Family Therapy
Does Your Family Need Help Communicating?
Is your family struggling to find common ground or adapt to a new change? Do you wonder if you and your children are on the same page about how to express yourselves, approach adversity, and problem-solve? Are instances of ongoing conflict disrupting a sense of peace among your family?
Maybe you notice underlying tension during shared time together, or perhaps your familial relationships are strained. It could be that verbal altercations have become a dominant form of communication between you, your partner, and your children, adding to feelings of stress and hostility at home.
You may have a blended family that struggles with issues of conflict and miscommunication. Perhaps your family is still adjusting to a separation or divorce. Or maybe the merging of two families has resulted in strife between your kids and your new partner/your new partner’s children.
It’s possible that one or more of your family members has a mental health condition or behavioral setback. Symptoms of depression or anxiety—which include isolation, feelings of hopelessness, restlessness, irritability, and anger—may impact individuals within your family and your family as a whole. Perhaps you’re in search of solutions that will bring about a sense of camaraderie and mutual support.
Ongoing family conflict can make life at home feel uncomfortable and frustrating. All you want is to figure out a way to get your children to understand your perspective—and they likely wish they could be better seen and understood by you. However, in family therapy, you can learn to identify one another’s strengths and communicate effectively so that you can start to feel like a close-knit unit again.
Every Family Experiences Hardship And Disconnect From Time To Time
As individuals with unique wants, needs, and communication styles, it makes sense that we do not always connect on the same level with certain members of our family. This work isn’t easy; it requires a lot of trial and error to reach a cohesive family dynamic—and even the most cooperative families among us experience their fair share of challenges.
Moreover, many external factors influence what happens at home. Between demanding schedules, the typical growing pains of childhood and adolescence, and navigating daily crises both big and small, the stress of it all can really wear us down. Adding instances of separation, divorce, or other forms of loss to the mix creates the perfect recipe for tension and misunderstanding.
What often happens within our families, however, is that certain patterns become established and ingrained. Living inside a particular family system, we can struggle to see and identify the patterns holding us back—ultimately repeating the same disruptive cycle of conflict and tension. Instead of understanding what’s at the core of the conflict between our family members, we often treat the symptom rather than the cause.
In therapy, we can work together to uncover the root of conflict and establish new and healthier patterns in your family. By developing a new understanding of one another, you have the chance to bridge the gap that’s keeping you disconnected.
Therapy Allows You To Join Your Family And Work Together To Tackle Problems
When you’re caught up in a cycle of tension and misunderstanding, it can be hard to feel like your family will ever get on the same page about how to communicate and solve problems. But working with a skilled family therapist can help create a sense of togetherness, trust, and mutual understanding.
Family therapy begins with an initial intake session, during which your family will come together, discuss presenting problems, and establish goals for counseling. This process usually spans one to two sessions, giving each individual in your family a chance to ask questions and share their perspective on your family’s unique situation and ensuring that every one of you has an opportunity to feel seen and heard in therapy.
From there, therapy sessions will be designed to provide each family member with adaptive ways of communicating and demonstrating care for loved ones. Your therapist will work to understand and clarify each family member’s unique strengths and needs so that a more cohesive dynamic can be created.
At SafeSpace, our therapist, Deborah, is a solution-focused and committed to customizing therapy to fit the needs of each family. In doing so, we often draw from a systems approach that works to understand how certain patterns and beliefs originated within each family and developed throughout subsequent generations. This kind of approach allows individual members of a family to identify shared experiences and find common ground.
In addition, she often uses many other methods, including Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) and Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT), to target harmful reactions and thinking patterns. We will also teach mindfulness practices to help identify emotional responses and reduce internal conflict. And a strengths-based approach is likely to give each member of your family a chance to feel empowered and capable of affecting positive change within the unit as a whole.
With new awareness and perspective, your family can better understand what triggers conflict and how to engage in healthy communication and discussions. As a parent, you can feel more confident and capable of setting boundaries, while your children can experience more appreciation and validation as valuable members of your family unit.
It is possible to bridge the gap of disconnect within your family and recapture a sense of togetherness. In therapy, your family can reach a deeper awareness of one another’s strengths and needs—paving the way for harmony at home.
Parenting is hard work, and Deborah knows that your family’s challenges are not because of a single misstep you made. You weren’t equipped with a handbook or blueprint for how your family would function; it takes lived experience and learning from your mistakes to understand what your family needs to thrive.
As a therapist, Deborah is not here to place blame on you for your family’s challenges. Instead, she aims to support you, providing you with the tools and awareness you need to communicate more effectively.
All families struggle with unique obstacles. Finding a sense of harmony is a process. But when issues of blended families, co-parenting, individual mental health conditions, and other challenges accumulate, it can really exacerbate the need for family therapy.
Counseling gives you a chance to clarify your family’s problems and develop effective solutions based on your individual strengths. Working with a therapist can give you a sense of how typical these issues truly are.
It’s normal for children to test boundaries and act out from time to time. Family therapy can help with these issues in particular because it teaches everyone involved how to communicate more effectively.
While individual counseling can target specific problems and behaviors, family therapy can establish shared goals and create a sense of cohesion among the group. That way, you are learning alongside your children how to create appropriate boundaries, engage in healthy and affirming behaviors, and play to unique strengths when identifying solutions to ongoing problems.
You Can Re-Establish A Sense Of Common Ground
If you and your children struggle to get on the same page, family therapy at SafeSpace can help you work together toward shared goals. To schedule an intake or to learn more about how our therapists can help your family, please fill out a contact form or call (630) 551-8602.