Couples who come to therapy often complain that they cycle around the same issues with no resolution, feeling stagnant, exhausted, and hopeless in the process. In essence they are stuck.
Sonia a 33-year old massage therapist wanted her partner Dean a 34-year-old pet-grooming service owner to attend couples therapy to make him commit to settling down and have a family. She was tired of asking him to make plans for these goals, often getting a non-comital response.
Dean was fed up with trying to prove his commitment while hating the pressure he felt to do things to please Sonia, giving up his autonomy and agency in the process.
Helping Couples Get Unstuck – Figuring Out the Obstacle
Truth became tabu
Dean and Sonia were stuck because they were too afraid to speak their truth. Truth was deemed lethal. So staying stuck was a way of maintaining the relationship outwardly by avoiding the truth. Speaking the truth would have meant one or other would have been the one to break them up, and neither of them wanted to be the one to do it.
Helping couples get unstuck – Shattering the Tabu Through Dream Images
Sonia had a dream about Dean that left her feeling bad, and discussing it with Dean had made him feel worse, so they agreed to bring it into their couples therapy, knowing that I work with dreams.
The dream: Sonia dreamt that Dean was walking naked in a procession with a bunch of others towards a woman organizing the procession. Sonia called out to Dean to put his clothes on, to cover himself up because he was naked. Sonia thought it was awful showing himself like that, but he kept going – leaving her embarrassed and afraid for him as he was exposed through being naked.
Helping Couples Get Unstuck – Revelations About Sonia’s Internal Script:
The dream revealed Sonia’s unconscious conflicts that prevented her from being honest in waking life – i.e. that Sonia wanted Dean to have him all to herself with him operating according to the costumes she determined were part of their script.
Fear of not being alluring enough: The dream communicated that Sonia was terrified that if she allowed Dean to be his authentic (naked) self, she would lose him to someone else, who was fascinated by him (the woman organizing the procession.)
Existential Threat: The dream also showed how badly Sonia failed to enact her need to penetrate and possess Dean – illustrated by his lack of acknowledgement when she called him to return and put on clothes. He just walks on – as if she didn’t exist.
Realization regarding her attempt to mold Dean and obliterate him as a separate person
Dean wanted to be seen for what he was, not in the ‘clothes’ that Sonia wanted him to wear
Perceiving Dean as a possession that she had a right to have: Only Sonia had a right to see Dean ‘naked’, i.e. know him inside out with no privacy, secrets, or boundaries. In the dream her entitlement to claim ownership over him came through loud and clear. No wonder she couldn’t speak about it in real life – it would have made her look mean and stifling.
Helping Couples Get Unstuck – Feeling Exposed
In the dream Sonia described feeling scared for David because his nakedness left him exposed. In real life, Sonia is afraid that her need for possession, control and proof of love would be exposed and that’s why she couldn’t be open about it in real life. Working on the dream in couple therapy made it safe to bring out as the dream image shielded her from shame.
The dream image also gave voice to Dean’s sense of Sonia’s possession – a thing – like a toy – or a pet – rather than a person who had a right to be himself and act accordingly
Furthermore, the discussion of the dream gave Dean permission and a sense of safety that he could express his sense of being thwarted, and molded to Sonia’s image of her perfect partner and the resentment it brought up. His stance of appeasment trying not to rock the boat made him angry about feeling pressured to be inauthentic.
Helping Couples Get Unstuck – Lowering Their Guards to be Vulnerable
Putting all this out there via this dream image helped Sonia acknowledge her sense of fear of losing Dean to something more alluring, and that her way of trying to keep him under wraps wasn’t working.
The dream image showed Sonia’s desperate need to fill Dean up so he didn’t look elsewhere.
The dream image allowed Dean to understand Sonia’s vulnerabilities and fears, which in real life were disguised by her controlling and demanding stance. He became more receptive to her and safe enough to experience her as scared rather than powerful and threatening.
Helping Couples Get Unstuck – Facilitating the Experience of Safe Emotional Intimacy by Exploring Dream Symbols
The symbol of nakedness allowed me the psychotherapist to introduce the concept of emotional nakedness as a precursor to emotional intimacy.
Helping Couples Get Unstuck – The Need for Transparency
Nakedness symbolized authenticity, lack of covering up, no pretense, sugar-coating or playing games. It’s straight up to the point honesty, and that was the inherent message of the dream – the need for transparency.
This dream image and our discussion about it allowed both to have an experience of emotional intimacy in safety, feeling for the first time the comfort in it. They were able to put down their shields and allow connection without Dean feeling he was going to swallowed alive; and Sonia to feel that her need to protect herself from loss didn’t make her a monster – that Dean still found her attractive and lovable.
Helping Couples Get Unstuck – Boundary Issues and the Symbol of Possession
One of the most profound issues in the relationship between the couple was a lack of boundaries on Sonia’s part. She wanted to merge with Dean so she never had to fear abandonment. She couldn’t tolerate Dean spending time in his job with other people and enjoying taking care of other people’s pets – they all became competitors like the woman organizer in the dream. Intimacy was impossible if one person wanted merger and the other separation and autonomy. The dream image explained how the issue of lack of healthy boundaries prevented safe and rewarding intimacy. It facilitated work in the couples therapy regarding personal boundaries, their function and how they can be maintained by both while still feeling connected.
Copyright, Jeanette Raymond, Ph.D. 2025
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