Does this feel familiar?
Sometimes the argument is not really about the argument.
You may keep returning to different versions of the same conflict. One person reaches harder for reassurance while the other pulls back. Small moments become loaded. Conversations end in anger, defensiveness, silence or exhaustion. Often, this does not mean either of you has stopped caring. It means something important is happening between you when connection begins to feel threatened.
Couples
Understanding the cycle, not finding the villain
Couples counselling is the main focus of my practice.
Rather than deciding who is right, we slow down the pattern you become caught in together: what sets it off, how each of you protects yourselves, what happens underneath the visible conflict, and how those responses affect the other person.
The aim is not to force agreement or reconciliation. It is to make enough room for honesty, emotional safety and clearer choices about the relationship.
How I work
People often make more sense when we understand what their behaviour is protecting
Anger can carry hurt. Withdrawal can be an attempt not to make things worse. Criticism can hold a longing to matter. Defensiveness can appear when someone feels ashamed, blamed or unsafe.
Understanding this does not remove accountability.
It gives us a more useful place from which change can begin.
My work is relational, person-centred, attachment-informed and trauma-informed, with my couples work strongly informed by Emotionally Focused Therapy / EFCT.
Meet Dan
Warmth, honesty and emotional precision
I’m Dan Adobaw, a counsellor and psychotherapist working with couples and individuals across Sydney and Australia-wide.
I want counselling to feel deeply human: somewhere you can be honest, be taken seriously, and be challenged with care rather than analysed from across the room.
Other ways I can help
Individual Counselling
Sometimes the relationship you need help understanding is the one you have with yourself, or the ways past and present relationships continue to shape how you feel.
Individual counselling can support you through relational pain, emotional overwhelm, grief and loss, difficult transitions, attachment patterns, questions of identity and periods where you simply don't feel like yourself.
Couples in Early Parenthood
A baby can bring enormous love while also placing enormous pressure on a relationship.
Sleep deprivation, shifting roles, intimacy changes, parenting differences, mental load and less time for each other can leave couples feeling more reactive or disconnected than they expected.
Counselling can help you understand what this season is doing to the relationship and find ways of protecting connection while caring for your family.
What counselling here can feel like
To be heard before being fixed.
Space to understand what is happening before rushing toward solutions.
To understand the pattern, not find the villain.
Particularly in couples work, we look for what happens between you rather than simply deciding whose behaviour is the problem.
To speak more honestly without the conversation immediately becoming unsafe.
Counselling gives us somewhere to slow difficult moments down.
To be challenged with care.
Being understood doesn't mean avoiding difficult conversations. Sometimes meaningful work involves looking carefully at the ways we protect ourselves and the impact those protections can have.
To move at a pace that allows deeper work without unnecessary pressure.
There is no requirement to arrive already knowing exactly what is wrong or what you want to do about it.
Questions & Answers
Do we need to know whether we want to stay together?
No. Couples sometimes come to counselling precisely because one or both people are uncertain. The work can support greater honesty and clarity without assuming what the outcome should be.
What happens in the first couples session?
We begin by understanding what has brought you in, hearing each person’s experience, and starting to notice the pattern that develops between you when things become difficult.
Can I come on my own?
Yes. Individual counselling is available separately. Where I am already working with you as a couple, we would first discuss what individual work would mean for the existing therapeutic relationship.
Do I have to book a session straight away?
No. A free 15-minute discovery call is available if you would first like to ask questions and get a sense of whether working together feels right.
Is counselling confidential?
Confidentiality is fundamental to counselling. What you share is treated with care and privacy, within the professional and legal limits of confidentiality, which we’ll discuss when we begin.