Paul McManus

I work with neurodiverse couples, typically where one or both partners are Autistic or ADHD.

I believe that most of the difficulties couples face can be explained by a failure to communicate. We’re surprisingly bad at communicating, even though as individuals most of us believe we are quite good at it (it’s just our partners who aren’t). We’re also hopeless at mind-reading, although we tend to expect our partners to be experts at it. As a result, when our partner fails to respond to us in the way we want them to, we feel disappointed. And because we imagine we’ve been very clear about what we need (and even if we haven’t, the fact that they can read our mind means they ought to know anyway) we then tend to try a bit of mind-reading ourselves and conclude (wrongly, usually) that they’re doing it on purpose. And that doesn’t leave us feeling good about them or about the state of our relationship.

That might sound like an overly simple way of thinking but, at heart, I believe we’re very simple creatures. We want to be known and we want to be safe. We want to be accepted (and loved) for who we really are. So, I work simply. I’ll help you talk to each other safely and I’ll give you a way of understanding yourselves and each other. And I think that if you can really understand what it is that your partner wants and needs, then you’re in a much better position to be able to give it to them. You’re also much more able to decide whether or not you want to. And the same goes for them.

I love working with couples, and I think couples therapy ought to be an entirely positive experience - whatever the outcome. If it results in you deciding to stay together, your relationship will be stronger than it was before; if you decide to part then you’ll be doing it knowing what you want and how to ask for it - and that’s going to make it much more likely you’ll get it the next time around.

I use Transactional Analysis (TA) which makes it really easy, first to notice, then to understand, why we’re thinking, feeling or behaving in the way we are. Most of us go through our days with the unquestioned belief that we do/think/feel the things we do because that’s just the way we are. “I’m the kind of person who always finishes what’s on his plate.” TA allows us to question that belief, and in doing so, it gives us choices. I also draw from Imago Relationship Theory which offers us a way of reconnecting with each other safely, because without connection, intimacy can’t exist.

I work online and face-to-face from my practice in Pimlico in central London.