Family Therapy
Family Therapy & Everything You Need to Know About It
All families argue, it's how we address these concerns that counts.
Our first step is to meet all involved members of the family to determine the common goal we want to achieve (e.g., improve communication skills, clarify roles, reduce arguing, etc.). Next, we work on gathering the necessary information to determine what is contributing to the areas of concern and interfering with your family’s goals.
1 in 5 people experience mental health or addiction problems in their lifetime. In turn, this can bleed into the rest of the family and begin to affect the way families operate or get along with one another.
Whether one or multiple members of the family are experiencing any issues with mental health, it can be very helpful to address these issues together and we see more and more families opting for family therapy.
Additionally, family therapy can be a healthy solution for families experiencing unhealthy disagreements or behavioural problems as these often require input from multiple family members.
What is Family Therapy?
Family therapy aids family members in addressing the issues that create conflicts and aims to improve communication amongst family members
Who can benefit from family therapy?
Family therapy can encompass a wide variety of concerns and does not require all members to have problem areas to address. Some examples are shown below, but are not limited to:
Communication issues in the family
Families facing financial problems
Families with a member coping with serious mental illness
Parents having issues with their children
Who conducts the sessions?
A licensed psychologist or mental health professional with appropriate training, skills, and knowledge in treating families. There may also be someone under the direct supervision of a licensed psychologist.
How long do the sessions last?
Therapy sessions are typically 1 hour. As each family is different, so are its common goals and problem areas. This means that the solution also has to be unique to each individual family in order to arrive upon a solution that makes sense for the family as a whole. This can result in a wide range of required sessions.
If you are looking to get an estimate on therapy duration for your family, schedule a no obligation call here.
Signs your family may benefit from therapy
Almost all families have disputes and conflicts. It's difficult to determine when your family needs therapy, and can seem like a daunting task as there are multiple people involved. Keep in mind we see plenty of families for therapy and a quick call might be your best option to understand if family therapy is right for your family.
Here are some indicators that it may be time to explore family therapy:
Members of the family remain sad, anxious or angry which has a negative impact on your family’s daily life.
Either they cannot distinguish the reason for their feelings, or they will not share
Your family is going through a crisis together (i.e financial, emotional etc.)
Someone in the family is facing trauma and is not comfortable or unable to attend sessions individually
Types of Family Therapy
Family therapy helps to identify the patterns and behaviours that cause arguments or areas of tension within the family, whereas individual therapy focuses on the internal conflicts of an individual. There are several causes that could trigger stress in families, and there are many ways to go about addressing these concerns.
Families may require:
Psychoeducation: If someone in your family has any form of mental illness, you may consider this therapy. With psychoeducational sessions, therapists can: help the patient to better understand their condition, provide tools to help cope, as well as provide ways the family can support their loved one.
Skill Building: It may be helpful to focus on learning skills and strategies to cope with intense emotions and to respond to situations differently. These skills will be practiced in sessions and at home.
Addressing Interpersonal Patterns: Families develop patterns of interacting, communicating, and dealing with conflicts. When these patterns become maladaptive or part of the problem, it can be helpful to focus on understanding them so that new, more effective patterns can be practiced.
Aspects of the following traditional family therapy modalities may be incorporated into the treatment:
Structural therapy: Identifies the authority inside the family and how the individuals inside the group interact with each other.
Strategic therapy: Focuses on problems and behaviours in the family that are less challenging to solve. The purpose of this therapy is to set goals to eliminate the behaviour; the therapy sessions focus on achieving these goals.
Narrative therapy: Based on the idea that people see their life in the form of stories. Every individual has their perspective, and these perspectives shape their stories and character. By hearing their stories, therapists can figure out their problems. In this way, they can help clients resolve their issues.
Transgenerational therapy: Inheriting problems is as common as inheriting wealth. Thus, transgenerational family therapy traces the family history to understand the past difficulties.
Communication theory: The biggest problem in modern families is the communication gap. Family communication therapy involves an open communication session with the members of the family. This activity reinforces the family roots.