some one on one individual separate, not the same person, not the same counselor, but two separate counselors.
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working with each of you individually to help you navigate the next step forward. Because you need an ally, you need someone that you can, you can talk to, you can cry to, you can yell at, whatever, who's gonna be in your corner as your ally, and as the person who's gonna tend to your heart. And what I mean by ally is not mean somebody that's gonna help you fight the other person, but somebody who's gonna be there for you in the process of what it might actually mean to take more of a serious.
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separation from one another. Make sure that you have that. If you are actually gonna say, hey, we're gonna move into another season, another way of engagement, make sure again that you sit down with your document, you recognize what has been done, you recognize what hasn't been done, and the two of you agree to, maybe it's not a separation document now, maybe it's another kind of document that says, hey, we're gonna agree over the next month, six months, to do these things in order for us to continue moving towards
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one another in a loving and hopeful way. So those are some thoughts around how to end the, the therapeutic separation in the next video. I'm going to talk about like, what if it doesn't work? What if the therapeutic separation doesn't work? I've alluded to a couple of things here today, but I really want to dive into that next.
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where we look forward to hearing about how your marriage continues to grow. See you same time, same place next week.