The founder

He left the office to reach the people who wouldn’t come in.

Christopher D. Adams, LMFT, CSAT

Developer of the RDX Effect

Christopher D. Adams, LMFT, CSAT, built RDX — The RDX Effect — over more than a decade of clinical practice in Utah. He built it because a couch and a closed door only reach some people. The rest still live in systems.

How RDX began

Chris, in his words

Olive Garden

A third person at the table

My wife and I had not been together very long when she started noticing something strange. People would walk up, talk for a minute, and then tell me things that felt too much for a stranger. She kept asking why. I shrugged it off — a good listener, a trusting face.

On our third anniversary we were at Olive Garden. Natalie loved that place. I exchanged a few words with our waiter. He was working hard and doing the job well, but I could feel he was in a vulnerable state. I didn’t have language for it yet. Later I would call myself a symptom bearer. Then I just noticed.

The next times he came by, I tailored what I said toward balancing that vulnerable connection. The next thing we knew, we had a third member of our anniversary dinner. He sat down. He shared, he swore, he cried, and he mourned. It went on until his manager intervened. We got a discount on the meal.

Red Robin

Okay, what is the deal?

“Okay, what is the deal?”— Natalie

We laughed and went on. A few weeks later we were at Red Robin — we ate out more then; four kids changed that. Something similar happened at the next table, and Natalie had had enough.

So as we went through the steak fries — I love those things — I grabbed a napkin and started explaining feelings, emotions, connection, intimacy, disconnection, power, vulnerability, drama. RDX started to take shape on that napkin.

A clinical retreat

Jeans, wood, and two scales

Over the next months the difference between spatial and emotional stimulation became obvious, and clients began to benefit. Couples could finally say what they thought and felt to each other. The more excited I got, the more colleagues wanted to understand what I had learned.

At a clinical retreat I got some wood, cut two-foot strips, cut a pair of my jeans into strips, and glued them to the wood so I could show them. That was the first mat. That was Relational Dynamics Treatment.

Out of the office

He took the model off the couch and onto the court, the mat, the gym floor, and the conference room. Same two scales. Same words. Standing up, wherever people already were. Then he trained every clinician at Connections Counseling Services in it, so the model works in the office too.

What the model is

Every person is in a system that is always rebalancing. Their position sits on two scales anyone can learn: power and vulnerability, connection and disconnection. No position is good or bad. What matters is whether they can move — fixed or fluid. When a whole room shares that map, blame stops and the work starts.

What came next

First delivery was off the couch, on the court. Then every clinician at Connections learned it, so the model also works in the office. Holladay, then Orem, then Murray. Statewide by telehealth. RDX takes that principle and uses it where you are.

“When we get into a conflict, our bodies respond defensively, and that defensiveness diminishes our ability to solve problems.”

“If we could remove the blame — get people focused on getting it right rather than being right — the world opened up to them.”

From practice to the mat

01A napkin at Red Robin — the first sketch of the scales
02Jeans glued to wood — the first mat
03First delivery off the couch, on the court
04Connections clinicians trained
05Taught wherever a system already gathers

Read how the model works, or see how RDX and Connections work together.