The waiting time for getting couples therapy appointments in the city of Helsinki has risen to near-record levels -- a situation caused by coronavirus-related delays, according to the city's chief psychotherapist, Sirpa Salonen.
Couples with children seeking guidance from relationship therapists have been forced to wait for up to eight months to get their first appointment, she said.
"This is exceptional. Couples haven't had to wait this long for access to family counselling in at least five years," Salonen said.
At the moment there are about 430 couples who are in the city's family counselling queues. Salonen said that the coronavirus crisis last spring contributed most to the delays.
Those who are at the back of the queue are often parents of young children, unable to conduct the therapy sessions remotely via video conferencing.
"In the spring, when we offered clients video-based rather than face-to-face sessions, some [parents of young children] refused and were then sent to the back of the queue," Salonen explained.
She said those parents were unable to arrange a quiet moment to talk with a therapist because their children were home all the time due to the exceptional circumstances brought about by the crisis.
On the other hand, some couples were able to get to see a city therapist more quickly than they would have otherwise because they were able to use the video conferencing service, according to Salonen.
Some head to parish for help
When waiting times for getting access to a therapist from the municipality are long, couples often turn to Helsinki's Evangelical Lutheran parish, which provides counselling services.
The parish's family counsellor, Veli-Matti Helminen, said that more than 100 couples are waiting for help from church counsellors.
"We have 17 family counsellors, so the queue is moving forward, but some couples may have to wait for a few months to get an appointment," Helminen explained, saying that the parish usually sees a lot of new clients seeking family services after the summer, but noted that the corona spring may have sparked an increased interest in counselling services.
"After the corona spring there's a kind of new pressure to get things sorted with therapy, or maybe sometimes a question of long-term, growing bad feelings in the relationship," Helminen said.
City psychotherapist Salonen said the growing interest in couple therapy could also be due to a lowering of couples' thresholds to seek help.
"Some couples want to go negotiate things again and consider whether there is something worth saving before ending their relationship," Salonen explained.
Due to the long waiting times for couple therapy sessions, clients at the tail end of the queue are contacted to see if they still need the help they first sought.
"When queues are long, sometimes couples go seek help elsewhere, like the parish or a private therapist, or the situation has changed," Salonen said.
Divorce filing rates fluctuate
It remains to be seen how much of an impact the crisis will have on the durability of marriages and relationships, at least in the long term.
Last week it was reported that about half as many divorce petitions were filed in Helsinki in June and July compared to the same time last year. However, divorce rates were relatively stable elsewhere across the Uusimaa region over the summer.
Meanwhile, in early summer, statistics showed that Finland's overall divorce rate had decreased over the spring.