Nearly two decades ago, Bill Doherty began collaboration with a family court judge to look at divorce ambivalence in couples already in the process of divorce. Their findings were striking:
►1 in 4 divorcing parents thought their marriage could be saved
►3 in 10 divorcing individuals expressed interest in reconciliation services, and
►In over 11% of divorcing couples, BOTH partners thought the marriage could be saved!
Read more about early studies here.
Motivated by these statistics, Doherty developed discernment counseling as a way for couples “on the brink” of divorce to consider options before prematurely making the decision to end their marriage.
Discernment counseling is not couples therapy. It is a short-term intervention that helps couples decide one of three paths: keep things as they are (at least for now), pursue separation/divorce, or commit to a trial of couples therapy with divorce off the table.
In a study of 100 consecutively seen discernment counseling cases, 47% of the couples opted to try therapy. 40% of the sample were still married 2 years after discernment counseling.