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Marriage is an important event in anyone's life. For most people, it's an untraveled road with many aspects that they haven't experienced until they tie the knot. Men and women both have different physical, and emotional needs. Their way of thinking and understanding life usually differ from one another. Which is why we always recommend pre-marriage counselling.

Pre-marriage counselling is a therapy practice that helps couples prepare mentally for their marriage. It is often seen as a way of addressing the conflicts and problems that a couple faces in maintaining a healthy, happy and strong relationship. Some also call it couple's counselling, but ultimately the point is to address a couple's concerns about their relationship and establish boundaries while improving their communication. 

There are many benefits of attending pre-marriage counselling before tieing the knot. Couples therapy is essential in improving communication, discussing past issues, learning to solve problems effectively, and getting to know one another better. Which is why we emphasise its importance. 

Newly engaged couples can also take advantage of the benefits of attending couples therapy before marriage. According to Health Research Funding, engaged couples who go through premarital counselling have a marriage success rate 30% higher than couples who don’t seek professional guidance. The research speaks volumes about the success rate of pre-marital counselling. Still, if you have doubts about it, here are some pointers to prove the importance of pre-marriage counselling. Scroll down and read on!

Strengthen Your Relationship With Pre-Marriage Counselling

Whether someone recommended pre-marriage counselling to you or you and your partner have been merely entertaining the idea yourselves, it is a great idea. Pre-marriage counselling can help both you and your partner a lot, especially since you're about to enter a whole new exciting and challenging phase of your life. Premarital counselling can help couples create a strong, happy marriage that brings happiness, health, wealth and well-being not only to the two people, but to their children, their children, and the generations after them. It helps you get to know yourself and your partner better, teaches you about your similarities and differences, and instructs you on how to create a roadmap for your life together.

Here are some other perks that will make you consider taking this route before getting married.

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I. Understanding Each Other's Expectations

Pre-marriage counselling helps couples understand each other's expectations from the relationship. Through therapy sessions, communication between partners improves immensely, which in turn helps develop conflict-resolution skills. You get to know each other better, understand each other's thought processes and establish a positive attitude between each other. In simpler words, the primary steps of pre-marriage counselling are to prepare the would-be bride and groom to understand the significance of marriage. Such counselling helps them develop the mentality of changing themselves and adjusting to their partners in their spaces.

If the bride and groom are mentally prepared for their marriage with one another through therapy, their compatibility increases even further. Initially, when you're getting to know one another, it's common to put up a fake front, hiding your habits and attitude in life, all to put your best self forward. Such gaps in communication can become hurdles in the future, whether it's a love marriage or an arranged one (or a arranged-cum-love marriage!).

Similarly, inter-caste, inter-religious or marriage with a foreigner are some critical situations which might cause a problem in future if not paid attention to before marriage. This is why couples should attend pre-marriage counselling sessions so that they understand each other's expectations better.  

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II. Communicating Effectively

One of the biggest hurdles of a couple is their inability to communicate. A lot of times, your partners may be bothered by something you did or said or the way they're feeling, but because they're trying to put their best selves forward, they fail to address it correctly. Often, it's not that they do not want to talk to each other, but that they don't know how to without hurting their partner's feelings. Couples who don't talk to one another clearly or do not know how to can lead to communication problems in the future.

As they say, communication is key to a happy, healthy marriage. You and your future spouse should be able to talk about anything. Discuss your days together and the future; discuss money and other heavy-hitting topics.  Learning how to communicate in couples therapy before marriage will set you up for a healthy relationship going forward.

During pre-marriage counselling, each partner is asked separate questions to answer in written format to assess their perspectives about each other and their marital relationship. Various issues including gender equality, liberalisation & opening up of society, women adopting equal responsibility as breadwinners, nuclear families, demanding lifestyles, an extremely cutthroat competitive world, and stresses & strains of day-to-day life are discussed during these sessions.

