--- title: "Who I Work With as a Marriage Coach | Parent Marriage" description: "The types of clients I take for relationship coaching: couples in crisis, good partners whose desire went quiet, and couples who simply want to get better." lang: en json-ld: | [ { "@context": "https://schema.org", "@type": "LocalBusiness", "@id": "https://parentmarriage.com/#business", "name": "Parent Marriage Coaching", "description": "Emotionally Connected Couples and Marriage Coaching for parents. Miami office and by video across the U.S.", "url": "https://parentmarriage.com", "telephone": "+1-305-986-2905", "email": "Matt@ParentMarriage.com", "image": "https://parentmarriage.com/favicon.png", "priceRange": "$$", "address": { "@type": "PostalAddress", "streetAddress": "12755 SW 116th Terrace", "addressLocality": "Miami", "addressRegion": "FL", "postalCode": "33186", "addressCountry": "US" }, "geo": { "@type": "GeoCoordinates", "latitude": 25.6599319, "longitude": -80.4012802 }, "areaServed": { "@type": "AdministrativeArea", "name": "Miami-Dade County, FL" }, "founder": { "@type": "Person", "@id": "https://parentmarriage.com/#matthew" } }, { "@context": "https://schema.org", "@type": "Person", "@id": "https://parentmarriage.com/#matthew", "name": "Matthew W. Hoelscher", "jobTitle": "Marriage Coach", "url": "https://parentmarriage.com/matthew-hoelscher", "worksFor": { "@id": "https://parentmarriage.com/#business" }, "hasCredential": [ { "@type": "EducationalOccupationalCredential", "name": "Professional Certified Coach (PCC)", "credentialCategory": "certification", "recognizedBy": { "@type": "Organization", "name": "International Coaching Federation" } }, { "@type": "EducationalOccupationalCredential", "name": "EQ-i 2.0 Certified Assessor", "credentialCategory": "certification", "recognizedBy": { "@type": "Organization", "name": "MHS Assessments" } } ], "alumniOf": [ { "@type": "CollegeOrUniversity", "name": "Iowa State University" }, { "@type": "CollegeOrUniversity", "name": "University of Miami" } ] }, [ { "@context": "https://schema.org", "@type": "Service", "serviceType": "First-Time Discovery Call", "provider": { "@id": "https://parentmarriage.com/#business" }, "areaServed": { "@type": "AdministrativeArea", "name": "Miami-Dade County, FL" }, "description": "The welcome call for first timers only, free and on Zoom. Tell me what's going on and get an honest answer about whether the work is a fit. Existing clients book a paid session instead.", "offers": { "@type": "Offer", "price": "0.00", "priceCurrency": "USD", "availability": "https://schema.org/InStock" } }, { "@context": "https://schema.org", "@type": "Service", "serviceType": "Three-Session Package", "provider": { "@id": "https://parentmarriage.com/#business" }, "areaServed": { "@type": "AdministrativeArea", "name": "Miami-Dade County, FL" }, "description": "The path most couples take, three sessions to get the pattern named, interrupted and replaced. Booked as a package rather than one session at a time.", "offers": { "@type": "Offer", "price": "700.00", "priceCurrency": "USD", "availability": "https://schema.org/InStock" } }, { "@context": "https://schema.org", "@type": "Service", "serviceType": "Standard Session", "provider": { "@id": "https://parentmarriage.com/#business" }, "areaServed": { "@type": "AdministrativeArea", "name": "Miami-Dade County, FL" }, "description": "The core coaching session, built for one person working on the relationship, in person or by video.", "offers": { "@type": "Offer", "price": "175.00", "priceCurrency": "USD", "availability": "https://schema.org/InStock" } }, { "@context": "https://schema.org", "@type": "Service", "serviceType": "Extended Session", "provider": { "@id": "https://parentmarriage.com/#business" }, "areaServed": { "@type": "AdministrativeArea", "name": "Miami-Dade County, FL" }, "description": "Ninety minutes for both partners together, with room to work through something bigger.", "offers": { "@type": "Offer", "price": "315.00", "priceCurrency": "USD", "availability": "https://schema.org/InStock" } }, { "@context": "https://schema.org", "@type": "Service", "serviceType": "Marathon Intensive", "provider": { "@id": "https://parentmarriage.com/#business" }, "areaServed": { "@type": "AdministrativeArea", "name": "Miami-Dade County, FL" }, "description": "A single three-hour in-office session for urgent, relationship-threatening situations that need a lot of ground covered in one sitting.", "offers": { "@type": "Offer", "price": "630.00", "priceCurrency": "USD", "availability": "https://schema.org/InStock" } }, { "@context": "https://schema.org", "@type": "Service", "serviceType": "Short Zoom Session", "provider": { "@id": "https://parentmarriage.com/#business" }, "areaServed": { "@type": "AdministrativeArea", "name": "Miami-Dade County, FL" }, "description": "A brief video session for one person, useful between longer sessions.", "offers": { "@type": "Offer", "price": "87.00", "priceCurrency": "USD", "availability": "https://schema.org/InStock" } }, { "@context": "https://schema.org", "@type": "Service", "serviceType": "Long Zoom Session", "provider": { "@id": "https://parentmarriage.com/#business" }, "areaServed": { "@type": "AdministrativeArea", "name": "Miami-Dade County, FL" }, "description": "Two hours by video for both partners, a deeper working session without traveling to the