When trauma enters the couple dynamic, talk therapy alone often isn’t enough. Integrating parts work, such as Resource Therapy alongside Imago, EFT, Gottman, PACT, art therapy, and somatic therapy, helps therapists reach beneath conflict to the wounded parts of each partner, restoring safety, connection, and repair.
Why Isn’t Talk Therapy Enough?
Even the most experienced couples therapist knows the moment when dialogue breaks down, when one partner shuts down, the other escalates, and connection feels out of reach. Beneath these reactions often lie unhealed trauma and protective parts that keep both partners stuck in familiar patterns of pain.
Traditional communication techniques, while valuable, cannot always touch the raw emotional injuries that live in the body and nervous system. As neuroscientist Daniel Siegel (2012) reminds us, “Integration is health.” Without integrating the fragmented self – those younger, reactive, or overwhelmed parts – relationships remain in a state of survival mode.
This is where parts work offers profound leverage.
How Parts Work Transforms the Couple Space
Approaches such as Resource Therapy, Internal Family Systems (IFS), and Ego State Therapy recognise that we all have multiple “selves” or Resource States with their own memories, emotions, and strategies for safety.
In couples therapy, these states interact across the relationship. One partner’s Vaded in Fear part might activate the other’s Retro Avoidant protector. The cycle continues until each state can be compassionately met, heard, and healed.
As Maureen McEvoy, MA, RCC (Canada), says:
“When trauma shows up in couples therapy, we can’t stay at the level of communication skills. We need to help each partner recognise and regulate the parts that get triggered in the dance.”
By giving these parts a voice through dialogue, imagination, somatic awareness, and creative interventions, therapists create a bridge between the internal world and the relational field. The result is genuine repair, not just behavioural change.
Integrating Attachment, Neuroscience, and Somatic Work
Research across attachment theory and neuroscience supports this integration.
- Bowlby (1988) showed that early attachment ruptures shape adult intimacy.
- Porges (2011) explained, through the polyvagal theory, how safety and connection depend on the regulation of the nervous system.
- van der Kolk (2014) demonstrated that trauma is stored not only in memory but also in the body, requiring somatic processing.
Somatic and art therapies help externalise, and re-regulate these implicit memories.
Through drawing, movement, or guided imagery, clients can express what words cannot.
When integrated with parts-based awareness and relational attunement, these creative modalities become powerful vehicles for healing.
Inside the Workshop: Healing Trauma, Restoring Connection
🗓 8–9 November 2025
📍 Sydney – Crows Nest Community Centre
🎓 12 CPD hours (PACFA, ACA, AASW, ASCH, AAPI, APS)
👩🏫 Presenter: Maureen McEvoy, MA, RCC (Canada)
🟡 Sponsored by Australian Resource Therapy Institute (ARTI)
In this two-day exclusive training, Maureen McEvoy, an internationally respected trauma and Imago couples specialist of Canada, guides therapists through experiential, embodied learning. Participants will:
- Understand the what, why and how of trauma-informed couples work
- Practise mapping reactive and protective parts between partners
- Learn somatic regulation and co-regulation strategies
- Explore integration methods from Imago, Gottman, EFT, PACT, Art therapy, Somatic Therapy and parts work
- Build confidence in managing high-intensity emotional sessions
Every exercise is grounded in safety, compassion, and practical skill-building. Numbers are strictly limited to ensure personalised attention and rich peer learning.
You will leave not only inspired but equipped to use these approaches immediately in your own practice. Plus the added benefit of refreshing our energy, learning and community connection cup.
Imago Case Consultation Day – 10 November 2025
For those wanting to extend their learning, Maureen McEvoy, in association with the Australian Imago Relationship Therapy Association (AIRTA), will offer an Imago Case Consultation Day on Monday, 10 November 2025.
This optional day provides an opportunity for Imago therapists to:
- Present their own cases for group consultation – videos welcome
- Receive direct feedback and supervision from Maureen
- Deepen understanding of Imago theory in complex trauma cases
- Explore how parts work and attachment models can complement the Imago dialogue
Why This Matters for Therapists
Working with couples in the relational space can be some of the most rewarding and confronting clinical work we do. When we can recognise the inner worlds operating beneath conflict, we move from blame to understanding, from fear to connection.
Parts work reminds us that no partner is the enemy; the true problem lies in the protective adaptations of wounded parts trying to stay safe. Healing begins when both partners can witness and integrate these inner dynamics with curiosity rather than defence.
Join Us in Sydney
Join us in Sydney this November to experience how trauma-informed parts work can transform your couples’ sessions.
👉 Secure your place today: Healing Trauma Nov 8/9
Maureen, and I can’t wait to meet you there!
References
Bowlby, J. (1988). A secure base: Parent–child attachment and healthy human development. New York, Basic Books.
Emmerson, G., & Essing, C. (2025). Therapist Gold: Treating fear-based trauma and attachment trauma. Melbourne, Australia: Old Golden Point Press.
Porges, S. W. (2011). The polyvagal theory: Neurophysiological foundations of emotions, attachment, communication, and self-regulation. New York: W. W. Norton & Company.
Siegel, D. J. (2012). The pocket guide to interpersonal neurobiology: An integrative handbook of the mind. New York: W. W. Norton & Company.
van der Kolk, B. A. (2014). The body keeps the score: Brain, mind, and body in the healing of trauma. New York: Viking.
