Emotionally Focused Couples therapy for marriages where one partner is deconstructing or has left the faith
Couples Therapy for Faith Deconstruction and Faith Transitions in Tacoma
Faith Was the Foundation of Your Marriage and Your Whole Life on the Eastside
One of you stopped believing, or started questioning, or just quietly stopped going through the motions, and now there's a wall between you that wasn't there before.
Maybe it happened gradually; skipping church more often, feeling less during worship, realizing the sermons weren't landing the way they used to. Maybe it happened all at once after something specific: a conversation, a book, a moment where the whole thing just stopped making sense. Either way, you can't un-know what you know now, and your partner is watching you become someone they didn't expect.
The hardest part might be that you can't talk about it. Every time it comes up, one of you gets hurt and the other gets frustrated, and you end up further apart. So you've stopped bringing it up. You go through the week, you handle the kids, you eat dinner, and the biggest thing happening in your marriage sits between you untouched because neither of you knows how to pick it up.
In Tacoma and Pierce County, faith is often woven into family in ways that make this even harder to navigate. Your parents and siblings are still in the church. The people you grew up with in Lakewood or University Place or Puyallup are still there. Leaving, or even questioning, feels like you're not just changing your beliefs, you're stepping outside your whole family.
You can learn more about how I approach couples therapy when faith is part of the equation, including what makes this work different from standard couples counseling, on my couples therapy for faith deconstruction page.
Why this is so painful for both of you
If you're the one who stayed in the faith:
If you're the partner who still believes, this feels like a betrayal. You married someone who shared your faith, who wanted to raise kids in the church, who was supposed to be your partner in this. Now you're carrying the spiritual life of the family alone, sitting by yourself on Sunday mornings, answering your mom's questions about why your spouse wasn't at service. You're scared, you're angry, and underneath all of that, you're grieving something you don't know how to name.
If you're the one who left or is leaving:
If you're the one whose beliefs have changed, you feel stuck. You can't be honest about where you are without hurting the person you love most. You see your partner's pain and you feel responsible for it, but you can't force yourself to believe something that isn't true for you anymore. You've lost your faith community, your spouse feels like a stranger on this topic, and you're processing the biggest identity shift of your life with nowhere to take it.
Both of you are grieving:
Both of you are scared the marriage won't survive this, both of you are grieving, and neither of you know how to support one another through this.
How Couples Therapy Helps When Faith Has Divided You
I use Emotionally Focused Therapy (EFT) as the foundation, combined with somatic and trauma-informed approaches. The work focuses on helping you stay deeply connected while holding different beliefs, a skill you never needed when you agreed about everything.
We slow down the moments where difference turns into disconnection. When your partner says something about their changing beliefs and your stomach drops and you want to shut the conversation down, we work with what's underneath that response: the fear that you're losing them, the grief that your shared life is changing. When you try to explain what you're going through and your partner's face closes off, we work with their fear too.
This means you can actually have the conversation you've been avoiding without it ending in silence or tears. You can talk about church, about the kids, about what holidays look like now, without someone's beliefs automatically winning. You learn to hear each other's pain instead of just each other's positions.
How Your Relationship Changes
Your partner comes home from church on Sunday and you ask how it was, and they actually tell you; not as a guilt trip, just as part of their day. You say "that sounds like it was meaningful" and you mean it, even though you wouldn't have been there yourself.
Your mom in Puyallup asks about the family's church attendance at Sunday dinner, and instead of the silent tension that usually follows, you look at each other and handle it together. On the drive home you talk about how it felt, and nobody blames the other for the awkwardness.
You sit on the couch after the kids go to bed and one of you says "I need to tell you something I've been thinking about" and the other listens. The conversation is hard, and scary, and neither of you has the answers. But you're in it together instead of on opposite sides.
Your daughter asks why you don't go to church anymore, and instead of the question turning into a fight between you and your partner about what to tell her, you figure out together what to say. It's not perfect, but you said it as a team.
You stop checking your partner's face every time religion comes up to see if they're angry or hurt. The topic still matters, it still stings sometimes, but it stops being the thing that could end your marriage at any moment.
Who is this for?
