Parenting and Child Raising

What is the purpose of therapy?

When people are troubled with painful life situations, therapy can be a way to either view those situations differently or to change the way one handles them. Most importantly, therapy is an opportunity to be really listened to and understood.

What is parenting therapy or counseling?

Family therapists help parents with their parenting skills. They believe that troubles show up in the way people relate to one another: The relationship is the focus of therapy. Some family therapists go with the current and insist on pathologizing problems: Since the problem is in the relationship, that relationship must be "dysfunctional." I don't see it that way. To me, neither individuals nor relationships are "sick." I believe people want to behave wholesomely and do the best they can given their own history ("baggage"), current situation, stresses, and support--in short, their context. What appears to be dysfunctional behavior always makes sense to me given this very important context.

How are therapy goals set?

The client decides what is wrong and what is to be accomplished. I do not take advantage of my expertise to direct therapy. My job is to offer the insights of a stranger looking somewhat objectively at you and your family. But you know your life, your desires, and your pain better than I could. When I'm working with families, I do take into account the child's or the adolescent's feelings; however, the main goal for therapy is set by the parents.

But what if the parents and the child have different goals?

Actually, I have found again and again that both parents and children want to get along; they want to be loved; they want approval; they want peace and harmony. These are overriding goals that eveyone in a family wants. The path to get there may require that children do their chores and homework and be polite and respectful. In a positive atmosphere, children are happy to do all of that. So, it turns out that the goals are not different at all. Rather, the parents need the skill--and the strength--to implement the ideas that the counselor suggests for good parenting. A good therapist will be sympathetic to these challenges faced by parents and will empower them to use the tools well.

What is the therapist's job?

The therapist helps clients meet their goals. She (or he) helps clients discover their own inner resources and use these resources as the basis for new solutions. The art of therapy is to notice themes and patterns, see things from a different angle, remember seemingly unrelated events that may be important, and generally bring in her own life experience and wisdom to add a new perspective to the one the client already has.

This approach sounds different from psychiatry, psychology, and social work. Is it?

Psychiatry, psychology, and social work are based on the idea that someone is sick and requires treatment. Therapists who do not focus on pathology see symptoms as a result of people's struggles to cope with difficulties--which is the human experience. This is particularly important in working with families. It's very convenient to blame the child for being spoiled--but who spoiled her? (Thank you for your honesty ;-) It makes more sense for the therapist to (a) gain the cooperation of the child in the process, (b) give the parents the correct tools to make a difference, and (c) empower the parents to use their tools.

Regardless of what you say about everyone being normal and just struggling, our family really has one very sick member. The rest of us are fine. Don't you believe there is such a thing as mental illness?

There have been many studies that find some people do have different brain chemistry. But no one knows what caused that. It is a chicken-and-egg kind of thing. Did it come from the genes? Or, did the emotional behavior of family members get copied by that individual thus causing different brain chemicals to be secreted? Or maybe the so-called sick person reacted to something painful in the family with poor coping skills. Which came first? The fact that some Medication sometimes work in conjunction with therapy does not prove anything. If tylenol works for a headache, it doesn't mean I was born with that headache!

If we have someone in the family whose behavior is intolerable, should we all come in for sessions?

I would like to see all of you, at least the first time. Then we can play it by ear.

How long should therapy take?

Children are much faster learners than adults and very resilient, I've found. All they want is to be loved, respected, disciplined lovingly, and listened to. If you can do that, you're in and out in one to five visits. Your child(ren) will most likely respond very well whether the problem is depression, hyperactivity, disrespect, uncontrollable behavior, grief, trauma, or even drugs (depending on how long he or she has abused them).

Parents do often have difficulties meeting their children's needs for love, discipline, and respect because they themselves were not given these things. This is understandable--how can a person give something when she or he doesn't really know what it is or how to give it? In that case, the therapy can end up centering on the parent's needs for a while, so it can take some time.

When do you see the child or teenager alone?

Family therapists see people individually all the time.

However, it is important to know that studies have shown that often people with a variety of mental health concerns have significantly better improvement when addressed in the family context. Here is a partial list that will surprise you of some things that seem individual but often improve more rapidly in a family context: depression, anorexia, addiction, cigarette smoking.

It doesn't take much to really, really hurt a child--just yelling will do a great deal of damage over time. So when a child has been deeply hurt and feels hopeless about being able to be happy again, I will see teens alone in order to (a) give them hope, (b) give them belief in themselves, (c) help them deal with their parents in a respectful but assertive way, (d) help them to set goals.

Sometimes, I also need to be alone with the adolescent or child to assess whether there may be other difficulties such as ADD and academic areas that need to be addressed. Usually, however, this sort of assessment can be done when the family history is taken.

I live on the other side of the country (world). But I like your approach. Can we work together?

Yes, we can do family therapy by phone or online. My phone system has the capability to call multiple numbers.

Read about the parenting book

Read what other people say about counseling with DrDeb.

Call for an appointment

Still not sure where to look? There are over a hundred articles that I wrote on this site.