office.", "offers": { "@type": "Offer", "price": "420.00", "priceCurrency": "USD", "availability": "https://schema.org/InStock" } } ], { "@context": "https://schema.org", "@type": "BreadcrumbList", "itemListElement": [ { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 1, "name": "Home", "item": "https://parentmarriage.com/" }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 2, "name": "Who I Work With", "item": "https://parentmarriage.com/types-of-clients-for-relationship-coaching" } ] }, { "@context": "https://schema.org", "@type": "FAQPage", "mainEntity": [ { "@type": "Question", "name": "Do you only work with couples who have children?", "acceptedAnswer": { "@type": "Answer", "text": "No. The parent marriage framework was built for couples raising kids and that is the heart of my practice, but I coach couples at every stage. Dating, engaged, married, in transition, empty nest, retired. Domestic couples have marriage problems and I do not care how they file their taxes. If two people share a life, the same patterns show up." } }, { "@type": "Question", "name": "Can I come without my spouse?", "acceptedAnswer": { "@type": "Answer", "text": "Yes, and a lot of people start that way. We work on your half of the pattern, which is the only half you actually control. What I will not do is coach you on tactics for managing your partner. In my experience the other spouse joins within a few sessions once they see this is a conversation rather than a trial." } }, { "@type": "Question", "name": "Is infidelity something a coach should handle?", "acceptedAnswer": { "@type": "Answer", "text": "In my practice yes, and I handle it constantly. Betrayal is a relational injury, not automatically a clinical one. What it needs is speed, structure and someone in the room who will not let the first conversations turn into the fight that ends the marriage. If abuse, an active addiction, or an untreated mental health condition is part of the picture, that goes to a licensed professional and I will say so." } }, { "@type": "Question", "name": "What if nothing is really wrong with us?", "acceptedAnswer": { "@type": "Answer", "text": "Then you are in my favorite group and you will get more out of this than almost anyone. Couples with goodwill still in the bank can change things in three sessions that take a couple in crisis the better part of a year, because nobody is bracing for impact. You do not have to be in trouble to book time." } } ] } ] --- [![Parent Marriage](/__l5e/assets-v1/323329b7-bfb6-4413-bc32-07161cb70b98/parent-marriage-logo.png)](/) [Home](/)[The 8 Stages](/help-me-save-my-marriage)[About](/about)[Marriage Straight Talk](/free-marriage-advice) [305-986-2905](tel:+13059862905)[Book a consultation](/book) [Book](/book) 1. [Home](/) 2. Who I Work With Guide # Who I Actually Work With Three kinds of couples call me, and only one of them is in crisis. Here is what each one sounds like on the first call, and where I am not the right person for you. ![Matthew sitting across from a couple in a warm Miami office at the start of a session](/assets/session-intro-BvUdJUS9.jpg) People ask who my clients are and expect me to say couples on the edge of divorce. Some of them are. But that is one of three groups, and it is not the biggest one. Most of the couples in my office are still functional. They pay the mortgage, they get the kids to school, they are polite to each other at dinner. They are just tired of feeling like business partners who happen to share a bed. Here is the honest breakdown of who calls me, what each of those couples sounds like the first time we talk, and where I am the wrong person entirely. I would rather you read this and rule yourself out than pay me for a session that was never going to fit. In this article 1. 01 [The three couples who call me](#three-kinds) 2. 02 [The couple in a bad place](#crisis) 3. 03 [Good partners whose desire went quiet](#quiet-bedroom) 4. 04 [Couples who are already good and want better](#already-good) 5. 05 [When only one of you is ready](#one-partner) 6. 06 [Every stage counts, not only married with kids](#every-stage) 7. 07 [When I am not the right call](#not-for-you) 8. 08 [Talk it through](#talk-it-through) 9. 09 [Questions couples ask](#faq) ## The three couples who call me I have used the same three way split for years because it keeps holding up. Couples usually recognize themselves in a single line of it, often before I finish saying it out loud. The useful part is not the labels. It is that each group needs a different first move, and starting in the wrong place wastes months. Who calls me - In a bad place Something broke. Usually betrayal, sometimes a fight that went somewhere it cannot come back from on its own. They are desperate, they want help this week, and they are often talking to me in a parking lot so the kids cannot hear. - Good partners, quiet bedroom They genuinely like each other. Solid parents, solid teammates. The physical side has gone flat, from mismatched desire, from both of them running on empty, or from life simply getting in the way for four years running. - Already good, want better Nothing is on fire. They want to get deliberate about connection, conflict and desire before anything breaks. These are some of the best sessions I run, and almost nobody books them. ![A man on one cliff with his wife and children across a