Couples Therapy · Grand Rapids, Michigan
Your relationship
deserves its own
kind of care
Something has shifted. The connection that once felt effortless now takes effort. Or maybe it always has. Wherever you are in your relationship, couples therapy at The Family Therapy Place offers a space to find your way back — to each other, and to yourselves.
Love rests on two pillars: surrender and autonomy. Our need for togetherness exists alongside our need for separateness.
— Esther Perel
What Brings Couples To Us
You don't have to be
in crisis to begin
Feeling disconnected
You're living parallel lives. The warmth that used to come naturally now feels like something you have to work to find.
Recurring conflict
The same arguments keep surfacing. You're not fighting about what you think you're fighting about — and both of you know it.
Rebuilding after betrayal
Trust has been broken. You're not sure what's possible, but something in you isn't ready to stop trying.
Life transitions
A new baby, a career change, loss, a move — the relationship that worked before doesn't quite fit the life you're in now.
Pre-marital work
You're committed and want to begin well — building patterns of communication and connection before the harder seasons arrive.
Growing apart
There's no single event — just a slow drift. You're wondering if you still know each other, and whether that can change.
Our Approach
Three people
in the room
In couples therapy, we are always working with three: you, your partner, and the relationship itself. Each deserves attention. Each holds something the others need.
Our work is emotionally focused, experiential, and attachment-based — drawing on the understanding that most relational pain is rooted not in incompatibility, but in disconnection from each other and from ourselves.
Emotionally focused
We work with the emotional undercurrents beneath conflict — the bids for connection, the fears of abandonment, the longing that gets expressed as anger or withdrawal.
Experiential
Insight alone rarely changes a relationship. We work with what happens in the room — the live moment between you — as the primary site of change.
Attachment-based
Our earliest experiences of love shape how we love as adults. Understanding your attachment patterns opens the door to choosing differently.
Differentiation-focused
Lasting intimacy requires two distinct people. We help each partner develop a stronger sense of self — not at the expense of the relationship, but in service of it.
A Practice Built for Relationships
More than a therapist.
A relational practice.
Most therapy practices treat relationships as a specialty. At The Family Therapy Place, relationships are the foundation of everything we do. Whether you're coming as a couple, a family, or an individual carrying the weight of relational pain — every clinician here shares the same relational lens.
This means if your partner is working with one of our therapists, a family member with another, and you're seeing someone individually — your care isn't siloed. It's held within a practice that understands how all of those relationships connect.
Couples therapy
Working with the relationship as its own living system — not just two individuals in the same room.
Family therapy
Whether your family includes young children, teenagers, or adult members navigating new seasons together.
Individual therapy
Individual work informed by a relational lens — understanding that who we are is shaped by our relationships.
About Our Fees
Why couples therapy
is self-pay
We made a deliberate choice not to bill insurance for couples therapy. This isn't a limitation — it's a clinical decision that allows us to do better work with you.
Insurance requires an identified patient
To bill insurance, one partner must be designated as "the patient" with a diagnosable condition. In relational work, this is clinically problematic — we're treating a relationship, not an individual pathology.
Insurance is built on a medical model
The insurance system was designed for individual, symptom-focused treatment. Couples therapy is fundamentally relational — it doesn't fit that model, and forcing it to often compromises the work.
Freedom to work the way your relationship needs
Without insurance constraints on session length, structure, or frequency, we can design the work around what's actually most helpful for you — not what a reimbursement code allows.
Session Fees
Transparent pricing
We believe access to good relational care matters. Our fees reflect the depth of this work while offering options for different circumstances.
Standard rate
$175
Per 50-minute session. No insurance billing — payment is due at time of service.
Sliding scale
Available
We offer a limited number of sliding scale spots for couples who need a reduced rate based on income. Ask us about availability when you reach out.
Get Started
The first step is
often the hardest
Reaching out takes courage. Fill out the form below and we'll be in touch within 24–48 hours to answer your questions and find the right fit — no pressure, no commitment.