About Ashley Marie Eckstein
Helping couples reconnect and heal through Emotionally Focused Couples Therapy.
Ashley Marie also helps dating, engaged, and committed couples through premarital counseling, couples therapy, and does grief work with couples and individuals.
COUPLES DEALING WITH HIGH CONFLICT
Relationships are hard. But change never happens in isolation. Deep down, we all are chasing after the same thing: connection. Intimate connection with another human being can be terrifying; you have to take risks and make yourself vulnerable, but if you’re willing to put in the work, the outcome can be life changing.
COUPLE RELATIONSHIPS
I am for your relationship. I don’t take sides because I am partnering with you both for the good of your relationship. I can support you in moving toward your partner, but you have to be willing to put in the work to create an amazing relationship. The real work is learning to be vulnerable. I’m here to metaphorically hold your hand and help you take those steps in vulnerability to grow intimacy in your couple relationship. Vulnerability is scary, but with my help, you won’t have to do it alone.
ADHD SUPPORT FOR INDIVIDUALS AND COUPLES
ADHD can be hard. I know because I’m an ADHDer myself, and I’m also raising neurodivergent kids! But an ADHD diagnosis doesn’t have to be a doom sentence, it can actually be a superpower when you understand how to manage it well. I take a strengths-based approach to supporting individuals with ADHD. I empower individuals to understand and use their strengths, and adjust to accommodate their weaknesses, because nobody can be great at everything! So many ADHDers live with incredible shame. I will help you explore the origins of that shame and rewrite your narrative of how you view yourself.
ADHD often presents differently in females than with males, and more and more women are being diagnosed later in life, often after one of their children gets diagnosed with ADHD. I can help you grieve what could have been if you had resources at an earlier age, and make sure you have the support to harness the superpower of your ADHD going forward!
When one partner has ADHD, couples can often get stuck. What are actually just symptoms of ADHD, can come across as intentions that cause hurt. Maybe during the early phase of your relationship, your ADHD-partner seemed incredibly attentive, maybe even obsessed (in a good way) with you and the relationship, but now that you’ve been together a while, you feel less important, or you find it difficult to get their attention at all. I work with couples to understand ADHD and empower both partners to take ownership of the relationship. Like regular couples therapy, I focus on creating closeness and connection for both partners. I weave the ADHD symptoms into the negative cycle that gets the couple stuck. This helps them both understand what triggers hurtful messages, then we work to create corrective emotional experiences to help the couple feel close and secure again.
GRIEF WORK
Grief is hard enough to walk through alone, but navigating grief with a partner can be especially tricky. When grieving a miscarriage, a difficult medical diagnosis, the death of a parent, or loss of any loved one, you will likely each grieve differently, and I would be honored to walk through the grieving process with you in a way that strengthens your bond with each other. Even if you feel like a mess, I can hold space for individuals and couples that work so hard to hold things together in the “real world” but may silently fall apart each night.
When emotions run high, I can still handle your pain.
PREMARITAL COUNSELING
If you’re considering getting married, this is one of the biggest decisions you’ll ever make. Why go at that alone? I would love to walk you through premarital counseling that brings to light things you may not have even thought to ask each other. We will talk about the big ones: sex, money, communication, in-laws, and children. But I will also help you both discover how your own families of origin will impact your own marriage. If you didn’t have the best marital examples growing up, let me teach you how to avoid making those same mistakes. If you are getting married, I don’t want you to just learn how to avoid divorce, but how to build a secure foundation so you’re glad you’re together many decades later.
PRIORITIZING THE SEXUAL HEALTH OF YOUR RELATIONSHIP
I want you to have an incredible sex life! We are all sexual creatures and deserve satisfying sex lives. But it doesn’t come easily. A common pitfall I see is one partner needs to feel emotionally connected to have sex, and the other partner needs to have sex to feel connected. If you are feeling stuck in that place, I want to help you and your partner work towards a mutually satisfying sex life in a safe, and non-judgmental way. Your personal beliefs and values will be honored throughout the process.
FAQ
How often do we need to come to therapy?
I prefer to see my couples and individuals weekly, especially in the initial stages, so we can get some traction. Once we’ve worked together long enough to identify patterns and work on shifting them, sessions can drop down to less frequently, but coming to therapy= is like working out: you’re not going to see gains if you only come once a month. Also, consistency and a willingness to put in the work is key!
What happens in the first few sessions with you?
This looks a little different for couples and individuals. For couples, in our initial session, I’m asking questions about the couple dynamic and looking for places they could be getting stuck. The next two sessions I spend one on one with each partner, hearing about their younger years since messages we get growing up impact our adult relationships. Then in session four I’m working to track the negative cycle hurting the couple. My “agenda” for these first 4 sessions sets the groundwork for everything else we will do moving forward.
For individuals, I spend some time getting to know who you are as a person before we dive into deep inner child work. I believe taking this slower approach creates space to build trust and allows clients the time they need to feel comfortable opening up to me.
How long does it take to experience results?
This really depends. If a couple is coming in highly escalated, we will need to spend more time in the de-escalation phase before it is safe enough for the couple to do the deeper, vulnerable work. It can take even longer if couples are resistant to being vulnerable with each other. When both partners come in ready to own their part in what’s getting them stuck, and do the hard work of being vulnerable, we tend to see faster results. But no matter how you spin it, couples therapy takes time. Your couple relationship didn’t get into this stuck place overnight, so consider planning to do this work for a significant amount of time if you want lasting change to occur.
For individuals, it also depends on the reasons for seeking therapy. My individuals often start with me for one presenting problem, then once they find relief, they discover they want to continue working with me on other areas of their lives.
Ashley Marie is supervised by Rachel Pendergraft, MA, LMFT-S.
