The family unit is one of the strongest relationships you’ll find. However, even the most tight-knit family can experience problems in communication. Sometimes, those problems last a long time, and hurdles seem insurmountable due to the close proximity and familiarity of family members. It may take a professional to get you all back on track to result in more peaceful home life.
That’s where family therapy comes in.
What is Family Therapy?
A form of psychotherapy, family therapy is designed to reduce distress and conflict through the improvement of interactions between family members. Usually, it’s best to have all family members who are affected by the problem in one room; however, this isn’t always feasible. What sets family therapy apart from individual counseling lies in the perspective or framework, not necessarily how many people are present in the session.
Family counseling looks at problems as patterns or systems that need to be adjusted, rather than focusing on one person’s sole role in the problem. This is why it’s often referred to as “strengths-based treatment.” Strong family relationships play a critical in the overall mental health of each family member. This method can be effective in helping family members adjust to another family member’s struggle with an addiction, medical issue or mental health diagnosis, for example. It can also be used to improve communication and reduce conflict.
Common Reasons for Family Therapy
There are many reasons that may prompt you to seek family therapy, including:
- If your child is having a problem with school, substance abuse or an eating disorder.
- If a major trauma or change has impacted the entire family, such as moving, a natural disaster, or incarceration of a sibling or parent.
- The unexpected or traumatic loss of a family member.
- Adjustment to a new family member in the home, such as the birth of a sibling or grandparent moving in.
- Domestic violence
- Divorce
- Parental conflict
Family therapy is a specialized skill set, so if you are in need of this type of therapy, it’s important to choose a mental health professional who has the training and credentials that uniquely qualify them to perform this kind of counseling.
Goals of Family Therapy
Family therapy can be helpful to all family members on many different levels. Family therapy sessions can help:
- Develop and maintain healthy boundaries
- Facilitate cohesion and communication
- Promote problem-solving by a better understanding of family dynamics
- Build empathy and understanding
- Reduce conflict within the family
Contact Comprehensive MedPsych Systems
We offer family therapy services here at Comprehensive MedPsych Systems. A therapist will meet with several members of your family to help you all more thoroughly understand others’ thoughts, motivations, behaviors, and feelings. Therapy is designed to improve communication and increase effective behavior choices, ultimately helping the family unit to function better. To book your appointment, contact us at 941-363-0878 or fill out our online form.
Overview
Family therapy is a type of psychological counseling (psychotherapy) that can help family members improve communication and resolve conflicts.
Family therapy is usually provided by a psychologist, clinical social worker or licensed therapist. These therapists have graduate or postgraduate degrees and may be credentialed by the American Association for Marriage and Family Therapy (AAMFT).
Family therapy is often short term. It may include all family members or just those able or willing to participate. Your specific treatment plan will depend on your family’s situation. Family therapy sessions can teach you skills to deepen family connections and get through stressful times, even after you’re done going to therapy sessions.
Why it’s done
Family therapy can help you improve troubled relationships with your partner, children or other family members. You may address specific issues such as marital or financial problems, conflict between parents and children, or the impact of substance abuse or a mental illness on the entire family.
Your family may pursue family therapy along with other types of mental health treatment, especially if one of you has a mental illness or addiction that also requires additional therapy or rehabilitation treatment. For example:
- Family therapy can help family members cope if a relative has a serious mental illness such as schizophrenia — but the person who has schizophrenia should continue with his or her individualized treatment plan, which may include medications, one-on-one therapy or other treatment.
- In the case of addiction, the family can attend family therapy while the person who has an addiction participates in residential treatment. Sometimes the family may participate in family therapy even if the person with an addiction hasn’t sought out his or her own treatment.
Family therapy can be useful in any family situation that causes stress, grief, anger or conflict. It can help you and your family members understand one another better and learn coping skills to bring you closer together.
How you prepare
You can ask your doctor or other primary care provider for a referral to a therapist. Family members or friends may give recommendations based on their experiences. You also can ask your employee assistance program, clergy, or state or local mental health agencies for suggestions for therapists.
Before scheduling sessions with a therapist, consider whether the therapist would be a good fit for your family. Here are some factors to consider and questions to ask:
- Education and experience. What is your educational and training background? Are you licensed by the state? Are you accredited by the AAMFT or other professional organizations? Do you have specialty training in family psychotherapy? What is your experience with my family’s type of problem?
