Los Angeles Couples Therapy
In-Person & Online Support for Relationships That Feel Strained, Stuck, or are simply seeking deeper connection
When Relationships Feel Hard
Close relationships can be deeply fulfilling and deeply painful.
When communication breaks down, trust feels strained, or conflict becomes constant, partners often feel overwhelmed, lonely, or unsure what to do next. Even relationships with a strong foundation can start to feel fragile when stress, hurt, or disconnection accumulates.
These struggles are common, and they don’t mean your relationship is broken.
Most of us were never taught how to navigate conflict, repair after rupture, or stay connected to one another during periods of stress, transition, or change. When challenges arise, it’s easy to assume something is fundamentally wrong rather than recognizing how much pressure your relationship may be carrying.
Understanding Relationship Struggles in Context
Many relationship challenges make sense when understood in context. Life transitions, grief, trauma, marginalization, parenting stress, work demands, or differing needs and communication styles can all strain even deeply loving partnerships. Over time, partners may find themselves stuck in cycles of misunderstanding, distance, or conflict that don’t reflect their intentions or values.
At Kindman & Co., we work with couples and intimate partnerships across identities and relationship structures, including queer and non-monogamous relationships. We also support families, families-of-choice, business partners, collaborators, and non-romantic relationships who want help navigating connection, communication, and change.
Our experienced Los Angeles couples therapists support partners in slowing down, understanding what’s happening beneath the surface, and finding new ways to relate with more care and clarity.
Relationship therapy can help deepen intimacy, work through disagreements, heal from betrayal, strengthen communication, and build a greater sense of safety and security within your relationship(s).
A free 20-minute call to talk about what’s going on and whether working together makes sense. No pressure to commit.
When Connection Starts to Feel Harder
Many couples seek therapy when everyday connection starts to feel more difficult than it used to. What once felt natural may now require effort, negotiation, or repair. Small moments of disconnection can build over time, leaving partners feeling unsure how to get back to one another.
Often, couples notice that stress shows up in the relationship before they fully recognize it elsewhere. Ongoing pressures can quietly erode patience, curiosity, and ease, even when there is care and commitment underneath.
How Disconnection Builds Over Time
Couples often come to therapy when they feel stuck in patterns they don’t know how to change. This might include difficulty navigating cultural or value differences, feeling disconnected during conflict, or struggling to make agreements that truly work for everyone involved.
Some partners notice it’s harder to feel forgiving or open after being hurt, or to stay warm and curious during challenging moments. Others feel strain around ongoing stressors such as money, sex, quality time, parenting, household responsibilities, or the logistics of daily life. Over time, these challenges can make it harder to collaborate as a team or to show up authentically in the relationship.
Trust and security can also be affected, especially when misunderstandings, unmet needs, or unresolved hurts build up. When this happens, many couples worry that something is fundamentally wrong, rather than recognizing that their relationship is responding to sustained stress.
If any of this resonates, you’re not alone. These experiences are common, and they don’t mean your relationship is beyond care or repair.
Couples therapy can offer space to slow down, understand what’s happening between you, and find ways to reconnect with more intention and support.
Inclusive relationship counseling for couples and intimate partnerships
Including support for consensual non-monogamy and diverse relationship structures
You’re not failing. You’re human.
Many couples come to therapy feeling unsure whether their struggles are “normal,” worried that something is fundamentally wrong, or afraid they’ve waited too long to get support. In reality, conflict, distance, and recurring patterns are common, even in deeply loving relationships.
Relationships don’t become difficult because you’re doing something badly. They become difficult because connection asks a lot of us, especially when life is full, stress is high, or past hurts haven’t had space to be repaired.
Relationships Are Hard Because We’re Not Taught How to Do Them
Most people were never taught how to stay connected during conflict, repair meaningfully after rupture, or talk about needs without defensiveness or shutdown. We’re rarely shown how to hold both closeness and difference at the same time, or how to navigate stress without turning on one another.
So when things start to feel tense, distant, or cyclical, it isn’t a sign that your relationship is broken. Often, it’s a sign that you’re doing something very human, without enough support.
The good news is that while we often hurt in relationships, we can heal in them too.
Couples therapy isn’t only for relationships in crisis. It can also support partners who want to be more intentional about communication, alignment, and the foundation they’re building together.
Relationship therapy helps partners reconnect, repair after hurt, strengthen emotional security, and better understand one another. Therapy offers space to explore, with care and clarity, what each partner needs — and whether staying together feels right.
If you’re here because something feels hard, or because you want to feel closer, steadier, or more aligned, you’re in the right place.
