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For anyone who is starting the proces of marriage counseling, consider these thoughts from Bill Doherty (a renowned expert in the field of Marriage and Family Therapy) about good marriage counselors. Taken from What to Look For in a Marriage Therapist What to Look For in an Experienced, Competent Marriage Counselor: The Do's and Don'ts of Marriage Counseling Most people don't know what to expect of a competent marriage therapist. Here are some qualities and actions that researchers have found to promote effective couples marriage counseling. Do's of Good Marriage Counseling The therapist is caring and compassionate to both of you.The therapist actively tries to help your marriage and communicates hope that you solve your marital problems. This goes beyond just clarifying your problems.The therapist is active in structuring the session.The therapist offers reasonable and helpful perspectives to help you understand the sources of your problems.The therapist challenges each of you about your contributions to the problems and about your capacity to make individual changes to resolve the problems.The therapist offers specific strategies for changing your relationship, and coaches you on how to use them.The therapist is alert to individual matters such as depression, alcoholism, and medical illness that might be influencing your marital problems.The therapist is alert to the problem of physical abuse and assesses in individual meetings whether there is danger to one of the spouses.Don'ts of Bad Marriage Counseling The therapist does not take sides.The therapist does not permit you and your spouse to interrupt each other, talk over each other, or speak for the other person. The therapist does not let you and your spouse engage in repeated angry exchanges during the session. Although the therapist may explore how your family-of-origin backgrounds influence your problems, the focus is on how to deal with your current marital problems rather than just on insight into how you developed these problems.The therapist does not assume that there are certain ways that men and women should behave according to their gender in marriage.

I am going to keep this short; please keep your advice to my specific questions. My temple marriage of 25 years is on the rocks. Why isn't relevant, though some hints lie within. In the past two years, I have suggested to my wife several times that we get marriage counseling. My wife has vehemently rejected this every time. I recently brought this up again and suggested that she pick the marriage counselor. She said that she's afraid that I'm not going to get out of what I think I am. I said that's fine, it's still worth a try. She said no. After ten years of inactivity for me and eight for my wife, she has returned to church (I'm fine with that.) I've wondered if using LDS social services marriage counseling will make her feel more at ease. At the same time I fear that I'm not going to be given close to a fair shake, which is fine up to a point where it becomes "blame the inactive husband" or resorts to "listen to Lord" and "feel the spirit." Been there, tried that. We have deep problems that go back 25 years and aren't going to resolved with cliches. FYI, we life in Utah County. My questions are: 1) How good is LDS social services marriage counseling? 2) How objective are they? 3) Is everything approached from a gospel standpoint or a neutral standpoint? 4) If this is advisable, can I get a referral from the bishop even though I'm inactive, but my wife isn't? 4a) If the answer is no, should I talk to the bishop anyway in hopes that he'll talk to my wife?