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When couples get pre-marriage counselling before their wedding, they get together to talk to a professional relationship counsellor who is trained to encourage them to talk to each other openly and helps them better understand each other. Couples who go through this type of counselling surely build better communication skills because they have a neutral party there to help them understand each other. Undoubtedly this is one of the biggest benefits of premarital counselling.

Furthermore, by learning how to communicate their needs and desires, couples also acquire the ability to reach mutual agreements and gain compassion for one another that will ultimately help them through tough times. 

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III. Resolving Conflicts

Pre-marriage counselling is a great opportunity for to-be-married couples to develop skills that will help them resolve conflicts in the future. These are issues that could lead to divorce if they're not addressed and allowed to become serious. By talking with a relationship counsellor, couples may be able to settle issues like money matters or talk about their roles are parents in the future. Talking about these issues before the marriage takes place is ultimately the best means to create a good springboard to push on forward. 

Couples need to come in with a candid mindset so that they can fix issues and there is a reason why many have been choosing to use this type of counselling for many years. For a solid foundation of a marriage, it is always best to learn how to address issues and be honest with one another. So that in the future you can avoid and resolve serious conflicts. 

Pre-marriage counselling also provides couples with a great opportunity to confront issues that could lead to divorce before they become serious. As you will be partners in the future, spending almost every hour of every day together, big and small conflicts can arise. Thus, when you get pre-marital counselling you learn to communicate better. And when you communicate with each other better, you're able to resolve small and big conflicts in a productive way that doesn't hurt anyone's feelings. 

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IV. Building a Stronger Relationship

Many premarital counsellors do more than only help couples talk through their current issues. They also help them plan meticulously for the future. A pre-marriage counsellor can help you and your partner set financial and family goals, aid you in finding ways to accomplish them and learn how to be realistic with your expectations. It's their goal to help you and your partner create and focus on healthy and realistic marriage goals that will come with the new changes in your life.

Since you do not want to blindly walk into a marriage, you have to get to know your partner and their true self. Your partner should make you feel safe and stable. Getting pre-marriage counselling may give you a feeling of stability, safety, direction, and an idea of where you are going and what you are doing.

It will take some of the potential fear out of the decision, and give you more hope, reason, and guidance. It will provide a framework for building a healthy relationship, and equip you with the tools and skills necessary to successfully navigate discord and to have meaningful conversations. This is your opportunity to build a stronger relationship that will get you through the highs and lows of life. 

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V. Nurture Your Intimacy

Often pre-marital counsellors understand the struggles of trusting your partner, intimacy, and the hurdles of finances that happen to younger couples especially. Many brides and grooms who have come together through an arranged match struggle with intimacy at the beginning of their marriage. Similarly, couples who are already close to each other may struggle to be as intimate as they were before.

The intimacy between a couple is dependent on their emotions and their communication. When people are taught how to handle their emotions in childhood, they learn that certain feelings like love are good, while other feelings like anger are bad. However, this can lead us to pent up our emotions and in turn cause problems in a relationship. 

Through pre-marriage counselling, you learn how to handle the intimacy factor of your relationship by understanding how to deal with each other's emotions. The philosophies about emotion in a marriage are addressed better in therapy and you learn to navigate the treacherous path of emploring intimacy with your partner better.  

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Conclusion

Again, we cannot stress enough how much pre-marriage counselling can help you and your partner before you enter this new phase of your life. Even the most perfect couples have their ups and downs. If you're looking to take charge of the future of your relationship, then this is the healthiest path you can take. By getting to know one another, for better or worse, you ensure that you’re mentally and emotionally prepared to deal with any issues that may arise. In conclusion, pre-marriage counselling helps to understand each other as a couple and their expectations from the marriage.

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The Importance of Pre-Marriage Counselling: How it Can Strengthen Your Relationship

by Shivani Singh

The Importance of Pre-Marriage Counselling: How it Can Strengthen Your Relationship