- Location and availability. Where is your office? What are your office hours? Are you available in case of emergency?
- Length and number of sessions. How long is each session? How often are sessions scheduled? How many sessions should I expect to have?
- Fees and insurance. How much do you charge for each session? Are your services covered by my health insurance plan? Will I need to pay the full fee upfront? What is your policy on canceled sessions?
What you can expect
Family therapy typically brings several family members together for therapy sessions. However, a family member may also see a family therapist individually.
Sessions typically take about 50 minutes to an hour. Family therapy is often short term — generally about 12 sessions. However, how often you meet and the number of sessions you’ll need will depend on your family’s particular situation and the therapist’s recommendation.
During family therapy, you can:
- Examine your family’s ability to solve problems and express thoughts and emotions in a productive manner
- Explore family roles, rules and behavior patterns to identify issues that contribute to conflict — and ways to work through these issues
- Identify your family’s strengths, such as caring for one another, and weaknesses, such as difficulty confiding in one another
Example: Depression
Say that your adult son has depression. Your family doesn’t understand his depression or how best to offer support. Although you’re worried about your son’s well-being, conversations with your son or other family members erupt into arguments and you feel frustrated and angry. Communication diminishes, decisions go unmade, family members avoid each other and the rift grows wider.
In such a situation, family therapy can help you:
- Pinpoint your specific challenges and how your family is handling them
- Learn new ways to interact and overcome unhealthy patterns of relating to each other
- Set individual and family goals and work on ways to achieve them
Results
Family therapy doesn’t automatically solve family conflicts or make an unpleasant situation go away. But it can help you and your family members understand one another better, and it can provide skills to cope with challenging situations in a more effective way. It may also help the family achieve a sense of togetherness.
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At one time, the word “family” meant people related by blood, marriage, or adoption. Today the definition embraces the many close relationships that form the foundations of your life — whether you share DNA or a legal connection.
Because these relationships are so important to your physical and mental health, family therapy may be helpful in many situations that affect family relationships and dynamics.
Some examples include situations where you or someone you love is grappling with:
- financial problems
- marital issues
- communication breakdown
- conflict over one or more issues
- a big life transition
- a serious illness
- a mental health condition
- a substance use disorder
Here’s a look at what family therapy is, the techniques that are used, and what to expect if you decide to try family therapy.
What is family therapy?
The phrase “family therapy” implies that the members of a family seek counseling together as a group.
Though it helps if everyone in the family participates, family therapy doesn’t necessarily mean that your whole family must be involved.
It means that the therapy focuses on family interactions and dynamics.
Family therapy is generally short-term and focuses on specific goals. It explores the patterns, conflicts, and ways of communicating in your family system.
Family therapy may benefit you and your family by:
- improving communication skills
- providing skills for coping with challenging situations
- offering new insight and understanding
- identifying problem areas within the family
- providing strategies for handling conflict
- improving and strengthening relationships
Family therapy may be guided by one of the following evidence-based treatment approaches, or your therapist may blend elements from several different approaches.
Family therapy approaches
Let’s take a closer look at the approaches most often used with family therapy.
Systemic family therapy
This therapy approach considers the family as a unit, in which each member’s actions affect the other people in the family and affect the family as a whole.
Therapy is aimed at understanding family processes, how they influence people, and how they change over time — with the goal of improving family interactions.
Structural family therapy
Developed by Salvador Minuchin in the 1960s, structural family therapy is based on the idea that emotional and behavioral concerns in children and teens are often connected to dysfunctional family structures.
Treatment focuses on understanding boundaries and subsystems within a family so that everyone can interact in more productive ways.
It also focuses on developing appropriate boundaries and strengthening the relationships among the family members.
Brief strategic family therapy
This approach to therapy is generally limited to around 12 sessions. The goal is to identify and restructure the family interactions that lead to the problematic behavior of a child, teen, or young adult.
The therapist will probably focus on strengthening positive patterns and making changes to family behaviors that aren’t helpful for a young person in crisis.
The therapist will also likely assign homework to assess and adjust the ways in which the family communicates.
Psychoeducation
Family therapy often includes opportunities to learn more about mental health conditions that are affecting family relationships, along with evidence-based treatments for these conditions.
One small 2018 study showed that educating a family improves the way the whole family functions.
An older 2006 study found that when families better understand mental health conditions and are better able to support each other, people with mental health conditions often have a better outlook, including fewer relapses.
