Novice Health - Family Therapy

 What is Family Therapy?

Family therapy is also known as couple therapy, or family systems therapy. It is a branch of physiotherapy, working with whole families as well as couples to help change and nurture their development together. Having the family members directly involved in the therapy session has proven to be highly beneficial, whether or not the family considers their problems individual or family oriented. The therapist uses the family members' own conversations to draw individual strengths, intelligence, and support out into the open by way of helping direct and influence the talks. Almost every type of psychological problem in both individuals and relationships have been approached using family therapy at one point or another.

Some family therapy techniques include communication, which in the sessions would include exploring different methods of which; psychoeducation, which would help family members with anxiety, high stress, depression, or eating disorders; psychotherapy, which would strengthen a person's self-esteem or reasons for living; relationship education, which is done mainly for married and almost-married couples, giving them the principles of maintaining a healthy intimate relationship emotionally; systemic coaching, which would help find a solution to a psychological problem by way of a person's individual goals and interests; systems theory, which method helps the individual's self-esteem by way of showing him his place in the grand scheme of the universe; and reality theory, which is a step-by-step problem solving technique that discovers the individual's dreams and helps him obtain that dream through practically observing his life as it now stands.

The therapy sessions vary in amount depending on the particular situation, but typically, they are no fewer than 5 and no more than 20. The family therapist will meet a few family members at once, which allows the therapist to observe and note specific patterns of interaction between certain members, which interaction methods can be used in the therapists later conversations and examples. The therapist will be on the lookout for habits among the family members that mirror the home life, and he will take note of patterns rather than impulses. Above all, the therapist will focus on interaction, not individuals, because his main goal is to solve a relationship problem rather than simply identifying a cause of certain behavior. It is only common sense that the therapist must identify the problem before seeking to solve it. But instead of trying to draw a possible answer to the problem out of the individual, the therapist will seek to discover the solution through encouraging the family members to work together.