11 Reasons You Might Need a Marriage Counselor

4. You’ve fallen into some unproductive communication patterns

Life brings new stressors and accumulated history. With working and/or raising kids in the past, you may also not have had time to devote as much time to talking things through as you would have liked to. These patterns of poor communication can catch up with your relationship over time. “Long-standing negative cycles may become more entrenched, leading to increased defensiveness, withdrawal or conflict,” says Rachel Thomas, a licensed marriage and family therapist in Scottsdale, Arizona, and owner of Therapy with Heart.

Older couples are often not just arguing about small things, like what movie to watch or which trip to take. “They’re trying to communicate through major life transitions like retirement plans, financial anxiety, caregiving roles, health concerns or grief,” Link says. These higher-stakes scenarios can make conversations feel more difficult, she says, leading partners to shut down, become critical or avoid difficult discussions moving forward.

Marriage counseling gives couples a structured space to slow down communication and rebuild emotional safety. “Many couples benefit from learning how to talk about high-stakes issues like money, health and family without spiraling into defensiveness or disconnection,” says Link. Counseling can also help people address difficult topics such as health issues and caregiving plans, says Dr. Nick Bach, a licensed psychologist at Louisville’s Grace Psychological Services.

5. Your intimacy is waning

Intimacy issues are the main reason older couples book appointments with Kennedy. “Some couples want to regain what they had in the first few glorious years, while others never had a satisfying sex life — largely because they didn’t have the communication tools to talk about it,” she says. And some couples, often in their 50s to 70s, now have exacerbating health issues that make intimacy challenging. “Many of the men start experiencing erectile dysfunction and the women have lower libido or pain with penetration,” Kennedy adds. 

It’s common for clients to enter therapy with hesitation to discuss tender topics, yet they’re aware they don’t have the tools to navigate these challenges alone. “A capable therapist should be able to unpack this topic and illuminate each of their needs without bias,” says Kennedy. They can help take the shame or pressure off the table, normalizing the situation and offering advice in a way that feels fixable.

6. One partner has shifted into a caretaking role

Statistics show that when someone turns 65, they have almost a 70 percent chance of needing some form of long-term care or support in their remaining years. And in around 15 percent of couples, one spouse or partner cares for the other. When one spouse assumes a caretaking role for another, it can lead to an unbalanced dynamic and new challenges in connection. “I find that the caretaking partner feels responsible, protective and loving, however, they may also feel exhausted, neglected and lacking in desire,” says Kennedy.

If the caretaking is short-term — for an acute illness or injury — or long-term during a chronic illness or mobility issue, couples may struggle to return the balance back and regain intimacy. This can lead to unspoken guilt or resentment. “There are so many demands placed on caregivers and this dynamic can feel frustrating, frightening and downright unwelcome at times,” says Kennedy. Having a forum to openly discuss and clear the air, she says, can often be a helpful and neutral reset for the couple.

Caretaking can also change a partner’s vision of their golden years. “Dreams of a carefree retirement may change or disappear altogether, and grief can emerge alongside exhaustion and resentment,” Harrington says. Couples therapy can help partners process these losses together, strengthen emotional safety and improve their ability to function as a team during demanding life transitions.

7. New family dynamics have emerged

Many couples over 50 find that parenting responsibilities don’t always end when children leave the home. Adult children may move back in and may also bring grandchildren with them. These “boomerang” living arrangements can be a major stressor — especially between couples who have varying opinions on how long to provide support, how much financial support to give and who sets the rules, says Jennifer L. FitzPatrick, a licensed clinical social worker and author of Reimagining Customer Service in Healthcare and Cruising through Caregiving. “So many aging couples find themselves furious with each other when they both have different expectations for these situations,” she explains. 

Counseling can help partners unite in how they’ll handle matters involving family members, addressing questions such as these that Castano lays out:

• What’s the relationship with the grandchildren going to look like?
• How much do we get involved with our children’s personal life and their parenting?
• How do we decide who hosts family events and gatherings?
• How do we manage disagreements others in our family are having?
• What about inheritance after we’re gone?