How Relationship Therapy Helps
At Kindman & Co., relationship therapy offers space to slow down, understand what’s really happening between you, and shift patterns that no longer support your connection. Rather than focusing only on surface-level issues, therapy supports partners in developing greater awareness, emotional safety, and build more secure, honest ways of relating to one another.
Our Science-Backed Approach to Relationship Therapy (PACT)
At Kindman & Co., we primarily work from the Psychobiological Approach to Couple Therapy® (PACT), a research-informed model that helps partners understand how nervous systems, attachment patterns, and real-time interactions shape their relationship.
PACT integrates neuroscience, attachment theory, and the biology of arousal to help partners recognize how stress, emotion, and relational history affect communication and connection. This approach pays close attention to how partners seek safety and closeness, how they respond under pressure, and what happens in moments of conflict, distance, or resolution.
In PACT sessions, we focus on what’s happening between you, as it’s happening.
Rather than only talking about problems, we notice communication patterns, emotional responses, and moments of connection or disconnection as they unfold. This allows partners to practice new ways of responding to one another with greater intention, compassion, and the ability to soothe and support each other.
Over time, many couples find that this work strengthens emotional security, supports more effective repair, and builds confidence for navigating life’s stressors together. Therapy becomes a place not just to understand your relationship, but to experience new possibilities for connection as they emerge.
If you’d like a deeper look at how PACT works and what to expect in sessions, you can read more about how PACT can help your partnership or watch the video below.
Paul discusses what to expect from your first PACT therapy session and how PACT helps you become an expert on your partner.
How co-therapy can support relationships
Co-therapy is an approach where two therapists work together with a relationship. It can offer additional support and a more balanced therapeutic space — especially when partners are navigating complex dynamics, power differences, or long-standing relational patterns. Having two therapists in the room can slow things down, increase attunement, and help each partner feel more seen and supported.
A Collaborative and Balanced Therapeutic Space
At Kindman & Co., co-therapy for relationships is offered by Paul Kindman and Kaitlin Kindman, who are licensed therapists and longtime collaborators in both life and work. Drawing from their shared training and experience, they use co-therapy to model collaboration, transparency, and respectful engagement in real time.
Working with two therapists can help partners feel less alone in the room and more supported during challenging conversations. Co-therapy also allows for multiple perspectives and attuned responses, which can make it easier to notice relational patterns as they occur. For many couples, this creates a therapy environment that feels thoughtful, balanced, and emotionally safe.
Co-therapy is one of the ways we support relationships at Kindman & Co. When it’s a good fit, it can deepen the work and offer a uniquely supportive way to explore connection, conflict, and repair — without rushing or oversimplifying complex dynamics.
If you’d like to learn more about co-therapy, you can visit our co-therapy page or ask about it during a free info session.
Who relationship & couples counseling is for
You may have heard this work referred to as couples counseling, marriage counseling, or relationship therapy. At Kindman & Co., we recognize that relationships are diverse, evolving, and often exist outside traditional boxes.
Relationships change over time, and the support people need can change with them. Some partners come to therapy during moments of conflict or transition. Others come because they want to be more intentional, aligned, or connected in how they relate to one another.
Honoring Diverse Relationships and Ways of Connecting
We work with people in many kinds of partnerships and relational configurations, approaching each relationship with curiosity, respect, and care. Our team has experience supporting interracial and intercultural couples, LGBTQIA+ partnerships, and expansive relationships that move beyond traditional or heteronormative structures.
We also work with partners navigating differences in identity, values, power, or lived experience, and with relationships shaped by systemic stress, marginalization, or cultural expectations. Therapy offers space to slow down, name what’s present, and explore how these dynamics affect connection and communication.
Relationship counseling at Kindman & Co. is not limited to romantic partnerships. We also support families, families-of-choice, and non-romantic partnerships who want deeper communication, clearer boundaries, and more intentional collaboration. This includes chosen family systems, co-parents, business partners, and other relational constellations where care and connection matter.
No matter the structure of your relationship, our goal is to create a therapeutic space that feels affirming, thoughtful, and responsive to who you are and how you love, work, and connect.
Reasons People Seek Relationship Therapy
Clients come to relationship therapy for many reasons, across stages of partnership and relationship structures. Some people seek support early, while others come after years together or during moments of change.
Relationship counseling can support a wide range of needs, including:
New, premarital, or early-stage relationships wanting to build a strong foundation
Long-term partnerships or marriages seeking deeper connection, repair, or renewal
Partners navigating conflict, distance, or recurring patterns, even when there is care and commitment
Relationships healing after betrayal, rupture, or major life transitions
Consensual non-monogamy (CNM), polyamory, or other expansive relationship structures navigating communication and boundaries
Parents, co-parents, and families-of-choice adjusting to changing roles and needs
Creative collaborators, business partners, or other non-romantic relationships seeking clearer communication and sustainable collaboration
Your relationships are complex and evolving. Many people seek relationship therapy to feel more aligned, intentional, and connected — or to build a foundation that can support them through future challenges.
