Couples therapy is often billed as the brave, mature step toward healing a struggling relationship. For many, it is. Sitting down with a licensed professional and unpacking years of resentment, miscommunication, and unmet needs can be life-changing.
But what happens when therapy isn’t progressing—it’s purgatory? What if those $200 sessions aren’t solving your problems but simply buying time in a relationship that should’ve ended months (or years) ago?
This isn’t about dismissing counseling. It’s about questioning whether it’s being used as a tool for healing or a high-cost excuse to avoid the truth. Let’s dive into what relationship therapy can (and can’t) do and whether it’s really helping you grow, or just helping you stay stuck.
1. Therapy Doesn’t Work If One Person’s Already Checked Out
You can’t fix a relationship if only one person is actually in it. If one partner’s just showing up out of guilt, obligation, or to check a box, therapy turns into theater.
They nod. They listen. Maybe they even say the “right” things. But emotionally? They’re gone. And the longer you sit across from them, hoping for a miracle, the more therapy becomes a weekly reminder of how alone you are, even when you’re together. Real healing requires two people equally invested in the outcome, not one person dragging the other toward change.
2. Some Couples Use Therapy to Avoid the Breakup Conversation
Therapy feels productive. You’re having hard talks, “doing the work, ” and getting tools. But sometimes, all that structure just delays the inevitable.
Instead of asking, “Should we be together?” therapy becomes a place where couples fix surface-level symptoms while avoiding the deeper truth: they’re not compatible, the love is gone, or the damage is too deep.
Counseling can create the illusion of effort, while both people quietly resist the honesty that would require actual change.
3. You Can’t “Communicate Better” Your Way Out of Fundamental Incompatibility
A therapist can teach you communication techniques. But they can’t rewrite your core values. If you want kids and your partner doesn’t? No amount of active listening will fix that.
If one of you needs deep emotional intimacy and the other is emotionally unavailable? Therapy might just help you articulate the problem better, without solving it. There’s a difference between poor communication and a poor match. Therapy works on the former. It can’t force alignment on the latter.
4. It Becomes a Performance Zone, Not a Growth Space
The therapy room should be where your guard drops. But some couples turn it into a courtroom. One partner pleads their case. The other deflects, minimizes, or gaslights. And the therapist becomes an unofficial referee.
You’re not healing. You’re posturing, trying to “win” the session instead of understanding each other. If therapy becomes a stage for blame, not vulnerability, it’s not therapy; it’s just a very expensive form of scorekeeping.
5. Sometimes, It’s the Only Time You’re Civil, Which Should Be a Red Flag
If the only time you talk without screaming is during therapy, that’s not progress. It’s a sign of dysfunction.
Some couples treat the therapist’s office like a pressure release valve. They vent, cry, and feel heard… and then go home and return to silent resentment. Nothing actually changes between sessions. You just feel slightly better for 48 hours.
Therapy should be a springboard for real-life change, not a weekly escape from a relationship you can’t stand.
6. You’re Paying to Preserve a Version of the Relationship That No Longer Exists
There’s something painfully nostalgic about couples therapy. You walk in hoping to recover what you once had—the laughter, the connection, the intimacy. But sometimes, that version of the relationship is gone. People evolve. Trust erodes. Love dies quietly while you’re busy managing logistics and pretending you’re okay.
In therapy, you keep talking about how things used to be. But the reality is, you’re both different people now, and the old relationship may not be worth resurrecting.
7. Staying in Therapy Feels Safer Than Starting Over
Starting over is terrifying. It means grieving, rebuilding, possibly co-parenting, and reimagining your future. Therapy, by contrast, feels safe. Familiar. Predictable.
It’s easier to sit on that couch for another six months than to face the loneliness of a breakup. You tell yourself you’re “giving it time.” But deep down, you know you’re avoiding the pain of change. The question isn’t just “Is therapy helping?”—it’s “Am I using therapy to delay a truth I already know?”
8. It’s Not That Counseling Doesn’t Work. It’s That You’re No Longer a Fit
Let’s be clear: therapy itself isn’t the problem. Counseling helps countless couples rebuild after trauma, betrayal, or years of neglect. It offers tools, insights, and a nonjudgmental space to unpack the complex stuff. But not every relationship deserves to be saved. And therapy, when misused, can keep people in a loop of suffering with no exit plan.
If you’re leaving therapy sessions more exhausted than empowered—if you’re learning more ways to survive a dynamic that drains you—it might be time to ask the harder question: Why am I still here?
Before You Spend Another $200, Ask Yourself:
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Are we in therapy to heal or to avoid ending things?
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Do I still want this relationship, or do I just fear what happens if it ends?
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Are we actually changing or just talking about changing?
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Am I investing in growth or postponing the inevitable?
Therapy isn’t supposed to just soothe the symptoms. It’s supposed to help you figure out whether the foundation is even worth reinforcing.
Have you ever stayed in a relationship longer than you should have, because therapy made it feel “active”? Did counseling help, or just delay your decision?
Read More:
6 Warning Signs Your Therapist Might Be Making You Worse
7 Relationship Rules That Actually Make Couples Resent Each Other
Riley Schnepf is an Arizona native with over nine years of writing experience. From personal finance to travel to digital marketing to pop culture, she’s written about everything under the sun. When she’s not writing, she’s spending her time outside, reading, or cuddling with her two corgis.
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