Candid Couples Program in Philadelphia and Newtown, PA
Most couples don't come in because something dramatic happened. They come in because the same argument keeps ending the same way, or because the quiet has gotten louder than the talking, or because they're standing at the edge of something big (a wedding, a baby, a move, a rebuild after betrayal) and they'd rather walk into it together than hope for the best. The Candid Couples Program is built for those couples. It pairs a research-based assessment with weekly therapy, so the work is aimed at your relationship instead of a generic curriculum.
An 8-week, evidence-based program that pairs the Prepare/Enrich assessment with weekly couples therapy.
How The 8-Week Candid Couples Program Works
Here's how it works. You and your partner each complete the Prepare/Enrich inventory separately, which means you answer honestly because you're answering alone. The results give us a clear, side-by-side picture of where you align, where you don't, and which areas you've been quietly agreeing not to discuss. From there we build the plan around your actual results: the conversations you've been avoiding, the patterns that show up under stress, and the strengths you can lean on when things get hard.
About The Candid Couples Program
Most couples therapy is open-ended and that works. But some couples want something with a clear beginning, a defined middle and an actual end — a structured process with an assessment at the start so you are not guessing at what needs attention, and a finish line you can see from the beginning.
The Candid Couples Program is that. It is an eight-week, assessment-driven program that combines the Prepare/Enrich relationship assessment with weekly therapeutic work. It is for couples who want to be deliberate: engaged couples preparing for marriage, couples at a decision point, couples rebuilding after a rupture, and couples who are doing fine and want to make sure they are building the right habits before life tests them.
The duration is not rigid. Some couples finish in eight weeks; others extend to ten or twelve if there is more to work through, or slow to biweekly sessions for a stretch.
Week 0 & 1
Week 0 - Intake and Assessment: A joint intake session to talk through your history and goals, followed by the Prepare/Enrich inventory completed separately by each partner online.
Week 1 - Review: You go through the assessment results together, identify your strengths as a couple and agree on the two or three areas the program will focus on.
Weeks 2-5
Week 2 & 3 - Communication: The mechanics of how you talk to each other: how to raise a hard topic without triggering a fight, how to listen when you are activated, how to slow an escalating exchange, and how to stop the interruption-and-defend cycle that most couples run automatically.
Week 4 & 5 - Conflict and Repair: Where your conflict pattern comes from, what each of you is protecting when you fight the way you do, and how to repair after a fight.
Week 6 & 7
Week 6 - Your Specific Pressure Points: Addresses your particular areas of divergence: money, family of origin, children, sex, work, or whatever the report flagged.
Week 7 - Shared Vision and Goals: Moving from what is wrong to what you are building. Values, intentions, how you want to handle the next decade, and what you each want the relationship to feel like.
Week 8
Week 8 - Consolidation and Plan: Reviewing what has changed, what has not, what you will keep doing, and what to watch for. You leave with a written summary of strategies that worked for you specifically, and a clear sense of when to come back.
Prepare/Enrich Assessment
Prepare/Enrich is one of the most widely used and most researched relationship assessment tools in the world. It is not a personality quiz and it is not a compatibility score. It is a structured inventory that both partners complete separately online, producing a report that maps how you two compare across the areas that most reliably predict whether a relationship thrives or erodes over time.
The report covers the areas that cause most of the trouble in long-term relationships, including:
Communication — how each of you sends and receives information, and where the breakdowns happen
Conflict resolution — the patterns you fall into under stress, and how well you repair afterward
Relationship dynamics — closeness, flexibility, and how decisions actually get made between you
Financial management — attitudes toward money, spending, saving and debt, and the assumptions you each inherited
Leisure and time together — whether you actually enjoy each other, and whether the relationship gets protected time
Sexual relationship — expectations, satisfaction, and how well you can discuss it
Children and parenting — intentions, disagreements, and what each of you expects the other to do
Family of origin — what you each learned about marriage from watching one, which is usually the deepest well
Spirituality and values — the beliefs that shape decisions and how much alignment matters to you
Stress and resilience — how you function as a unit when things go wrong
Both partners complete the inventory on their own time before the program begins. Neither person sees the other's individual responses as the report is designed to be reviewed together, with the therapist, which makes it possible to answer honestly without worrying about what your partner will read or see.
