The Question of Counseling

After a week or so of putting it off, I finally started to call around to find a counselor for Steve and I.  In one sense, it feels good to be taking some action to try to repair that which is broken between us, or to build those parts of our relationship that never fully got a chance to flourish.  In another, this just feels scary and too big and somehow ridiculous.  I have been thinking of all of the people I know who have gone to counseling or therapy of some sort, and though it seems to be extremely benefical to a (wo)man on an individual level, I don't know a single couple for whom therapy has actually worked.  I don't know why this is, but it scares me.  There are so many different levels in the way I feel that I find it hard to pinpoint any one thing, which is both confusing and frustrating for me.  I have really been examining this-wondering why I really want to go, wondering if Steve is really willing or if he is just agreeing to get me off his back, I don't even really know what I hope to accomplish.  And like I said, I don't know any couples it has worked for.

In what I would like to accomplish, well, part of it is the obvious: I would like to see if there is anything there to build on, find ways to be in a relationship in a more healthy manner, open up the lines of communication.  I would like to be able to find out if I really even love Steve, which sounds awful; we have been together just over two years, so you'd think that would be a no-brainer.  I do know I love him, I guess, but what I want to find out is if I love him because of who he is as a person or if it is only because he is Owen's dad.  That also seems a little obvious-I have three other kids from two different fathers (not as careless as it sounds!), and I certainly don't feel the love for either of my ex-husbands!  But none of this is black and white, nor even grey.  Just different levels of feelings all layered over one another, and I think I need to go through them and see what is there.  I would like him to be open enough to do the same.

Worst case scenario?  We don't make it as a couple but can somehow learn to co-parent Owen together.  And that is no small thing, I know.  Like I said, I have two ex-husbands, and I would not even come close to describe our parenting relationship as co-ANYTHING.  I have full legal and physical custody of Sam, age 8, and have had since he was 4; we have little to do with his father other than my repeated attempt to locate him in order to try to collect child support.  The father of the other two is as interested as he can be, which from 750 miles away is very little.  I don't want to have to deal with the same kinds of problems with Steve as I have had with either of my ex-husbands, and I don't think he does, either.  So if we can learn how to parent together even if we are apart, then in a sense everyone wins.

Still, and this what I really need an answer to-from a person, a family member, someone here, God, someone!-is who has this ever worked for?  Who, besides the hooker from Pretty Woman, ever had the real-life happy ending?  Who has gone to counseling and kept an open mind and had things actually turn out the way you had hoped? IS this just a colossal waste of both our time and money?  I just-I don't know.