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Dr. Dana McNeil

Founder, The Relationship Place Certified Gottman Therapist Licenses: California: LMFT #99008 | Texas: LMFT #205614 Dana is a gifted, compassionate, and practical therapist. She has achieved the highest level of training possible in the Gottman Method of couples therapy and has special interests in working with all clients, including those who live out-of-the-ordinary lives or have alternative relationships.

20 Ways to Find love in 2022

20 Different Ways to Find Love in 2022 – As Seen In – Ask Men

Our founder, Dr. Dana McNeil, was recently featured in an article written for Ask Men Magazine. Experts were asked, “What is your top way to find love in 2022?” Dr. Dana offered tip number 5. 5. Network With Dates Who Didn’t Work Out This may seem like strange advice, but according to marriage and family therapist Dana McNeil, the more you expand your social circle, the more likely it is you’ll meet someone. “If you […]

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Stolen Pur Hearts podcast

Pets and Your Relationship

Our founder, Dr. Dana McNeil, chatted with Nyree host of the Stolen Our Heart Podcast, about pets and their impact on a couple’s relationship. She answered questions about resentment, sharing of tasks, boundaries, choice of pet, when is the best time to get a pet, when is something a dealbreaker, and more.

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The Gifts of Showing Your Gratitude for Each Other

The Gifts of Showing Your Gratitude for Each Other

This piece was originally published on Gottman.com and is republished here with permission from the Gottman Institute. How a simple “thank you” can create connection As a couple, did you know that you’re not required to do nice things for each other? Did you know you don’t have to want to do those things? It’s true. That’s why anything you or your partner do for each other is a gift.   While many of my clients give me

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Improve your relationship

Improve Your Relationship – 6 Ways Couples Counseling Helps

Looking to improve your relationship? For many, couples therapy is considered a last-ditch effort to save a relationship. But what if couples therapy was also used to prevent problems instead of just fixing them? No matter the stage of your relationship, couples therapy is a great resource across the board. Some couples go to therapy in order to identify issues or differences before they become problems; others go to improve their communication and increase intimacy

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individual versus couples therapy

What is the Difference Between Individual and Couples Therapy?

With therapy is growing in popularity these days, it is good to know about individual versus couples therapy. More people are accepting therapy as an essential part of our well-being, and more people are going to therapy as a treatment for mental and emotional health.  And, while more talk and acceptance of therapy can only be a positive thing, it is important for all of us to understand the difference between individual and couples therapy.

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10 Tips for Setting Realistic Expectations for Therapy

10 Tips for Setting Realistic Expectations for Therapy

How To Set Realistic Expectations For Therapy As humans, it’s easy to fall into the trap of setting high expectations for an experience and then feeling let down when we fail to meet that expectation. Therapy is no different. But setting expectations that are too high or unrealistic in therapy can be detrimental to your experience and take away from the progress you are making. It is essential, therefore, to learn how to set realistic

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Choosing a great therapist

Choosing a Great Therapist – 8 Things to Consider

Choosing a great therapist is the secret to making therapy work. But how do you find the right one for you? Here’s what we recommend. Begin by identifying why you are going to therapy. Are you going alone or with a partner? Do you want to work on overall mental and emotional health, reducing depression or anxiety, creating meaningful relationships? Or are you seeking treatment for a specific experience such as a trauma? Knowing why

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What is Going Well in Your Life

How to Take Stock of What is Going Well in Your Life

At the start of a new year is the opportunity to take stock of what is going well in your life and the world around you. Although 2020 was a year for the books – with the upheaval of a global pandemic and the uncertainty that followed – it is essential to our mental and emotional health to acknowledge the things that are going right in our lives. Even on those days, or years, that

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US Capitol Riot

US Capitol Riot – Talking to Our Kids: Fox 5 Interview

This past Wednesday our country shared in collective shock and sadness following the events that occurred in the US Capitol. Never before as a country have we had to experience so many losses and mind-bending concepts about who we are as Americans. How do we explain these types of events to our kids when we don’t really understand them ourselves?

I had the privilege of speaking with Kelsey Christensen of Fox 5 News about how to best help our children understand why this happened and what it means to them. One of the take-aways from our chat was how important it is that we not minimize our children’s fears and that we give them the space to talk about their fears as often as they need to.

We should normalize for them that these big feelings are real and that it is important for them to talk to their parents to help them better understand what they are experiencing. This means that parents need to be willing to have these conversations even though they may not know what to do or say. The important thing is that parents should be a safe space for their children and let them know they will never judge them for having their feelings – even if their children’s thoughts and feelings differ from their own.

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