Alwyn Crawford, MA, MFT
As far back as I can remember, my family and friends have always come to me for help with their life concerns. On many of those occasions I found myself doing research before having follow-up conversations to help them address their cares. It was those initial breakthroughs that fueled my present desire to help people, in particular, in and through marriage.
I accepted the call to ministry in 1990 and was ordained a Christian minister in 1993. I created my first Christian Counseling curriculum for couples planning to get married in the same year. By 2003 I began to realize that there were obstacles to couples preparing for marriage that the Bible did not address directly, and that I wanted to be able to have an impact on marriages in general, even those marriages that are non-Christian. For this reason, I made the decision to return to academia in order to pursue a degree in counseling. In 2006 I completed a Bachelor’s degree in Physiology and in 2009 I completed a Master’s degree in Counseling, all while attending school year-round and working full time.
The underlying perception I discovered from counseling couples is that most believe that the role of a husband or wife is innate. In other words, they operate as if there is something in our DNA that turns on when you say “I Do” causing us to know instinctively how to be a husband or a wife.
Armed with a desire to “Help Couples Make ‘I Do’ work” and knowing that there is no definite link in
our DNA that affects our spousal behavior, I founded “The Marriage Gene” – the missing DNA, to educate couples about and help equip couples for marriage. We are focused on helping couples, individuals, and families prepare to foster a happy and healthy marriage, while simultaneously taking some sting out of divorce.
I hold a Master’s Degree in Community Counseling and have studied counseling techniques that are not only utilized in counseling for couples, individuals, groups, but also in addiction and other mental health counseling practices. As an ordained Christian minister I can, when appropriate, combine these clinical techniques and theory with Biblical teachings for clients whose beliefs play an important role in their life, living, relationship, and recovery.
I believe learning about one’s partner and one’s self are fruitful ways of evaluating both your readiness for marriage and your understanding of what it means to be married. For this reason, I specialize in the areas of Pre-Engagement and Pre-Marital counseling.
It is my goal to help couples build a strong foundation for communication and honesty; define realistic expectations and boundaries; restore integrity and trust to the institution of marriage; and promote healthy marriages by creating an environment in which couples (both preparing for marriage and married) will have access to tools, techniques, and information that will enable them to make decisions that will foster a growing, loving, life-long marriage.
“Helping Couples Make ‘I Do’ Work”