This works for couples where one or both partners are going through a change in faith, belief, or religious identity, and the marriage is suffering because of it. You may be fighting about church, parenting, holidays, money, extended family, or your relationship with each other's families. You may have stopped talking about it entirely, which isn't working either.
This works best when both of you want to stay together and are willing to figure out how to be different from each other without it meaning the end. You don't have to have the same beliefs to have a strong marriage, but you do need to learn how to hold that difference without it destroying your connection.
This won't work well if one partner is using faith changes to justify leaving, if there's spiritual abuse or control happening, or if one person refuses to respect the other's right to believe differently.
Telehealth Couples Therapy in Tacoma and Pierce County
I see couples throughout Tacoma and Pierce County via telehealth. Sessions are available on Tuesdays and Wednesdays between 8am and 6pm.
For couples coming out of conservative religious communities, telehealth offers something an office can’t: privacy. There’s no waiting room, no parking lot, no chance of running into someone from your former congregation. You do the work from home, on your own terms.
In-person sessions are available at my Bothell office through summer 2026.
Serving Tacoma and Pierce County Couples via Telehealth
Including Lakewood, University Place, Puyallup, Spanaway, Bonney Lake, Gig Harbor, Fife, Auburn, and surrounding areas.
Questions?
FAQs About Couples Therapy for Faith Changes
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Couples sessions are $350 for 50 minutes. I don't accept insurance directly. For couples work, I use a relational diagnosis code that most insurance plans won't cover even out of network, so sessions typically come out of pocket. If you have an HSA or FSA account, those funds can usually be used. I recommend checking with your plan administrator first to confirm.
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No. I don’t have an agenda for what you believe or where your faith lands. The deconstructing partner sometimes worries I'll pathologize their questions or try to bring them back to faith. The believing partner sometimes worries I'll side with the deconstructing one. Neither of those is how I work. My job is to help you stay connected to each other through this, not to decide who is right about God, faith, or religion. Both of your experiences are real, both of your fears are valid, and I hold space for both without steering either of you toward a particular conclusion.
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Most couples in this situation have already been to a pastor, a church counselor, or a general therapist who didn't fully understand the dynamics at play. Pastoral counseling often has an implicit goal of bringing the questioning partner back to faith. General couples therapy may address communication but miss the grief, identity loss, and nervous system responses that make faith transitions so destabilizing for a marriage. I specialize in this intersection — EFT for the relationship, somatic and trauma-informed work for what's happening in your bodies when these conversations go sideways, and a deep understanding of what deconstruction actually does to a couple. You don't have to explain what purity culture is or why leaving church feels like losing your entire world.
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That's a real possibility, and I won't pretend otherwise. The goal of this work is to help you see each other clearly enough to make a real decision about your future. Most couples I work with find that when they can actually hear each other’s fears instead of just each other’s positions, the gap between them is smaller than it seemed during the fights. But if you go through this process and decide you’ve genuinely grown in different directions, you’ll make that decision from a place of understanding rather than reactivity.
About Ingrid Johnston, LMFT, MDFT
EFT couples therapist in Tacoma
I’ve been working with individuals and couples since 2014, with specialized training in trauma, somatic therapy, and faith transitions. I hold a Master of Science in Marriage and Family Therapy and advanced certification in Medical Family Therapy and Collaborative Medicine from Seattle Pacific University.
My approach integrates EMDR, somatic therapy, and Emotion-Focused Therapy (EFT), evidence-based modalities specifically effective for religious trauma and complex PTSD. I’ve completed over 100 hours of specialized training in trauma treatment and body-based healing.
Beyond my clinical training, my work is informed by my own lived experience. I grew up immersed in traditional Christian faith. I’ve navigated my own path through chronic pain, somatic healing, and decades of mindfulness and meditation practices. I understand what it's like to rebuild trust in your body and intuition after being taught they couldn’t be trusted.
I’m a member of the American Association for Marriage and Family Therapy (AAMFT) and the Washington Association for Marriage and Family Therapy (WAMFT).
Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist: Washington State License #LF61033631
Get In Touch
Contact Ingrid
Please complete the form, and I will be in touch within 48 business hours.
Office and mailing address:
19803 North Creek Parkway, Suite 205
Bothell, WA 98011
In-person in Bothell & online across Washington