The family therapist Virginia Satir believed that people could develop self-worth from within a nurturing family. A healthy family, she stated, is “an atmosphere where individual differences are appreciated, mistakes are tolerated, communication is open, and rules are flexible.” But families don’t always meet that standard. Family members can have misunderstandings, squabbles, and even conflicts that result in long-standing grudges or estrangements. But love is what keeps people trying to heal rifts and improve communication. And love is what brings families to therapy when they’re having trouble managing stress on their own.
Marriage and family therapy at Thriveworks in Tigard, OR helps family members see problems from everyone’s perspective and work toward practical solutions on which everyone can agree. Marriage and family therapists (MFTs) at Thriveworks are all fully licensed, highly qualified, and experienced. They bring compassion and expertise to therapy sessions, helping to enhance family relationships one discussion or exercise at a time.
How Does Family Counseling Help?
There’s no limit to what family counseling can help with, whether problems are acute or mild, short-term or chronic. For example, the exceptional counselors at Thriveworks in Tigard, OR have the skills and insight to address the following within families:
- Behavioral problems
- Addiction issues
- Estrangements and enduring grudges
- Blended family transitions
- Intergenerational family issues
- LGBTQ issues
- Interracial issues
- Mental health conditions like depression and anxiety
- Financial stress
- Marital conflicts
Family counseling can explore how individual issues can affect the family as a whole. For example, a parent’s addiction can have a broad impact on every family member. A family therapist can also find areas where someone can benefit from individual therapy with another Thriveworks mental health professional like a social worker or a psychiatrist.
How Does Family Therapy Work?
Family therapy works by getting all–or at least the relevant–family members together in one room or in one secure video conference (in the case of online counseling). Then the therapist acts as a facilitator to encourage open dialogue in a safe, comfortable environment. During family therapy sessions at Thriveworks in Tigard, OR, family members may address specific issues, or they may work more generally to explore elements like the following:
- Individual roles that everyone plays within the family
- The family’s implicit strengths and weaknesses
- Unspoken rules and codes of behavior
- Patterns of communication and miscommunication
- Emotional triggers
- Historical context
- Individual perspectives
Family therapists can help tease out deeper truths about family dynamics through discussion, psychoeducation, games, exercises, and icebreakers.
What’s Internal Family Systems Therapy?
Internal family systems therapy is one of the therapeutic modalities that a Thriveworks family counselor might use to reveal a family’s true nature and recognize both individual and collective strengths. It works like this: The family therapist helps each individual member of the family identify parts of their psyche that have taken on the personality of other family members. Everyone has a core Self, but they also have these sub personalities that can be wounded or exiled. It’s a helpful modality for figuring out how people can bring their innermost selves into harmony again.
Other therapeutic modalities that people might encounter at family therapy include the following:
- Structural, which considers the role each member plays in the family
- Systemic, which is rooted in family systems
- Narrative, which focuses on individuals
- Transgenerational, which looks at conflicts from a generational standpoint
- Milan, which sees the body as a system guided by natural behavior
- Strategic, which attempts to examine and redirect patterns of behavior
But family therapists don’t have to subscribe exclusively to one approach or another. Each family is different and may call for different therapy models. Depending on how effectively family members respond to treatment, a therapist may use several different techniques, or a hybrid approach.
Reinforce Your Bonds with Family Therapy at Thriveworks in Tigard, OR
Family therapists at Thriveworks in Tigard, OR help create safe environments where parents and children, grandparents and siblings, in-laws and fiance(e)s, can confront their problem areas and reinforce their strengths. It can require a lot of love and bravery to schedule family therapy, but the leap of faith is worth it. Most families can find practical, effective solutions to their issues in fewer than 12 sessions.
When you call to make your first family therapy appointment at Thriveworks in Tigard, OR, you can expect a quick turnaround. Most clients can meet with their providers within 24-48 hours of their initial call. All the mental health providers at Thriveworks are fully licensed, so they accept most major health insurance plans. They can also see clients online or in-person at the modern office, depending on what’s most comfortable and convenient for their clients. As an additional benefit, Thriveworks clients can access their counselor by phone or email between sessions.
The counselors at Thriveworks look forward to helping you and your family members!
