- Partnership/marriage is a developmental process that reiterates in an adult form the childhood developmental process of the individual members of the couple.
- Stress between the partners is a reiteration of the developmental arrests/disruptions of each partner from prior relationships. These developmental arrests/disruptions of each partner are often similar or identical, and the adaptations or developed reactions to stress are complementary.
- Stress and subsequent conflict between the partners is an externalization of internal stress and conflict in each partner played out in the interpersonal arena of the relationship.
- Adaptations/developed reactions to stress in childhood form character defenses which function as a person’s personality in adult life. Since these character formations are often rigid and complementary, they must be changed if ultimate improvement is to exist in the relationship. An individual’s choice of response to the need deficits in their partner merits characterological change in self, and this can in turn effect change in the partner, as well as potential change in the relationship.
The role of the counselor/therapist is to reflect what each individual presents as arrests, disruptions and conflicts that are showing up in the partnership, and to facilitate the developmental process of self-assessment and the discovery of conscious choices of response that can effect the changes each individual desires.
Based on “Working Hypothesis in Couples Therapy,” by Bernard J. Baca, Ph.D., L.C.S.W.