Professional Memberships
- SAC-Registered Counsellor (C0780)
Educational Qualifications
- MSc in Family Therapy, King’s College London
- Graduate Certificate in Family Therapy, King’s College London
- Bachelor of Arts (English & Social Work), National University of Singapore
Qualifications (Relationship and Marital Counselling)
- Certificates of Completion for Gottman Method Couples Therapy Level 1: Bridging the Couple Chasm & Level 2: Assessment, Intervention, and Co-Morbidities
- Certificate of Completion for Gottman Method Couples Therapy Level 3 Clinical Training
- Certificates of Completion for Emotionally Focused Couples Therapy (EFCT) *Modules A and B
- Certificate of Completion for Emotionally Focused Couple Therapy – Extramarital Affairs
- Certificate of Completion for Humanistic Play Therapy and Interplay Family Therapy
Phyllis Wong
Professional Counsellor
Language Spoken: English
Specialties (specifically for relationship counselling):
- Sexual health issues (difficulty in consummating the marraige, erectile dysfuctnction, difficulties in having penetrative sex)
- Marital conflicts
- Relationship issues
Phyllis Wong is an experienced couple and family therapist working with couples with various sexual health issues such as difficulty in consummating the marriage, erectile dysfunction, difficulty in having penetrative sex, low libido and various sexual dysfunctions. Her passion, desire and purpose is to help individuals, couples and families find healing, restoration and freedom, within oneself, and in their relationships with others through improving communication, coaching conflict resolution strategies, individual psychotherapy / counselling so that they can reach their fullest potential.
She has more than 18 years of experiences working with couples, families, children, single teenage mothers, parents with premature babies and women’s health with regards to gynaecological conditions, gynaecological cancers and breast cancer in a healthcare setting. She also completed a 2-year stint working with mentally distressed children and adolescents under the Child Adolescent Mental Health Service (CAMHS), National Health Service (NHS), in London, United Kingdom from 2015 to 2017.
Phyllis adopts an integrative approach to therapy, comprising Systemic Therapy, Gottman Method Couples Therapy, Emotionally Focused Therapy, Bowen Family, Systems Couple Therapy, Narrative Therapy, Solution Focused Brief Therapy, Transgenerational Family Therapy, Structural Family Therapy and psycho-education.
Phyllis’ clinical interest is in couples with sexual health issues and sexual dysfunctions, marital conflicts, relationship issues, affairs and mental health issues. Additionally, her interest also lies in running workshops. She has also published a book chapter “Women’s Health in Medical Settings” in “Medical Social Work in Singapore in 2021.
Understand Phyllis’ Approach
We understand that choosing a counsellor is a personal decision, so we asked Phyllis to answer a few questions to help you get to know her better and feel more comfortable before your first session.
What is your experience in working with couples?
I am trained in couple therapy and family therapy with Kings College London, United Kingdom. I have multiple experiences working with couples with various issues such as
- lack of consummation in the marriage
- female / male sexual dysfunction, low libido
- differing conflict resolution styles
- negative patterns of communication / interaction
- affair / infidelity / betrayal
- emotional intimacy and sexual intimacy issues
- life transitions
- finance
- parenting challenges
- rebuilding trust
- roles and responsibilities
- sexuality issue
- blended families
- one partner presents with mental health issues such as depression
- one partner presents with an addiction issue (i.e. porn addiction, alcohol addiction)
- boundaries and privacy
- overcoming trauma
- grief and loss
- etc
What is your approach to couples counselling?
My approach tends to be an integrated approach, which includes Gottman Couple Therapy Method, Emotion Focused Couple Therapy, Narrative Therapy, etc., to name a few.
I tailor these approaches to fit into my couple-clients’ cultural context and issues that they bring to the therapy room. I also adopt the use of multiple screening tools, which is applicable to my couple-clients’ issues, and offers an evidence-based lens to help my couple-clients better understand the multiple layers contributing to their marital lens from another lens or perspective.
What can I expect during a session?
Depending on the context and the couple relational dynamics, the sessions may be a couple therapy session or an individual session with each spouse.
Morever, there will also be homework given after each session, in preparation for the next session. Similarly, the prescribed homework might be for couple to practise specific skills such as communication skill or love language, etc., with the objective of improving the couple relationship. You can also expect some role plays and / or coaching for a session, if the situation arises, depending on the issue to be worked on by a couple.
The prescribed homework will be sent via email via SCC’s administrative team.
I want to go for couple sessions but my partner is resistant. How can I approach this?
Depending on the context, it might be helpful to approach your partner by emphasizing that by coming for couple sessions, it is a helpful way for him or her to get feedback from the resistant spouse to help the other spouse to be more aware and to make changes, while the therapist gets another perspective from this resistant spouse about the problem definition.
What should we expect during the first session?
During the first session, the couple would be asked to share their perspective of the problem individually. The individual partners would also be asked to share what would be their objectives or goals for the couple therapy sessions.
The therapist would then help the couple-clients to make sense of their problems by developing various hypotheses which form a systemic formulation about the multiple layers contributing to their marital issues. The hypotheses would be explored with the couple before they can be validated.
How do you handle confidentiality in couples counselling?
As part of ethical practice, there should not be secrets between one spouse and the couple therapist. The spouse would be encouraged to talk to the other spouse about it. If there are difficulties, the couple therapist would role-play with or coach the other spouse on how to express it to the spouse in a constructive way. Couple therapist will also facilitate these conversations during the therapy session to facilitate disclosure and sharing from one spouse to the other.
Book an Appointment with Phyllis