What can you expect from a family therapy session?
Family therapies often share certain goals. These usually include:
- exploring how family members interact with one another
- identifying and improving any unhealthy communication patterns in the family system
- marshalling the family’s strengths and resources
- equipping the family with better problem-solving skills
Although each therapist has an individual style, here’s a basic idea of what family therapy could look like:
Initial intake
During the first meeting, you and your therapist will likely discuss the issue that brought you and your family members to therapy.
Your therapist will give each person an opportunity to talk about what they think are the main problems they or the family is facing and why.
Assessment
For the next several sessions, your therapist will probably gather information from you to build up a picture of your family and how it works, including:
- your family history
- family roles
- parenting and discipline approaches
- coping skills your family has used
Your therapist will form an understanding of the crises your family weathered and how you dealt with them together and as individuals.
Your therapist may ask you to think and write about who has power in your family and how decisions are made.
If your therapist takes a strategic approach to family therapy, you may discuss how the problem that brought you to therapy serves a specific function in your family.
If your family used certain coping skills, you may be asked to think and talk about whether those strategies still work.
Mapping the family structure
If your therapist uses a structural approach, the next step might involve the therapist creating a map that explains your family’s hierarchy.
The map may help describe how authority and boundaries work in your family, including the ways that they may be changing over time.
Creating a treatment plan
Family therapists are generally more interested in solving problems than in assigning blame for them.
Working together, you and your therapist will likely discuss a plan that outlines what you — and any members of your family participating in therapy — can do to change unhealthy communication and problem-solving.
Your treatment plan may also involve looking at ways to boost your family’s special strengths.
Education and training of family therapists
Family therapy is generally provided by a mental health professional who has been specially trained in psychotherapy for couples or family systems.
Generally, family therapists have advanced degrees (master’s degree or PhD) in a mental health field focused on marriage and family therapy.
To become state-licensed, marriage and family therapists must complete a supervised clinical fellowship (usually 2 years).
Therapists who have a master’s degree must also complete a licensure exam conducted by the Association of Marital and Family Therapy Regulatory Boards.
On the other hand, the licensing exam for therapists with PhDs is conducted by the Association of State and Provincial Psychology Boards.
How to find the right therapist for your family
Finding the right therapist for you and your family is important for the success of your therapy. It’s OK to take your time, ask questions, check credentials, and even “interview” therapists to find a good fit.
Here are some things to consider:
- Is the therapist licensed in your state?
- Does the therapist have experience treating families with similar issues?
- Do you feel heard and supported in therapy sessions?
- If you have health insurance, is this therapist in your network?
- How close to your home or work is the therapist’s office?
- Does the therapist offer virtual mental health services?
You may be able to find a marriage and family therapist through the American Association for Marriage and Family Therapy.
About cost and insurance
Most individual, small group, and employer-provided health insurance plans offer mental health coverage.
If you have questions about whether your family therapist is an approved provider, you can speak with your plan administrator or contact your insurance provider directly.
Medicaid and Medicare plans also offer mental health coverage. If you’re covered under Medicaid, you can reach out to the Medicaid office in your state to get a better understanding of the guidelines for family therapy.
If you have original Medicare (Part A and Part B), you can contact Medicare to find out whether your family therapist is a Medicare-approved provider.
If you have Medicare Part C (Medicare Advantage), you’ll need to speak with your insurance provider for coverage details.
If you don’t have insurance coverage, you may be able to locate low cost family therapy in your area through the following resources:
- PsychCentral
- GoodTherapy.org
- Open Path Psychotherapy Collective
Additionally, the National Alliance on Mental Illness and MentalHealth.gov both maintain lists of community mental health clinics that may offer free family therapy services near you.
The bottom line
Family therapy is a type of psychotherapy that focuses on family dynamics and building healthier interactions within family systems. It can be especially helpful if you or someone in your family has:
- relationship or financial issues
- marital problems
- a substance use disorder
- a mental health condition
Working with your therapist, you and your family members can identify patterns that may be problematic by exploring your family’s problem-solving skills, boundaries, authority structures, and communication habits.
Your therapist will then work with you on creating a plan that improves communication and problem-solving skills for your family.
Family therapy won’t necessarily resolve every conflict you and your family encounter, but it may help you develop healthier coping skills and more productive ways of communicating with each other.
