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No one develops in an emptiness. When one family member experiences some pain (which manifests itself in behaviour or emotional reactions), then to some extent all members of this family feel this pain and suffer. Hence, family therapy is addressed to all family members.
When is it worth using family therapy?
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when there are difficulties in family relations,
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when there are problems with raising children in the family,
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when a parent feels that they are losing contact with a child,
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when one of the family members is ill,
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when one of the family members withdraws,
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when the entire family is going through a developmental crisis (birth of a child, child going to kindergarten/school, child leaving for college, adult child leaving home),
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in a crisis around divorce.
"In every way possible, family is our connection to our past and a bridge to our future."
Alex Haley
In family therapy, we do not focus on one person. During therapeutic sessions, attention is focused on relationships (between members) and patterns of behaviour in these relationships. Based on ‘systemic thinking’, the family is one, unique system, and the behaviours of one family member affect the behaviours of all the others. This creates an invisible, but influencing, complex network of mutual interactions.
For example, if parents come to us with a difficult child's problematic behaviour, family therapy does not focus on the child, but on the connections of each family member in this context, because according to the systemic view of the family, the relationship between everyone in this family affects how this child behaves. Therapy allows us to see this network of dependencies and introduce change by building new habits, changing ways of reacting, expanding the narrative about ourselves and the family.
Therefore, solving the difficulties that the entire family struggles with is not focused on working with just one of its members. Therapy allows us to see the perspective of all the people involved in a given problem. It is not just one person who has a problem and needs to undergo therapy ("change"), but the entire family system that suffers and we strive to gently develop behavioural patterns that will help the family reduce the suffering with which they came to therapy. Hence, family members are often given different tasks to do between sessions, so as not to rush and not to create pressure to develop new behavioural patterns and beliefs on a given topic.
What is family psychotherapy?
The most important benefit of family therapy is improving the functioning of the family, which in practice means reducing or resolving the difficulties with which the family came to therapy.
Additional benefits may include:
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strengthening family ties,
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engaging the entire family in resolving difficulties (without burdening one person with this task),
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expanding one's skills in "give and take",
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building new skills and acquiring knowledge on how to deal constructively with difficult situations,
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improving communication in the family.
Benefits of the therapy for family:
A family session at our Centre usually lasts 75 minutes. If the family is large, it may happen that the individual session length will be increased.
The first 2-3 sessions are for the family to get to know the therapist and the therapist to get to know the family. Then we define the goals of the therapy together and slowly enter the process of introducing changes to the family system.
Sessions take place on average every 3 weeks.
How long do sessions last and how often do they take place?
If you are interested in this form of therapy, please contact us:
email - info@ckudublin.org
Phone/ WhatsApp: + 353 876 494 555
At the CKU Center, you can also take advantage of other forms of therapy and personal development.