Ask a Therapist: How to Make Your Relationship Work

Most couples wait an average of seven years longer than they should before going to therapy. Seven years of unspoken assumptions, avoided conversations, and tension that could have been addressed so much sooner.

In this episode of Couchside Conversations, Advisor Beau Wirick sits down with licensed therapist Jennie Marie Battistin to talk about a different approach — one where therapy isn't a last resort but a tool you use early to build understanding, communicate better, and strengthen what you already have.

Tune in if you're interested in:

• Why couples wait too long to start therapy and what it costs them
• What the Gottman research actually says about healthy relationships
• How to bring up therapy with a partner who is resistant
• What strong couples do differently from the start
• How to have the conversations most people were never taught to have

To watch the episode or read the transcript, visit our website here.

Transcript

Full Episode Transcript

The following is a lightly edited transcript of the conversation between Beau Wirick and Jennie Marie Battistin.

Beau: Today we're asking a therapist the million dollar question: how do I make my relationship work, financially and otherwise? I want to introduce my very good friend Jennie Marie Bateson, who is kind of a big deal. Not only is she a wonderful therapist, but she's the practice owner of the largest holistic oriented therapy and psychiatric practice in California, with a 95% success rate of getting clients off psychotropic medications within an 18 month period. And full disclosure, Jennie did Daniela and my premarital counseling. So she's basically the reason I'm still married. 

Jennie: Thank you. While Beau is strategic about planning people's financial future, I'm strategic about helping people understand their emotions and connect with their partner in new ways, so they can have the important conversations and really get under the surface. We want to stop the endless cycle of ineffective therapy and ineffective medication so people are actually living their best lives. 

Beau: Finances are one of the central themes that brings couples into therapy. Tell me why.

Jennie: There's so much around finances that highlights old core wounds from childhood. It connects directly to attachment theory — whether someone is more anxious or more avoidant in how they approach conversations that feel uncertain or scary. Couples usually come in for two major reasons: finances or sex. And what I always say is, if we get your finances going in the right direction, your sex life is going to be amazing.

Beau: I think that's our new marketing campaign.

Jennie: When it comes to finances, I look at clients in two categories: seekers and retreaters. Interestingly, those roles can flip when money is the topic. Someone who's typically anxious and seeking in emotional conversations might become a retreater around money, because it brings up so much uncertainty. I call it the SIP — security, identity, and power. Those are the three things money typically translates to in someone's mind. When couples can understand which themes are emerging for them, they can have much better conversations.

Beau: That seeker and retreater dynamic is exactly what I see in financial planning conversations. One person driving everything, one person barely saying a word. What's usually behind the retreating?

Jennie: It often goes back to what someone learned from their parents — that money was scary, that you don't talk about it, or that they simply were never taught the basics. When you don't even understand the language, how do you enter the conversation? And then both people enter a relationship carrying all of that history, making assumptions the other person can't see. Usually it doesn't surface until wedding planning, when one person books a $30,000 venue and the other is thinking about a down payment on a house. And then once kids come, the budget conversation becomes unavoidable.

Beau: So what does a healthy financial conversation between partners actually look like?

Jennie: Ideally it starts on the third date. I always say talk about money early. What are our spending habits? What are our saving habits? What does financial security mean to each of us? Because if you can create safety in that conversation early, you can build a relationship where money becomes something you navigate together rather than something that drives you apart. The goal is to get curious about each other rather than defensive — to say, help me understand your relationship with money, not, why did you spend that?

Beau: You mentioned the Gottman research. Tell me about that, because I think this is where the therapy conversation gets really relevant for couples who think they're fine.

Jennie: John and Julie Gottman have researched couples for over 40 years and found that couples come into therapy seven years later than they should. Seven years. My hope is always that people come in sooner, not when things are falling apart, but as preventative maintenance. If you can frame it to your partner as, I really want to understand you better, I want to know you in a deeper way, it feels much less threatening. And the reality is, we don't learn about relationships or money in school. Two of the most important things in adult life, and there's no handbook.

Beau: I also refer clients to you when I can see that what's happening between a couple is beyond what a financial conversation can fix. There's clearly a role for both sides of this — financial planning and therapy working together.

Jennie: Absolutely. Everyone needs an arsenal of advisors. A financial planner, a therapist, someone on the other side of the phone when you need them. They're not competing, they're complementary. You're working on the financial security side, I'm working on the emotional security side, and ideally we're sending clients back and forth between the two.

Beau: For someone who's had a rough history with relationships, especially when finances were the reason things didn't work out — how do you inch your way back in?

Jennie: Every relationship comes with a problem you're going to accept. The question is which one. If yours is that talking about money is hard, be upfront about that early. Tell your partner, I really want to get this right. I'm committing to you and I know this is an area I've struggled in, but I want us to find a pathway together — whether that's a therapist, a financial planner, or both. That kind of vulnerability is actually one of the most powerful things you can bring into a new relationship.

Beau: Last question. Where can someone find you?

Jennie: We're Hope Therapy Center. You can find us at hope-therapy-center.com and on Instagram at hope_therapy_center. We also run relationship workshops — it's a great, lower stakes way in. A group setting, multiple couples, we talk about what I call the demon dialogs and how to move past them. Therapy really isn't scary. It's actually kind of fun.

Beau: Therapy is fun — words I never thought I'd hear. I apologize in advance for the wave of referrals headed your way.

This or That

Beau: Separate bank accounts or joint bank accounts?

Jennie: Separate.

Beau: From the therapist. Interesting.

Beau: Split the bill or one person pays?

Jennie: One person pays. I'm a romantic.

Beau: Last one. Know someone's salary or know someone's debt?

Jennie: Debt. It tells you so much more. Their values, their lifestyle, what's really going on under the hood.

Beau: I'm scared of debt, so that answer is another session entirely. Thanks Jennie, this was a great one.

Jennie: Thank you!