Has couples therapy worked for you?

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Posting here for traffic.

Has couples therapy worked for you?
Or how was your experience of having couples therapy?

Also, if you have had it, can you tell me what changes you made for the better and if those good changes are still happening.

I think my partner and I really could do with couples Counselling but they're resistant thinking it won't help.

We had an introductory session.

The fact that he actually sat down & listened, & saw that the therapist was listening, seemed to solve the problem.

@Sazzasez that's good to know.
DP doesn't want to involve a third party and feels we should be able to deal with this ourselves. But I really think we need the help.

We found it really helpful, helped us to look at how our own individual issues were effecting our communication in our relationship and taught us to communicate in a way that was helpful to moving forward. It's good to have a mediator sometimes who has absolutely no bias and hears both sides. It is however really hard work at the time
We have never been better as a couple since doing it, think we did around 8 sessions with a private therapist, went through relate once but didn't gel with the therapist

Yes and No. It brought into sharp focus that there was no amount of therapy that could save our relationship, and helped with keeping the split amicable.

If your DP is not wanting to do it, it won’t work. Therapy only helps when the client wants to be there.

For the outcomes of therapy to be good, there needs to be a certain amount of personal accountability, and reflectiveness, otherwise it is just a blame game. The therapist is not a referee but more of a facilitator. You both need to want to be facilitated.

@RogersOrganismicProcess
That is what's so difficult. I feel like we are at the end of the road. But we have a small baby and I do want us to try and I don't feel we can do that on our own without some support.
I don't want to keep asking but I've made it clear that if we don't go to couples sessions, then it shows me there's an unwillingness to try and work through this. I can't carry on in this relationship with the way it is, with all the ups and downs.

Honestly, without a third party being there I don’t think he’d have listened to me at all.

Silly, really: but that was the trouble.

My DP felt it was pointless a while back then one day he agreed to it. At the very first session we were asked to sit down and we instantly pulled the chairs towards each other so we could sit next to each other. The therapist commented later that was very significant and showed we were still strong as a couple but just needed a bit of help. It worked really well for us and things have been on track for a while but every now and then we go back for a few sessions just to remind ourselves of how to communicate etc.

It absolutely worked for me in that it made crystal clear that our relationship had been beyond repair for a very long time. Single parenting has been a doddle compared to the hell we were all living in.

I had family therapy on the NHS, which is rarer than hen's teeth. I'm very grateful.