Private Couples Intensive in Zürich
Stuck in the same painful relationship patterns?
Give the pattern room to change—in as little as a single weekend.
An Imago Therapy 10-hour couples intensive in Zürich for English-speaking couples—designed to help meaningful change take hold sooner, often reaching in one focused weekend what weekly sessions can take months to approach.
Built for international couples with demanding schedules who need focused work and want accelerated change.
Real change works on two levels—understanding the pattern clearly, and experiencing each other differently as it shifts. This weekend works to help you reach both.
If this sounds familiar
What wears you down is the same argument in a hundred disguises
It’s the conversation that turns before you know why, then the silence afterward where you each feel a little more alone. From the outside, your life works, but the distance between you continues to grow and grow.
As painful as this is, it’s not an uncommon experience; it’s just that people rarely talk about it openly.
Nearly every committed relationship reaches this point, in one form or another.
In Imago therapy, we view conflict like this as growth trying to happen, and that’s a signal, not a verdict. Believe it or not, when both partners own their part and are willing to work for change, the pattern that previously divided you can become the turning point where your bond grows deepest.
Why now
Most couples don’t seek an intensive because things are mildly uncomfortable. They come because the same conflict has begun to cost too much—sleep, tenderness, trust, patience, attraction, and the sense of being on the same team. A focused weekend is a way to meet that directly, rather than waiting out the weeks between sessions.
What it is
A focused weekend of relationship work
Roughly ten hours over a single weekend, drawing primarily from Imago Relationship Therapy, attachment theory, trauma-informed counseling, and parts work—with hypnotic and experiential techniques when they serve you. Rather than stopping just as insight begins to surface, we have the time to go deeper and practice new ways of relating together, in real time.
The difference a weekend makes
Why ten focused hours move differently
A weekly hour
Built for steady, ongoing support. Each session re-enters the feeling and finds where you left off, then pauses at the hour— and a week later, the openness has often closed and old defenses re-arm.
A focused weekend
Built for the breakthrough. The thread stays unbroken, and momentum can build across two days, helping couples move through rupture into repair in real time—covering ground that weekly sessions often take months to reach.
Is this the right format?
Not sure where you land? That’s exactly what the first call is for. Bring your questions and we’ll think it through together.
Meet your therapist
About Elizabeth, Your Couples Therapist
I’m Elizabeth Carter—a licensed clinical mental health counselor from the US and a certified clinical hypnotherapist with over seven years of trauma-informed work with couples, groups, and individuals in private practice. For five of those years I’ve worked, and continue to work, with Paracelsus Recovery, a bespoke Zürich rehabilitation clinic specializing in treating high-profile individuals dealing with executive burnout, addiction, and severe mental health disorders. In this setting, I have regularly supported couples and families as they navigate recovery together.
This weekend is built on that same depth, joining a clear understanding of what is really happening between two people with the willingness to stay with the feelings underneath it.
Watch — a short introduction
If this is beginning to sound like what you and your partner need, I’d love to hear from you.
The weekend
Day One
Seeing the pattern
- Relationship history & assessment
- Naming the recurring conflict cycle
- Each partner’s emotional experience
- Imago dialogue & communication work
Day Two
Repair & reconnection
- Deepening relational understanding
- Repair conversations
- Practicing new patterns together
- A practical roadmap forward
How to begin
Start with a conversation, not a commitment
A free 15-minute call
A relaxed conversation so you can get a feel for how I work, ask questions, and hear how the weekend is structured. There’s no charge and no obligation; this call is simply for you to get a sense of whether we’re a fit.
A 90-minute preliminary consultation
We meet to talk in depth about your relationship, your history, and what you each want from the weekend—so the two days are shaped around you before they begin. It’s also where you can ask me anything you didn’t get to on the call.
The intensive weekend
Ten focused hours over two days: the work itself. It includes personalized treatment planning, individual assessments for each partner, guided Imago dialogues and communication coaching, and written recommendations and resources.
A four-week follow-up
A 90-minute session about a month later to review progress, address obstacles, and reinforce the gains from the weekend.
I work with only one or two couples each month, so weekends tend to fill in advance. If you have a date in mind, it’s worth reaching out early.
After the weekend
What couples often notice
Every couple is different, but a few shifts tend to come up again and again — not the erasing of every difficulty, but something more durable to take home.
Hearing each other at last
The same conversation in different forms gives way to hearing what the other has been trying to say for years. Not a cure, but a completely different way to talk.
The softness comes back
Beyond the communication tools, what shifts most is the tenderness that returns once both people feel understood, and the sense of being on the same side again.
Reacting less, understanding more
The structure helps couples slow down instead of react. Each comes to understand the other’s side of the pattern, the withdrawal and the pushing alike, and the whole tone changes.
None of it makes a relationship effortless. What it offers is a steadier, warmer way of being together, one couples can return to long after the weekend ends.
Questions
Common questions
What exactly is a couples intensive?
Rather than spreading couples’ work across months of weekly hours, an intensive concentrates it into one focused weekend, roughly ten hours across Friday and Saturday, with one couple at a time. The structure is built on Imago Relationship Therapy. Because we’re not stopping at the hour, we can follow something all the way through instead of pausing just as it opens up. If you’d like a fuller picture, I’ve written more about how an intensive works and who it tends to help.
Is it private and discreet?
Yes. This is private, one-couple work in a confidential setting. Much of my career has been spent with high-profile individuals and families for whom discretion is non-negotiable, and I hold your privacy to that same standard.
Can it help after an affair or a serious breach of trust?
Often, yes. Rebuilding trust after betrayal is some of the most meaningful work couples do here. Where old wounds or individual trauma are part of the picture, I frequently integrate trauma-focused work alongside the couples process. If you’re wondering whether now is the right moment, that’s a good thing to talk through on a call.
What if we’re not sure the relationship will make it?
Couples come at every point, including uncertain ones — that uncertainty is often exactly why the weekend helps. An intensive can bring real clarity, sometimes toward reconnection, sometimes toward a calmer, clearer understanding of where you each stand. What it can’t do is make the decision for you. Wherever you are, you’re welcome to start with a call.
What if one of us is hesitant?
Some hesitation is completely normal, and more common than not — often one partner arrives more convinced than the other. Doubt about the relationship is very workable; what matters is that you’re both willing to be in the room. If one of you is on the fence, that’s worth a conversation rather than a reason to hold back.
What does the weekend actually involve?
A mix of individual and joint sessions across two days, held privately in my Zürich office. We meet Friday and Saturday, roughly 9:00 to 16:00 each day, with short breaks and an hour for lunch built in. Together that’s about ten focused hours: history and assessment, learning the core Imago tools like mirroring and the full Imago dialogue, tracing how present patterns connect to their roots, and working directly on what matters most to you, with grounding or hypnosis where it helps. You can see the full hour-by-hour schedule here.
What’s the investment, and what happens afterward?
The weekend is offered as one all-inclusive package: the ten hours, individual assessments, personalized planning, written recommendations, and a four-week follow-up, with a preliminary consultation beforehand. Full details are on the services & costs page. You’ll leave with tools you can keep using on your own. If you’d benefit from longer-term support afterward, I’ll usually refer you to a trusted colleague rather than keep you on my own calendar because my space for extended couples therapy is limited.
Begin with a conversation
If the same pattern keeps returning, and you’re both willing to do focused work, the next step is simple: a free, no-obligation 15-minute call to talk through your situation, hear how the weekend is structured, and sense whether it’s the right fit for you both.
Prefer to see the numbers first? View the full investment details.