Central Coast Counselling - Susan Owens

01/02/2026

centralcoastcounselling.com
Tuggerah

Relationships
Your Children Are Watching How You Love

Affection between parents teaches children:

What love looks like
How closeness feels
What to expect in their future relationships

Silence, distance, and emotional coldness teach lessons too - just not the ones we intend.

Affection isn’t a bonus in relationships - it’s the glue.
It tells your partner
“I see you, I chose you, you matter.”

Without it, distance grows. Resentment follows.
With it, safety, connection, and desire can actually survive stress, parenting, and life.

If affection has quietly disappeared, the relationship feels it - even if no one is talking about it.

If this sounds like you and you would like to get back to basics, take the first step by clicking on the link above for a booking today.

29/01/2026

centralcoastcounselling.com
Tuggerah

Relationships

Children Don’t Hear the Words - They Absorb the Atmosphere

Many children do not grow up in homes watching affection.
They grow up watching tension. Silence. Conflict.

Parents often stay together “for the sake of the kids”, believing if the fighting takes place behind closed doors - or when the kids are in their rooms - they’re being protected.

Children don’t need to hear every word to feel the tension.

They learn what love looks like by watching their parents.
They learn how conflict is handled - or avoided.
They learn whether relationships feel safe, unpredictable, or exhausting.

When conflict is constant and affection is absent, children don’t just learn about relationships - they learn about the world. And about themselves.

They learn that love equals tension.
Closeness leads to conflict.
Their needs come second to keeping the peace.
Emotions should be hidden.
Shouting, withdrawal, or fear are normal parts of connection.

Even when children are in their rooms, their nervous systems are listening.

The real question isn’t “Is it better to stay together?”
It’s “What is our relationship teaching our children about love, safety, and their worth?”

Children don’t grow up doing what parents say - they grow up repeating what they see.

If you are concerned what your children are learning from your relationship and would like to do things differently, take the first step today by clicking on the link above for a booking today.

29/01/2026

centralcoastcounselling.com
Tuggerah

Relationships
When Love Becomes a Battlefield

Sometimes relationships fail because:

Criticism replaces curiosity.
Bullying replaces conversation.
Control replaces connection.

What happens when mistakes aren’t allowed in the relationship?
Flexibility disappears.
One partner must always be right.
Fear replaces safety and control replaces connection.

Criticism, rigidity and bullying don’t create stronger relationships - they create distance, resentment and silence.

Healthy relationships make room for being human. For repair.
For accountability.
For growth - on both sides.
Healthy relationships makes room for mistakes.

If you are walking on eggshells, if you have stopped speaking up, if you would like to learn how to reconnect with your partner in a safe place, take the first step by clicking on the link above for a booking today.

28/01/2026

28/01/2026

centralcoastcounselling.com
Tuggerah

Relationships
Is There A Blind spot In Your Relationship?

Every relationship has a blindspot.
It’s not what you don’t know -
It’s what your brain won’t let you see.

Because seeing it might mean conflict.
Or grief.
Or questioning who you’ve been to each other.

Our minds protect attachment first, truth second.

Until the blind spot starts costing the relationship.

We tell ourselves stories:
It’s not that bad.
They didn’t mean it.
This is just a rough patch.

Blind spots are survival strategies.

Over time the blind spot doesn’t protect the relationship -
It limits it.

Healing begins with acknowledging what we see instead of trying to cover it up in our minds.

If you would like support in uncovering what you think might be happening in your relationship in a safe space, take the first step by clicking on the link above for a booking today.

28/01/2026

centralcoastcounselling.com
Tuggerah

Relationships
When Starting Over Feels Uncertain

Starting over sounds hopeful.
But for many couples, it feels terrifying.

The question isn’t
“Can we love each other again?”

It’s
“What if we do…. and nothing really changes?”

When old patterns haven’t been understood, they don’t disappear.
They wait.

They wait in unspoken tension.
In careful conversations.
In the things neither of you dare to say yet.

So couples try again while staying guarded.
More polite.
Less honest.
Hoping this time will be different -
Without knowing how to make it so.

Starting over isn’t about erasing the past or pretending the hurt didn’t matter.

It’s about understanding what broke trust, how conflict became unsafe, and why certain moments still trigger old reactions.

Real repair doesn’t come from promises.
It comes from changed patterns, emotional safety, and learning how to stay present when it would be easier to shut down or defend.