“If multiple situations have already arisen prior to marriage counseling, then the counselor will help the couple address them one at a time, with the most pressing ones being addressed first,” says Castano.

8. You’ve become empty nesters

If you raised kids together, chances are your focus was largely centered on school, activities and hobbies for many years. “While raising children, there is often little space to notice emotional distance,” says Reuven Rosen, a licensed clinical social worker and couples therapist in Columbia, Maryland. Once that phase ends and the home becomes quieter, unresolved patterns can come into sharper focus.

“One day, all of the children are out of the house and each person in the couple looks at one another and silently asks, ‘Who are you?’ ” Castano says. Partners often find themselves having lost sight of each other’s lives over the years, to the point where they begin to feel like strangers. “At that moment, often quietly in the background, there is a real fear that their partner may not love them anymore, or at least the way they used to,” says Castano. Marriage counseling can help couples learn creative ways to reconnect in this novel phase of life — and find things to talk about that aren’t related to homework, soccer practice or curfews. 

9. You or your partner is struggling with grief

As you live longer, you’ll inevitably experience the deaths of more friends, family members and acquaintances. While grief is inevitable, it can sometimes put a strain on the marriage if one partner is not supportive enough or the other withdraws to process. “Grief is often underestimated as a relationship stressor in older adulthood because it does not always look like sadness,” says Asma Rehman, founder and director of the Grief Recovery Center in Houston. When your partner is dealing with grief, it can affect the relationship, Rehman says. Your partner might be irritable, withdrawn, emotionally numb, anxious or looking for conflict.

Another challenge is that each partner may grieve in a different way. One may want to talk and the other might avoid the topic, which can leave both feeling alone. “That mismatch can reduce emotional intimacy and create tension that the couple does not recognize as grief-related,” says Rehman. She adds that therapy can “provide couples with tools to stay connected and support each other through what is a difficult time.

10. Past resentments have been swept under the rug

“Chances are very good that if a couple has been together for 30+ years and they’ve never seen a marriage counselor before, there will be issues between them that keep coming up and have been lingering for years,” Castano says. While many people try to leave the past in the past, ignoring situations won’t help you get over them. This leaves couples often battling unresolved issues and wondering why they won’t go away. “Marriage counseling can help by working through some of these past resentments and helping the couple heal them, because if they don’t, those issues just won’t go away on their own,” adds Castano.

Examples of past resentments can include infidelity. While cheating may be thought of as something that happens mainly in younger demographics and not long-term “happy” couples, infidelity can occur at any age. Research by the Institute for Family Studies found that women in their 60s had one of the highest self-admitted infidelity rates (around 16 percent), as did men in their 70s (around 26 percent). “I once saw a couple where one of the partners had an affair 25 years prior, and because it had never been addressed, the pain of that affair was still there after all that time,” says Castano. Therapy can help give the relationship a chance to work past one or both partners being unfaithful in the past.

11. A later-in-life relationship is new, and you’re still learning about each other

It’s not just long-term married couples who seek out counseling. After 50, you may be entering a new relationship after divorce, loss or long stretches of independence. “Even with strong chemistry, it can be hard to blend lives at this stage, especially when each person has long-established habits, routines, financial preferences and family ties,“ adds Link. She tells her clients that therapy is a great way to help newer couples talk through the practical and emotional realities early, before small differences become major fault lines. “It gives couples a place to build trust, negotiate expectations and create a shared vision that respects both partners’ independence,” she says.

“Dating or remarrying later in life can bring unique challenges, including blending families, navigating past losses and adjusting expectations shaped by previous relationships,” adds Rosen. Counseling can provide a space for couples to talk openly about fears, assumptions and hopes so they can build connections rather than repeat old patterns. It’s also a safe space to work through differences in issues like religion or politics.

Money can also be a major issue in relationships that are becoming more serious. “One partner may be making sizable payments to an ex-spouse, there may be one or two houses that people would prefer to leave to biological children rather than their spouse, there are Social Security benefits to think about,” says Dr. Wendy Walsh, a psychology professor and relationship expert at DatingAdvice.com. “These can be difficult conversations that may be easier to discuss with the help of a marriage and family therapist trained to help people talk about the hard subjects.”