Therapy can support you in understanding what’s happening between you, advocating for your relational needs, and creating agreements that work within your values and relationship structure.
If your relationship matters to you, you’re welcome here.
You don’t have to be in crisis to seek relationship support
Many people think of relationship therapy as something you turn to only when things are falling apart. It’s common to assume that seeking support means a relationship has failed, or that things must be “bad enough” to justify reaching out.
In reality, couples therapy is often most effective before distress feels urgent or overwhelming.
Support for Prevention, Intention, and Growth
While relationship therapy can absolutely help during times of crisis, it is just as often used preventively.
This includes premarital counseling and other moments when partners want to be intentional about understanding one another, strengthening communication, and building a foundation that can support them through future stress.
Many relationships become more challenging not because something is “wrong”, but because life gets fuller. Work demands increase, family responsibilities shift, stress accumulates, and relational patterns solidify. Care and connection that once felt natural can begin to require more attention and intention.
Relationship therapy offers space to slow down, reflect, and reconnect before distance or resentment has a chance to grow. Partners can learn to recognize patterns early, communicate more clearly, and navigate differences with greater understanding and care.
You don’t have to wait until things feel urgent to reach out.
Often, the earlier you have support, the easier it is to create meaningful, lasting change. Seeking relationship therapy can be a proactive step toward sustaining connection, alignment, and resilience — not a sign that something has gone wrong.
Relationship Therapy FAQs
What is relationship therapy?
Relationship therapy (sometimes called couples or partnership therapy) is a supportive process where you and your partner meet with a professional therapist to learn to repair conflicts quickly, improve communication, strengthen your connection, and feel more security in your relationship. At Kindman & Co., we use the PACT method — a science-based approach that focuses on attachment, neuroscience, and body awareness.
Who is relationship & couples counseling for?
We specialize in supporting interracial and intercultural couples, queer partnerships, and non-traditional relationship structures like consensual non-monogamy (CNM) and polyamorous partnerships, but our doors are open to all kinds of relationships. We also work with married and long-term partners, dating or premarital couples, and even business partners—anyone wanting to communicate better, repair trust, or reconnect emotionally.
Whether your relationship is “traditional”, queer, intercultural, or something in between, we help you build mutual understanding, deepen empathy, and grow stronger as a team across differences.
Do we need to attend together?
Our couple/relationship therapy sessions are designed for all partners to attend together, ideally in our office or if virtually, where you’re physically located in the same place. We know that in some instances participants may be in different places and we can generally work with this as long as all members are located within California and your therapist believes this will work to support you to meet your goals.
How long are sessions?
Sessions are typically 60, 90, or 120 minutes depending on the therapist’s experience level and availability, so you have the space to work deeply without feeling rushed. Our goal is for you to have new and different experiences in your relationship therapy sessions that you can take outside our sessions to better support you—having slightly longer sessions greatly helps with this.
How many sessions will we need?
Every relationship is unique. While many partners notice positive changes after just a few sessions, we typically recommend planning for at least six months of therapy to create lasting change. Many couples choose to continue longer term as an ongoing way to strengthen and maintain their relationship. Your therapist will work with you to create a plan that fits your needs and goals.
Is relationship therapy only for partners in crisis?
Not at all. Many partners come in proactively—to deepen their bond, navigate transitions (like loss, parenthood, or moving), and learn tools to prevent small issues from becoming bigger ones.
What if we’re not married?
That’s absolutely fine! We work with partners at every stage of commitment — dating, engaged, married, or long-term companions. We offer pre-marital counseling to help you deepen your relationship with confidence and also support non-romantic relationships, such as business partners, creative collaborators, co-stars, and family members. Effective communication and connection matter in all kinds of relationships.
How much does relationship therapy cost?
Our session rates are listed on the Fees & Insurance page and vary depending on therapist experience level and session length. We’ll review fees and scheduling with you before your first appointment.
How do we get started?
The best first step is to book a free info session. This gives you a chance to speak with our Care Coordinator — to be paired with your best fit therapist, ask questions, learn more about our practice and approach, and decide together if Kindman & Co. is right fit for you.
Couples therapy at Kindman & Co. supports partners in Highland Park and Northeast L.A. Learn more about individual therapy, LGBTQIA+ affirming therapy, and our relationship therapists.