ABSTRACT
Fashionably and expensively dressed, George and Joan Blake could have been the models in an advertisement for success. A tall handsome couple who wore their affluence well, the Blakes appeared to be moving toward middle age gracefully. The real picture was different.
When Joan Blake called for an appointment for herself and her husband, she made it clear that the cracks in the family portrait were deep. Things were at a difficult stage in the marriage. Although it was “not publicly known,” she said, George had moved out of the home three months earlier, the second time in a 17-year marriage when the partners had separated. “The stress is beginning to get to both of us, and to our kids as well. My attorney–neither of us has filed for divorce, but I have seen an attorney and he strongly recommended that we try with you. And we've got three boys that I don't want to see messed up.” Was her husband willing to come in? “Yes, he was last night, but we've tried before without getting very far, and George is just not intrigued with the idea of any kind of therapy.”
As many other couples who seek professional help, the Blakes were far advanced in their marital discord and quite mixed in their motivations for making an appointment.