chasm](/assets/canstockphoto21021376-Cz14Z4y5.jpg) The gap opens quietly, and then one day you are looking at your own family from the other side of it. ## The couple in a bad place This is the call I get on a Sunday night. Something surfaced. A phone was open on a counter, or a confession landed in the middle of an argument, and now two people are sitting in a house that does not feel like theirs anymore. They are not asking me for a framework. They are asking me whether this is survivable. It usually is. Betrayal is coaching work, not a wound I hand off. I sit in it constantly and I have watched a lot of couples come out the other side with a marriage that is honestly better built than the one they had before, because the one they had before was running on assumptions nobody had checked in a decade. That does not make the next few months pleasant. It makes them worth doing. I walk through the whole arc of it in [Stage 2, infidelity and betrayal](/stage-2-infidelity-betrayal). What I need from this couple is speed and honesty, in that order. We stop the bleeding first, which mostly means agreeing on what gets said in front of the kids and what does not, and then we get to the truth of how the two of you drifted far enough apart for this to be possible. If this is you Do not spend three weeks deciding whether to call. The first hard conversation is going to happen either way. The only question is whether it happens in a room with someone whose job is to keep it from turning into the fight that ends things. ## Good partners whose desire went quiet This is the largest group and the one that thinks it does not qualify for help. Two people who are kind to each other, who split the load reasonably well, who have not had a real fight in months and have not had a real anything else in months either. One of them wants more. One of them is too depleted to want anything. Or they both stopped and neither wanted to be the one to say it. Sometimes the problem is mismatched desire, where the two of you have simply been running on different clocks since the first baby arrived. Sometimes both engines went quiet. Sometimes life just got in the way so thoroughly that the bedroom became the last room on a list that never ends. None of those are character flaws and none of them mean the marriage is over. They mean nobody built a plan for the part of the marriage that used to run on autopilot. The thing I want this couple to understand is that the fade is normal. The giddy chemistry of the first two years was always going to cool. Reading that cooling as proof of failure is what actually does the damage, because then you start blaming a person for biology. I go deeper on this in [how desire fades naturally](/how-does-desire-fade-naturally). > The couples who think they do not qualify for help are usually the ones I can help fastest. Matthew W. Hoelscher, PCC ## Couples who are already good and want better Then there are the couples where nothing is wrong. They come in curious. They want better conversations, a cleaner way to handle conflict, more deliberate attention on their connection, and they would like to build all of that while they still have goodwill in the bank. I love this work and almost nobody books it, because we are culturally trained to treat marriage help as an emergency service. It is not. A couple with no crisis can make changes in three sessions that would take a couple in crisis nine months, for the simple reason that neither of them is bracing. If you are in this group, you probably already know the language of the [parent marriage](/what-is-a-parent-marriage) even if you have never used the phrase. You are trying to build something on purpose rather than hoping it holds. ## When only one of you is ready Plenty of people reach out alone. Their partner is not opposed exactly, just not ready to sit in a room and be discussed. That is workable. I will meet with one person and we will look honestly at your half of the pattern, which is the only half you control anyway. What I will not do is coach one of you into a strategy for managing the other. That is not coaching, that is recruitment, and it always surfaces later as a betrayal of its own. Your partner will not come in. Now what? Start alone We work on your half. Your reactions, your requests, the thing you have been swallowing for two years. Change one side of a pattern and the pattern has to move. Most partners join within a few sessions, once they see this is not a trial where they are the defendant. Wait for them You hold the line and hope the pressure drops on its own. Sometimes it does. More often the resentment quietly compounds and the invitation gets harder to make each month. Waiting is a choice with a cost. Make it knowingly rather than by default. ## Every stage counts, not only married with kids The name on the door says parent marriage, so people assume I only take married couples with toddlers. Not true. I work with couples dating seriously, couples engaged, couples years into it, couples going through a transition, couples staring at an empty nest, and couples figuring out what retirement together actually looks like. Domestic couples have marriage problems. I do not care how they file their taxes. Couples I take - Dating seriously and wondering whether the friction is normal - Engaged and trying to have the hard conversations before the wedding, not