As Valentine’s Day arrives and love is in the air, couples can receive a free relationship check-up with the University of Rhode Island Couples and Family Therapy Clinic, facilitated by licensed graduate student therapists.
The free checkups happen annually as part of the Human Development and Family Science program, according to Riley McDonald, a graduate student therapist in the HDFS program. If a couple wants to book a checkup, one partner of the couple has to be enrolled at URI.
Valentine’s Day checkups are to offer students who want to know if their relationship is healthy and to make decisions about what they want going forward, according to Gina MacLure, coordinator of the couples and family therapy clinic at URI. In some cases, the checkup will lead to the couple feeling comfortable about taking the next step. In other cases, couples realize their relationship isn’t healthy and decide to break up.
Before the first session, the couples fill out a private inventory with questions about their relationship, according to MacLure. These questions include how they handle fights, their relationship with their partner’s family and their philosophy of marriage. The questions are all multiple choice to give students ideas of what to say during the session.
The therapist then reviews the reports and in the first session, they share the results with the couples, according to MacLure. The results help the couples understand their strengths, areas of growth, compatibility and how to move forward with that information.
“[The session is] very tailored to the individual couple,” MacLure said. “The types of questions we might ask them is, how do they feel about this report? Does this surprise them what they’re seeing on this report?”
Therapists get a little background on the couple during the session, according to MacLure. They ask about how they first met and their relationship in general. Depending on the relationship, they may ask them for confidential questions based on their answers to the inventory questions.
A Valentine’s Day checkup is special because it’s a free opportunity to be open about relationships, according to MacLure.
“Although we [also] do them outside [of Valentine’s Day], I think people do think a little bit more surrounding Valentine’s Day about relationships in their relationship,” MacLure said. “So while it’s just sort of a way to take advantage of what’s on people’s minds.”
Checkups are available year-round at any point during the year if they want, but they would have to pay for it, according to MacLure. The cost is typically $35 for inventory and then $25 for every session.
One piece of advice MacLure had for couples was don’t wait until things get really bad in a relationship to get help.
“The longer you wait, the more damage there is to repair,” MacLure said. “So I think that you do need to consider being a bit more attentive.”
Couples should wait to come into counseling until they’ve had six months of regular check-ups, according to MacLure. Beyond that, it’s never too early or never too late for one check-up to use as a relationship enhancement tool.
“It’s really interesting because it’s a little bit different than what we typically do in session,” McDonald said. “We get to explore [a relationship] in a short period of time, some of the strengths and growth areas of couples and kind of like just what they particularly want to focus on.”
To participate, URI students can call 401-874-5956 to make their first confidential appointment. Appointments are available during the morning, afternoon or evening hours, Monday through Friday, in Kingston or in Pawtucket.
