We only went once. Oh, and the only way I got him to go (after YEARS of nagging) was to pull out the big guns: "So, I guess you must have loved BM more than me. You went to the counselor with HER. And you guys weren't even MARRIED."

I expected to have a full blown argument when we left. But we didn't. It actually seemed to bring us closer for a while. It was like he couldn't hear my experience from ME but he could understand it better when I explained it to someone else...? I don't know.

If it weren't for the fact that NN's alcoholism is the true problem, I probably would have pushed to go more because we both agreed that she helped.

MY BF and I have been going for about a year and it has helped so much. We have gotten so much out of it. We understand each other better, we work together as parents to our five kids better (2 his, 3 mine), handle disagreements better, and much more. We are to the point now that we really don't have much to talk about in our therapy appointments anymore, and are weaning down to not going anymore.
There were a couple times that something brought up in session carried over after we left our therapist, but we worked it out. The therapist's office is supposed to be a 'safe' place that you can bring up anything to discuss and not get attacked by your partner and hopefully come to a resolve before you leave, but of course that's not always possible, but we usually left feeling ok about whatever the issue was, enough to work on it more at home.

We went for almost 3 years. We had been married for almost 7 and began contemplating divorce. WE are now winding down, most of our issues we can handle on our own and resolve on our own. There are some issues that will hang around but we have accept each other as who we are for the most part.

It has given us the skills to communicate and work together.

And yes there were times that what was discussed at the counselors carried out and there were times that we didn't talk to each other for 2-3 days. And as the counselor said, was it worth the lost time.

I was totally opposed for a long time, and I am a strong proponent now. It was a tremendous help.

We went for a year and a half. It was exhausting and expensive but really helpful in the end. I don't think we would have made it this far (8 years) without it. Sometimes we still reference stuff we learned in counseling when we have a conflict. You need to have the right counselor, someone you both trust. I heard a story somewhere about a counselor who was a biomom who had stepmom issues -- uh, no -- can't have a counselor bringing their own stepcrap to the table. Yes, sometimes we argued outside of counseling based on stuff we did there. But we brought it back to the sessions and worked through it, so ultimately it was a good thing.

In a way, counseling was like negotiating a contract, helping to negotiate our marriage contract. We learned about each other's non-negotiables and bottom lines, and where we could each give a little for the overall good. And we could hear each other instead of putting up defensive walls because there was a third person mediating and calling us on our crap.