The Relationship Roadmap
Three hours to understand how the two of you are built — and what it will take to change.
Why every couple starts here
Most couples therapy begins the same way: a fifty-minute intake, a bit of history, and a slow start while the therapist gradually pieces together what’s happening. Months pass. You cover ground you’ve already covered before, with someone still forming a picture.
I don’t work that way.
Every couple I see begins with a Relationship Roadmap: a single three-hour session, followed by a written assessment and roadmap that is yours to keep. It is where I learn how each of you is built, how you fit together, and what is actually driving the pattern you keep landing in.
It is also where we decide what kind of work you need — steady weekly sessions, or concentrated intensive days. That is not a decision I ask you to make from the outside. It’s one I make with you, once I can see clearly.
Why three hours
Couples in recurring conflict rarely have trouble describing the problem. You can probably both narrate the argument before it happens.
What’s missing is an accurate, shared picture of how the two of you actually operate together — what sets things off, what happens in your bodies when it does, and why the same conflict keeps returning in different clothing.
That picture cannot be assembled in fifty minutes. Three hours gives us room to slow down, let real interaction happen in the room, and see the pattern as it occurs rather than reconstruct it afterward.
What we do in the three hours
Understand each of you individually. How you’re built, what you learned early about closeness and safety, and what each of you carries into this relationship.
Look closely at how you fit together. Where you complement one another, and where you reliably collide.
Work with live interaction, slowed down. This is not an interview. We work with what happens between you in real time, because the patterns that matter live in the nervous system, not in the analysis.
Identify what’s actually driving the conflict — underneath the content of any particular argument.
What you leave with
A written relationship assessment and roadmap. Sent to you within 7–10 days: what I see, what the work needs to be, and in what order. Yours to keep, whatever you decide to do next.
A clear picture of your relationship’s particular architecture. Not a diagnosis — a map.
Language for what happens between you that doesn’t require either of you to be the problem.
My recommendation on which path fits — ongoing couples therapy or a Marriage Intensive — and an honest account of what change will ask of each of you.
Where the Roadmap Can Lead
After the Relationship Roadmap, we’ll have a clearer sense of what kind of support fits your relationship now: a focused Marriage Intensive, steady ongoing couples therapy, or another next step if something different is needed.
Focused, Immersive Support
The Second Half Intensive
Private, focused 2-day or custom Marriage Intensive support for couples at a turning point.
Often the right fit when your relationship feels urgent, deeply stuck, post-betrayal, or too important to keep addressing one week at a time.
Steady, Ongoing Support
Couples Therapy
Two-hour sessions, weekly or every other week, in person in Boulder or online.
Often the right fit when you want ongoing support, space between sessions to practice, and a slower rhythm for new ways of relating to take hold.
How I work
I practice from PACT® — the Psychobiological Approach to Couple Therapy, developed by Stan Tatkin — with Terry Real’s Relational Life work and attachment- and trauma-informed experiential methods integrated where they serve.
The work is experiential and body-based. We work with what happens between you in real time rather than discussing it from a distance. The aim is secure functioning: becoming a team that reliably protects one another.
Practical Details
Questions couples ask
Why is the first session three hours instead of fifty minutes?
Because fifty minutes isn’t long enough to see the pattern — only long enough to hear about it. Three hours lets us work with what actually happens between you, which is where the useful information is.
Do we have to do the Roadmap? Can't we just start weekly sessions?
The Roadmap is the required first session for every couple I work with. It’s how I know what we’re treating, and it’s what makes the sessions that follow worth your time and money. Starting without it means spending your first two months paying me to figure out what a single focused session would have told us.
We've already done couples therapy. Do we still need this?
Is $1,500 for one session normal?
It is not a typical fifty-minute session, and it isn’t priced like one. It includes three hours of clinical work, preparation and review beforehand, and a written assessment and roadmap you keep. My practice is private pay; I don’t bill insurance.
Can we do this online?
Yes. Many couples do. If you’re within reach of Boulder, in person is my preference for the first session, but online works well.
What if you don't think we're a fit?
I’ll say so. If the Roadmap indicates you’d be better served by a different format or level of care, I’ll tell you directly and help you find it. That’s part of what the session is for.
What if one of us wants an intensive and the other doesn't?
That’s common, and it’s worth talking about rather than resolving in advance. We’ll sort it out together after the Roadmap, when you both have the same information.
Start where the work actually starts
If the two of you are ready to understand what’s happening between you — and what it would take to change it — the Roadmap is where we begin.