Starting over isn’t going back.

It’s choosing to do the relationship differently - with awareness instead of hope alone.

For support in starting over, to learn to do things differently, while learning to communicate so your partner can hear you, click on the link above for a booking today.

28/01/2026

centralcoastcounselling.com
Tuggerah

Relationships

When the Person You Trusted Most Betrays You.

You discover your partner cheated throughout your marriage.
You built a life together.
Now you question was your marriage a lie? Did they ever love you?

They call their affair a “mistake”.
People around you tell you “Everyone makes mistakes.”

You know logically mistakes happen once. They’re not premeditated.
You feel dismissed and not valued.
You feel thrown aside.

You don’t have to go through this alone. Support is only one click away to being seen, validated, and reclaiming your truth.

Counselling brings perspective to an already painful reality.
Take the first step to gaining caring and compassionate support by clicking on the link above for a booking today.

26/01/2026

25/01/2026

centralcoastcounselling.com
Tuggerah

Relationships
“I Didn’t Ask You To.”
And just like that, everything you gave felt invisible.

What happens when your partner doesn’t validate the effort or sacrifices you made for them?
When the late nights, the compromises, the emotional labour, the things you quietly carried for the sake of the relationship are dismissed with:

“You didn’t have to.”
“I didn’t ask you to.”

It stings deeper than they realise.

It’s not about being thanked for every little thing.
It’s about being seen.
It’s about knowing your love, your effort, your giving actually mattered.

You start questioning everything you do.

“Why don’t you see me?”
“Why doesn’t my effort matter?”

You begin to shutdown and pull away.
Resentment quietly takes root.
Slowly the relationship stops feeling like a place of safety.

Many relationships don’t breakdown because of a lack of love.
They breakdown because effort goes unacknowledged, sacrifices go unamed, and emotional bids go unanswered.

The right support and the right conversations can help repair this.
Take the first step towards repair by clicking in the link above for a booking today.

23/01/2026

centralcoastcounsellingservice.com
Tuggerah

Relationships

When Turning Up Seems Far Away.

What matters to a woman is when her partner shows up when she is at her most vulnerable.
But what happens when he can’t.?
What happens when he doesn’t understand how to advocate for her?

It isn’t because he doesn’t care.
He never saw it as a child.
No one advocated for him.

When he stays quiet, she feels exposed.
Unprotected.
She feels she has to defend herself against the world.
She’s alone and feels abandoned.

She need’s him to say
“That’s not okay.”
To notice when she’s shrinking in a room.
To choose her, even when it’s uncomfortable.

When he can’t show up for her, she learns to do it alone.
She becomes the strong one.
The voice.
The boundary setter.

She stops reaching out.
Stops asking.
Stops believing he’ll step in.
Not because she has stopped loving him.
But because hope starts to hurt.

Couples counselling helps men learn how to show up -
How to advocate.
How to lead gently.
How to stand with her.

Love isn’t just about being together.
It’s about showing up when it matters most.

If you would like support in reconnecting, take the first step by clicking on the link for a booking today.

23/01/2026

When a child pushes back, it’s rarely about “attitude”. It’s often overwhelm spilling out.

22/01/2026

centralcoastcounselling.com
Tuggerah

Relationships

When Childhood Trauma Meets Conflict

Childhood was not a safe place for you. You learnt your feelings were wrong. You learnt to disappear and hide away your emotions and your feelings.
You were punished for crying.

Now you’re in a relationship and you find yourself shutting down and running away from conflict.
You need to feel heard.
You need your emotions validated.

Instead, you are left unheard and invalidated….. But so is your partner.
They desperately need to feel heard and validated too but trauma stops the brain from hearing.

When trauma gets in the way of listening, two people are left in deep emotional distress.
They are caught in a “trauma cycle”
of yelling in an effort to be heard snd understood.
Not only understood - but to be seen.
Not only to be seen - but to feel loved and cared for by their partner.

When one or both people shut down, two people become victims caught up in their past trauma, or their partner’s trauma.

Communication is always the key.
It is important to allow each person the time and space for emotional recovery.

Once both people have time to process their fears and avoidance, it is important to calmly return to the conversation, preparing your selves to listen to understand.

Support is only one click away to provide tools and understanding to help you both break from this trauma cycle.
Take the first step by clicking on the link above for a booking today.