after - Seven to ten years in with young kids and no time to think - In a transition: a move, a job loss, a diagnosis in the family - Facing an empty house and realizing you have not been alone together since 2011 - Retired, together all day, discovering that is a different marriage ## When I am not the right call I will say this plainly, because it saves everyone money. If your marriage involves physical, sexual or mental abuse, an active addiction, or an untreated mental health condition, that belongs with a licensed professional and I will tell you so on the first call. I am a coach. I do not diagnose and I do not treat. I am also the wrong fit if you want me to fix your spouse while you sit and watch. And I am the wrong fit if what you are protecting is the appearance of the marriage rather than the marriage itself. If you are weighing coaching against the clinical route in general, I wrote an honest comparison in [marriage therapy vs marriage coaching](/marriage-therapy-vs-marriage-coaching). I will refer you out - Abuse of any kind Physical, sexual or emotional. Safety is not a coaching conversation and I will not pretend otherwise. - Active addiction Until that is being treated, marriage work is building on sand and both of you will end up blaming the wrong thing. - An untreated condition If depression, an anxiety disorder or anything similar is driving the pattern, a licensed professional leads and I am happy to work alongside that. ## Talk it through If you saw yourself in one of these three, [book a free 25 minute call](/talk-to-marriage-coach). It is for first timers, it costs nothing, and the only thing I am trying to establish is whether I am the right person for what is actually happening in your house. If I am not, I will tell you who is. ## Questions couples ask ### Do you only work with couples who have children? No. The parent marriage framework was built for couples raising kids and that is the heart of my practice, but I coach couples at every stage. Dating, engaged, married, in transition, empty nest, retired. Domestic couples have marriage problems and I do not care how they file their taxes. If two people share a life, the same patterns show up. ### Can I come without my spouse? Yes, and a lot of people start that way. We work on your half of the pattern, which is the only half you actually control. What I will not do is coach you on tactics for managing your partner. In my experience the other spouse joins within a few sessions once they see this is a conversation rather than a trial. ### Is infidelity something a coach should handle? In my practice yes, and I handle it constantly. Betrayal is a relational injury, not automatically a clinical one. What it needs is speed, structure and someone in the room who will not let the first conversations turn into the fight that ends the marriage. If abuse, an active addiction, or an untreated mental health condition is part of the picture, that goes to a licensed professional and I will say so. ### What if nothing is really wrong with us? Then you are in my favorite group and you will get more out of this than almost anyone. Couples with goodwill still in the bank can change things in three sessions that take a couple in crisis the better part of a year, because nobody is bracing for impact. You do not have to be in trouble to book time. [Book a free call ](/book) ![Matthew W. Hoelscher, marriage coach in Miami](/__l5e/assets-v1/793ff08a-677d-4393-a950-cb99a7968138/matt-portrait.jpg) Matthew W. Hoelscher, PCC ICF Professional Certified Coach and the marriage coach behind Parent Marriage, in Miami. He is a coach, not a licensed therapist, [Book a free call](/book) Book a consultation ## 25 minutes. _Honest answer._ Tell me what's going on and I'll tell you honestly whether I can help. No pressure, no sales pitch. [Book a free call ](/book) Or call [305.986.2905](tel:+13059862905) ![Parent Marriage](/__l5e/assets-v1/323329b7-bfb6-4413-bc32-07161cb70b98/parent-marriage-logo.png) Emotionally Connected Couples Coaching in Miami and by video nationwide. Coaching, not therapy. 12755 SW 116th Terrace Miami, FL 33186 Explore - [Home](/) - [About Matthew](/matthew-hoelscher) - [The 8 Stages](/help-me-save-my-marriage) - [Marriage Straight Talk](/free-marriage-advice) - [Book a Call](/book) - [Stage 1: Constant Fighting](/stage-1-stupid-arguments-constant-fighting) - [Stage 2: Infidelity & Betrayal](/stage-2-infidelity-betrayal) - [Stage 3: Stay or Go](/stage-3-stay-or-go) Resources - [Marriage Coaching in Miami](/couples-counseling-marriage-coach-miami-life-coaching) - [Common Questions](/couples-therapy-relationship-counseling-faq) - [Coaching Services](/marriage-coaching-questions-services) - [Talk to a Marriage Coach](/talk-to-marriage-coach) - [Conflict Resolution](/conflict-resolution-strategies) - [Fix a Struggling Marriage](/how-to-fix-a-struggling-marriage) - [Love, Marriage & Family](/love-marriage-family-problems) - [10 Common Marriage Problems](/top-10-stable-marriage-problem-example) - [Privacy Policy](/privacy) Contact - [305.986.2905](tel:+13059862905) - [Matt@ParentMarriage.com](mailto:Matt@ParentMarriage.com) - Miami · Office in Kendall, FL - By video in all 50 states & DC © 2026 Parent Marriage Coaching. All rights reserved. Coaching services provided by an ICF-certified coach. Not therapy, counseling, or medical care.