Emotionally focused therapy for couples is a model for relationship therapy, which is based on attachment theory. It focuses on the emotions of the partners and strives for an improved emotional interaction with the partners. EFT is an integrative model, in which three perspectives are combined: the attachment theory, the intrapsychic or experiential perspective and the interpersonal or systemic perspective.
Attachment and relationship formation
You unconsciously take along, the way in which you were attached as a young child, which draws your later (partner) relationships. If you were securely attached, then there is a good chance that you will have stable relationships later on. If bonding was less safe or perhaps even unsafe, it could lead to problems with safety and trust in a relationship.
Insecure attachment can be expressed in a few patterns:
- The fight relationship with violent escalations in which both partners are constantly in a power struggle, attack each other and blame each other.
- The relationship in which one partner constantly criticizes the other, bombards him/her accusations and pursues him/her with demands. The other partner defends him/herself and retreats behind a thick wall, from where he/she sometimes fights back, making him unreachable for his/her attacking partner.
- The relationship in which both partners have given up and withdraw to their own island and feel little emotional connection.
Common enemy
These patterns mentioned above cause pain and sadness. They provide feelings of loneliness and powerlessness. They also ensure that partners seem to be each other’s enemy. However, there is one common enemy and that is the resulting relationship pattern.
Relationship break-ups often do not arise from lack of love, but because people do not know what to do with feelings and emotions. As a result, these emotions are pushed away and dysfunctional patterns of intercommunication with one another continue to exist. These eventually lead to escalations. This treatment teaches how a couple can de-escalate. Partners are taught new ways in which to express themselves in a way that does justice to both of the partners’ emotions and needs. Afterwards, partners learn to continue applying this new pattern.
There is a site from EFT Nederland eft.nl There you will find a tab ‘I am a visitor’.
You can view videos
Written information is provided.
You can also do a relationship test.