Family Interview

Family Interview

Family counseling helps promote healthier relationships within the system, though communication skills, understanding, and altering negative behaviors. In counseling, this has been a topic of interest due to the desire to assist individuals improve his/her marriage, family, and relationship. However, it is apparent the level of skills a counselor may need to master in order to be an effective counselor. The MFT course gave the opportunity to get firsthand experience in facilitating family counseling, apply learned therapeutic techniques, and utilize basic counseling skills with not just one individual but with a family system. This paper will discuss this writer's the counseling session, techniques applied, and experience.

Counseling Session

To initiate the session the family stated why they entered therapy and how they would know the therapy is working? The family began by addressing a recurrent conflict that is taking place between step-father and step-daughter. The therapist proceeded to use solution-focused therapy and followed with "What needs to happen today so when you leave you'll think 'This was a good session?" The family was able to conclude that the step-daughter would like to feel a part of the family and be accepted by her step-father. As the initial session progressed, the therapist found negative behaviors made by the step-father that lead the step-daughter to "act out." Throughout the thirty minute session, the family discussed strengths within the family, which kept the family engaged and motivated to change problematic behaviors.

Techniques Applied

Solution-focused therapy focuses on the solution to the problem, rather than the problem itself. Some techniques that were implemented in the counseling session were: miracle, scale, and coping questioning. For instance, when the family disclosed of the problematic situation the therapist asks the following question: "If you were to wake up tomorrow, and a miracle happened where you no longer treat your step-daughter different than your other children, what would that look like?" This method of counseling entails altering negative thinking to constructive, which the family reacted very positively and optimistic. In addition,

Experience

Family counseling was definitely challenging, in the way that the therapist must keep all members engaged and to come up with the same goal. Conducting a thirty minute family counseling session was a little overwhelming, since every member of the family seems to talk over each other. The therapist must keep control of the session and slowing down the member in order for the therapist to stay on track. The length of time seemed to go by fast, since there was so much interaction in the session. This write found that when the therapeutic questions were asked, the members were able to slow down think about the question before answered, which helped the process.

During the session, this writer felt overwhelmed and incapable of keeping control. For instance, when the step-father was discussing his behavior toward the step-daughter, the mother began to speak out causing a triangulation, in addition to the step-daughter speaking over both parents to get her point across. This writer had a difficult