Understanding How Premarital Questionnaires Help Expose Potential Issues

Getting engaged is a significant milestone in your relationship, but contrary to the claim in a popular song, love is not all you need. You may know your partner well by the time you agree to get married, but there are many things you should learn about your fiancé before you walk down the aisle. 

Premarital counseling is an excellent way to address the potential problem areas and learn the crucial details about each other before you permanently entwine your lives together. Read on to learn how premarital questionnaires—one of the first steps in premarital counseling—can help expose potential issues in your future marriage and equip you both with the ability to foster a healthy, thriving, long-term relationship.  

What is premarital counseling, and how does it work?

Premarital counseling is a subset of couples therapy intended to equip engaged couples with the tools and skills to construct a foundation of trust, communication, and healthy conflict resolution to build their marriage. Throughout the process, counselors guide you through conversations to learn vital facts about each other, helping you form realistic plans and expectations for your merged lives. Studies show that couples participating in premarital counseling experience a much lower divorce rate. 

Assessing both partners

Once you choose a premarital couples therapist, your provider will likely start the process by having both of you complete a series of questionnaires to help them determine your emotional state, commitment to the relationship, and potential areas of conflict and compatibility. 

Sharing past histories

Your therapist will lead you through conversations to discuss your childhoods, family members, their influence on your thoughts and behavior, and other influential events before you met. 

Discussing essential issues

When planning to unite your life with your fiancé's, having a realistic idea of what your shared life will look like can be helpful. With the support and guidance of your therapist, discuss the essential issues that can affect your marriage, such as children, parenting, finances, values, and other topics. 

How completing premarital questionnaires can reveal conflict areas

Completing the premarital questionnaires your therapist gives you can help reveal potential areas of conflict in your relationship—and help you find healthy ways to address them together. One of the main goals of premarital counseling is to get both partners on the same page about the important aspects of their relationship. 

Talk about the important issues

After reviewing the answers you and your partner provide on the premarital questionnaires, your therapist will better understand the tension sources in your relationship. From there, the couples counselor will guide you through conversations to explore topics likely to affect your marriage. Premarital counseling doesn't just highlight the areas you need to address; it can also showcase what you two are doing right and how you can use that knowledge to meet each other’s needs.

Premarital questionnaire subjects

• Children and parenting plans
• Career and ambitions
• Family history and influences
• How to handle conflicts
• Finances and debt
• Expectations and future plans
• How you communicate and understand
• Lifestyle and sexual needs and expectations
• Timelines for your ideal life
• Retirement plans
• How decisions and tasks will be divided

Premarital counseling treatment approaches

Couples therapy and premarital counseling aren’t a uniform experience for every pair. Mental healthcare providers utilize various therapeutic approaches to help couples work through their issues and strengthen their relationships. 

The Gottman method

Couples work to increase the emotional intimacy in their relationship while building verbal communication skills and developing practical methods to resolve conflicts. 

Emotionally focused therapy (EFT)

You and your fiancé strengthen your relationship's emotional attachment and bond by openly expressing authentic feelings to one another. 

Psychodynamic couples therapy

Explore the underlying issues in your relationship that interfere with or influence how you relate to each other.

Sex therapy

Resolves conflicts related to physical intimacy and sex in your relationship, learning how to communicate your needs and understand your partner’s. 

PACT therapy 

Work with your fiancé to pinpoint the sources of tension and conflict in your relationship, addressing the issues with the support and guidance of a mental health professional. 

Exploring the problem areas premarital questionnaires may reveal

Premarital counseling can expose the areas around which you and your fiancé are most likely to experience conflicts. Your therapist will explore each topic in detail, helping you find ways to compromise and overcome obstacles together. 

• Family history and current influence over thoughts and behaviors
• Opposing or conflicting views on religion
• Inability to communicate effectively or express needs and feelings
• Differing opinions on having children or parenting
• Expectations for married life, sex, and intimacy
• Lifestyle and sexual interests
• Significant debt that may influence your merged finances
• Dramatic differences of opinion about foundational values

How does premarital counseling build stronger marriages?

Generally, preparation is how you plan to succeed. For something as important as the rest of your life, utilizing the resources at your disposal to ensure your marriage starts with as many advantages as possible makes sense. Prepare for married life alongside your fiancé as you get to know each other better and establish communication and conflict-resolution skills that will benefit you throughout your relationship. 

Learn to communicate your needs and emotions

Working with a licensed couples therapist is an excellent way to learn effective, practical methods to express your needs and feelings to your partner. When you establish open, honest communication channels early in your relationship, your marriage will benefit because both of you know how to listen, understand, and respond to your partner, validating their feelings. 

Establish healthy conflict resolution strategies

Few couples are so in synch that they never argue. While conflict can be healthy in a relationship, if you and your fiancé don’t have strategies to handle it, you may face further problems if arguments leave lingering hurt feelings. Learning healthy, practical ways to address the issues in your relationship allows you to present a united front when approaching problems. One of the crucial aspects of successful long-term relationships is the ability to troubleshoot solutions together and find resolutions to disputes that allow you both to move forward without resentment or repressed anger. 

Develop realistic expectations for married life

Many people get married with an idealized vision of how their lives will look, and those expectations aren’t always realistic. Premarital counseling can help you shape reasonable hopes and plans for your married life. When you both know what to expect of your role in the marriage, your partner's role, and how you face obstacles together, it can be easier to adjust to the changes you'll experience. 

“Good premarital counseling should deepen your understanding of yourself, your partner, and your relationship dynamic.” — Stephen J. Betchen, D.S.W.

When to start premarital counseling

Some couples even seek pre-engagement counseling when they start discussing marriage to help evaluate their compatibility and identify potentially problematic areas of their habits and personalities. After getting engaged, it is wise to include premarital counseling among your wedding preparations so you start your married life off with every possible advantage. 

How premarital counseling creates stronger marriages

You've already decided to marry your fiancé, so why not do everything in your power to make that bond a healthy, successful one that benefits both of you? Consider working with a licensed premarital counselor online through a virtual relationship therapy platform like Regain. Attending couples counseling before the wedding can teach you the communication skills to effectively express your needs, expectations, and feelings, conflict-resolution strategies to work through problems together, and guide you through conversations to discuss the essential details of merging your lives. 

Many couples are increasingly interested in versatile mental health and relationship therapy treatment options. Studies show that premarital counseling and couples therapy offer comparable results online and in person. Both groups in the study showed increased relationship satisfaction and a substantial reduction in symptoms associated with stress, depression, and anxiety. Teletherapy treatments are often less expensive, have shorter wait times, and provide access to a much more comprehensive network of qualified mental health professionals. If your first match isn’t a good fit, connecting with another therapist is simple.