About

Posted by MTI on Nov 5, 2014

Introducing Marriage Therapy Institute and the Co-Therapy Team of Dr. Mark Schwartz, Sc.D and Lori Galperin, LCSW, MSW

Dr. Mark Schwartz and Lori Galperin are senior clinicians with more than 30 years experience working with hundreds of couples.

They have integrated their own work with their extensive training at Masters & Johnson Institute, combined with advances developed from John Gottman PhD, Susan Johnson PhD, and Harville Hendrix PhD, to provide state of the art seven-day intensive psychotherapy programs.

Having 21 hours of therapy plus daily practice is equivalent to six-months of once-a-week therapy, but in a concentrated period of time, thus allowing for more rapid and effective change. Blocks to intimacy are explored for each individual. The couples’ work is directive, with daily skills-training to build and enhance capacities for creating connection and safe attachment, facilitating effective communications, conflict- and anger-management, problem-solving without defensiveness, withdrawing or moving into blaming self or other, parenting and step parenting, and thereby, recreating feelings of affection and passion.

How Masters & Johnson Contributed to the Philosophies and Therapeutic Techniques of Marriage Therapy Institute

Training with Masters & Johnson, for both Dr. Schwartz as well as for Lori Galperin LCSW, MSW, was, says Dr. Schwartz, “Incredible.” Dr. Schwartz remembers, “One or both of them would actively listen to their staff work with couples, and provide feedback at the end of the session on how to improve the therapist’s technique. Their model of treatment was powerful. Couples came from throughout the world for two weeks and they worked with them daily. The result was a model of treatment that was short-term and highly effective.

1. Highly Directive
2. Allowed for Daily Practice of New Tools
3. Highly Orientated to Teaching New Skills
4. Assessing for stuck points in the therapy to guide the therapist on the nature of the problem
5. Integrating creating closeness and connection and truly ‘seeing’ one’s partner with sexual intimacy
6. Working equally with both partners
7. Quite effective

Marital Counseling

When a marriage is struggling, expert intervention can be critical. With more than 30 years of experience with hundreds of couples, this Marriage Therapy Institute’s co-therapy team has developed a unique approach to revitalizing a relationship. This approach is based on the many years spent working closely with William Masters and Virginia Johnson.

Co-Therapy Team 

A co-therapy team is a male/female team of therapists who allows for each individual in the relationship to have their own therapist, one who will both support and confront the blocks to intimacy and connectedness between the couple.

The “Relationship” as a Focus of Treatment

Masters & Johnson believed there were three clients:  him/her/the relationship (for heterosexual couples). In this perspective, Schwartz and Galperin were taught to focus on the “relationship” and how each individual had affected the other in both positive and negative ways.  They also worked with each individuals and their “stuck points,” particularly those from the past that had an influence the relationship. This deeper work was usually performed with their partner in the room as a key dynamic that would thoughtfully facilitate relational intimacy. After the individual session, the couples are instructed to go out and discuss the issues that came up in session, all of which promotes relational intimacy.

Communication, Problem Solving, and Quality Time Together

There are basic skills all couples require to deal with, including conflict, anger, control issues, and ways in which to creatively deal with the more typical problems such as finances, in-laws, step-children, and ex-spouses, for example. Once learning such skills, Marriage Therapy Institute recommends that it is essential to spend three hours alone together each week to practice implementing new ways of interacting. Typically, couples have great problems implementing the tools, which is exactly what orients the therapists as to where to focus the psychotherapy for best possible results.