[Therapist to partner A]
What would be needed for you to feel safe and speak on behalf of the part that got hurt?
[To partner B]:
Would it be OK for me to speak to partner A, while you listen?
Listening is more difficult than speaking, because protectors may feel attacked without being able to defend themselves.
It’s possible that while your partner is talking, parts of you may be triggered and want to jump in to defend etc. Rather than doing that, would you give me a sign that you have urge to speak up?
Now, before I move back to partner A, is there any part of you that feels uncomfortable with this? The moment we get activated by a part it becomes impossible to listen with an open heart any more.
[To partner A]:
How did it feel to hear partner B agree to this?
Is there a part of you that is reluctant, that doesn’t feel safe to speak on behalf of the part that got hurt?
You heard your partner promise not to interrupt, but to give a sign if he got triggered and wanted to say something.
Your part that got hurt has all our attention. Can you then focus on part of you that got hurt?
That simple fact that you give that part your focus may trigger other parts, and I’d like you to tell me about parts that do show up.
When you are in touch with the hurt part, tell it it can use your voice to express itself, that you are going to speak on behalf of that part.
I realise there are strong emotions associated with that hurt – we will deal with those separately. At this point it’s just important for your partner to hear you speak on behalf of the part that got hurt.
How does that land, when I say that you speak on behalf of the part that got hurt?
To what extent are you open to sharing vulnerability now, in this session?
[To partner B]:
I want to check in again with you – are you available, are you able to listen with an open heart?
it’s wonderful to hear that, but I just want to check in again, do you have any part that might be worried if we do this? Do you have any concerns at all?
Eg any part of you that we have named, is it enough for it to step back?
Or is it now triggered, does it need some work doing to it? [NB that could take a long time to set up].
Notes
Big thing in setting this up safely, it’s not an opportunity for the speaker to start laying into their partner about everything they do wrong. It’s all about them talking from their experience.
So they say ‘my experience of you is..’ [ie speaking on behalf of the hurt part]. Not ‘You always do this blah blah…’]
[In practice you can set it up beautifully but they always start laying into each other. Then you have to go back and work with the parts.]
CC should focus in its set-up on the vulnerability of the partner – the ending of the cycling of the tracking in the previous session.
CC is set up so the couple learns to communicate at home – Are you open to listening, are you ready to listen? If it’s nicely set up by the therapist, the couple can take that home – they can’t do that when they’re caught in their loop.
When we have one half of a couple that is still pretty blended with their beliefs and feelings, we need to do individual work with that partner.