Beth Collins

Meet Beth.

Hi, I'm Beth Collins.

You're probably here because something in your relationship has stopped working — and you've tried to fix it on your own long enough to know you need more than good intentions and another difficult conversation.

Maybe you're caught in a cycle neither of you wanted and neither of you knows how to break. Maybe there's been a betrayal, a rupture, or years of slow disconnection. Maybe you love each other but can't seem to find your way back to each other. Or maybe you've even been told that your relationship is too complicated for therapy to help.

My job is to help you see what's happening between you through a different lens.

At We Thrive Together, we've built our practice around therapists who are specifically trained in couples and family work. We believe relationships — even deeply fractured ones — have the capacity to heal.

Who I Work With

I've built much of my practice around couples that a lot of therapists find difficult to work with. And honestly — I enjoy it. Couples who are really stuck are often defended, frustrated, exhausted, and pretty convinced nothing is ever going to change. But underneath all of that, I often find two people who are still fighting for something that matters to them.

What looks like anger, stubbornness, withdrawal, or resistance usually tells us something important about how each person learned to protect themselves. My work is to understand those protections without letting them run the room.

That said, you don't have to be in crisis to work with me. Some couples come in because everything has fallen apart. Others know something is quietly off and want to address it before it gets worse. And some love each other very much and just cannot seem to stop having the same stupid argument about who does the dishes.

All of it is welcome here.

High-Conflict Couples

I work with couples whose conflict has become chronic, intense, or seemingly impossible to resolve — including couples who have tried therapy before and still feel stuck.

I have specialized Emotionally Focused Therapy training for highly conflicted couples. High conflict doesn't automatically mean a relationship can't be helped. It usually means we need to slow things down enough to understand what keeps happening between you — and why neither of you has been able to stop it.

Narcissistic or High-Control Relationship Patterns

Some of the most painful relationships involve patterns of entitlement, control, defensiveness, blame, or one partner gradually losing trust in their own perceptions.

My advanced training in Relational Life Therapy includes working with narcissistic dynamics in relationships. This work requires both compassion and accountability. I don't automatically assign one person the role of villain, but I also don't explain harmful behavior away as simply "the cycle."

Sometimes behavior needs to be named honestly before a relationship can become healthier.

Affairs and Betrayal

Discovering an affair or significant betrayal can create a profound attachment injury and, for some partners, a trauma response. Healing usually takes more than deciding to forgive or promising it won't happen again.

I have specialized training in affair recovery through Emotionally Focused Therapy, including AIRM, Broken Bonds Attachment Injury Resolution, and additional couples infidelity repair training.

Whether the betrayal happened last month or years ago, if it still lives between you, it matters.

Couples Who Want to Feel Closer

Not every couple who walks through the door is in crisis.

Sometimes the connection is still there, but the ease isn't. You love each other and keep missing each other. One of you shuts down, the other pushes, or the same conversation keeps going sideways in a way neither of you intended.

Sometimes life has simply gotten loud — kids, work, obligations — and the two of you have quietly moved to the back of your own priority list.

EFT helps us get underneath the communication problem to understand what each of you is needing, fearing, protecting, or trying unsuccessfully to say.

You don't have to be falling apart to deserve good couples therapy.

My Approach

My work is attachment-based, trauma-informed, and grounded in Emotionally Focused Therapy. Underneath most relationship conflict — the anger, criticism, withdrawal, pursuit, or shutdown — something deeper is usually happening around safety, connection, trust, importance, or the fear of losing each other.

And this isn't the kind of therapy where you'll spend an hour talking back and forth while I occasionally ask, "And how does that make you feel?"

Our work is active and focused. We'll slow things down, track the cycle as it's happening, and pay attention to the moments when anger, defensiveness, or withdrawal take over. I'll name what I see, challenge you when it's needed, and help you get to what's harder to say out loud — while making sure both of you have room to be understood.

Trauma matters here, too. Sometimes what looks like a relationship problem is being fueled by something much older. My training in trauma and EMDR helps me recognize when past experiences are showing up in the present relationship and respond to them without losing sight of what's happening between you now.

The goal isn't to decide which person is "the problem." It's to understand the pattern you've gotten caught in while also being honest about individual behaviors that are hurting the relationship and need to change.

Both things can be true.

Training and Credentials

I earned my Master's degree in Social Work from the University of Maryland and have more than 25 years of clinical experience working with individuals, couples, and families.

My advanced training in couples and trauma work includes:

• Emotionally Focused Therapy (EFT) Externship and Core Skills Training

• AIRM — Affair Recovery through Emotionally Focused Therapy

• Broken Bonds — Attachment Injury Resolution through EFT

• Couples Infidelity Repair training

• EFT with Highly Conflicted Couples

• Hold Me Tight Workshop Facilitation

• Relational Life Therapy (RLT), including working with narcissistic dynamics

• Certified Trauma Therapist (CTT)

• Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR)

A Little About Me

My education and training are the foundation of my work — but they only tell part of the story.

The rest of it is life. Hard relationships. A blended family. The beautiful mess of it. The parts that humbled me and the parts that taught me more than any training ever could.

I'm not perfect at this stuff.

I've been the one shutting down and the one pursuing. I've been the one convinced I was right when I was mostly just scared.

So I'm not sitting across from you as someone who has relationships figured out. I'm sitting across from you as someone who understands why this is hard — and who also knows it's possible to do it differently because I've had to learn how to do it differently myself.

After more than 25 years, I still find this work fascinating. I'm still genuinely invested in the couples I work with, and I still believe something can shift — sometimes even when the couple sitting across from me isn't sure they believe it yet.

Sessions and Availability

I offer in-person couples therapy in Fredericksburg, Virginia, and secure online sessions for couples across Virginia. I also offer couples intensives for those who want to do concentrated work over one or two days rather than meeting weekly.

Because of licensure requirements, all participants in online sessions must be physically located in Virginia at the time of the session.

If something here resonates — if you recognize your relationship somewhere in what you've read — reach out.

You don't have to have it all figured out. Just tell us a little about what's happening, and we'll help you determine whether I might be a good fit and what the next step looks like.

Our team responds within one business day.

Schedule a Consultation with Beth