Hypothesis & Assessment of Different Family Counseling Hinsdale - Grace Integrated

Jun 10
16:12

2021

Individual Counseling

Individual Counseling

  • Share this article on Facebook
  • Share this article on Twitter
  • Share this article on Linkedin

Patients and their families are usually referred for counseling as some family issues arise. The Family Counseling Hinsdale therapist may be accustomed to individual sessions involving the patient but may be puzzled to approach and handle a family with a lot of information. Here is some guideline that he should follow while conducting individual sessions.

mediaimage

The assessment of therapy for family functioning and interactions take about 3 to 5 sessions involving the whole family. Each session lasts for about 45 minutes up to an hour. Different therapists take the assessment in different ways as per their style. Mentioned below are some tasks recommend for Family Counseling Hinsdale therapists to perform.

Typically,Hypothesis & Assessment of Different Family Counseling Hinsdale - Grace Integrated Articles a naive therapist should start with a three-generation genogram and then follow different life cycles and stages and family functions as mentioned below.

  1. The three-generation genogram lists out the index patient's generation and two other generations—for example, patients and grandparents as an adolescent client or parents and children as a middle-aged client. The ages and composition of family members are recorded, and transgenerational family patterns and interactions are studied to understand the family from a longitudinal and epigenetic perspective.

The therapist familiarizes himself with the family for better consultation. It renders a wide background to perceive and act as per the family situation.

  1. In the next stage, the life cycle of the index family is explored. Yeh function and specific roles of family members are delineated in each stage of the family life cycle. The index family is viewed from a developmental perspective, and the therapist tries to get a longitudinal and temporal perspective of the family.

Proper care is taken to notice how the family handles problems and transitions from one stage to another. The discipline and parenting styles of children are explored.

  1. Problem Solving: Many therapists stress this aspect of the family to notice how cohesive or adaptable the family has been. The family members are asked to talk about some stress that the family has faced, like some life events, environmental stressors, or illness. The family then describes how they handled the situation. The therapist ask “circular questions” to focus on antecedent events.
  2. The Structural Map: After completion of the injury, the therapist offers a structural map that gives a diagrammatic representation of the family system, with different sub-systems, power structure, boundaries, and relationships.
  3. The Circular Hypothesis: A systemic family hypothesis is postulated by analyzing the function and symptoms of the client and the family. These questions provide circular hypothesis:
  4. What is the client trying to convey through the symptoms?
  5. How is the family maintaining these symptoms?
  6. Why has the family come now?

Formal Contract: A brief understanding of the family homeostasis is made. The complete hypothesis is also provided sometimes in a non-critical and positive way. The Family Counseling Riverside therapist presents the treatment to the family and negotiates and plans the action they would take at the present time.

Techniques to promote family adaptation to illness

  • Heighten awareness of shifting family roles like pragmatic and emotional.
  • Increase family communication regarding the illness.
  • Facilitate some prominent family lifestyle changes.
  • Help the family to accept what they cannot control and focus on what they can.
  • Facilitate those grieving inevitable losses–of functions, dreams, and life.
  • Find meaning in illness. Help the families move beyond “Why us”?
  • Trace prior family experience of the illness by constructing a genogram.
  • Increase productive collaboration of the patients, families, healthcare team.
  • Set individual and family goals for developmental events.