What is family therapy? In general, it’s a form of psychotherapy that helps a client resolve issues with close family members who are also invited to participate in therapy sessions with their troubled loved one and a therapist.
More than helping family members provide the support that their loved one needs to overcome their diagnosed issue; it can help the entire family communicate better and therefore maintain better conflict resolution habits. Are you looking for family therapy services in Florida? Contact Gulf Breeze Recovery Center today by calling 833.551.2304 or contacting our team online.
What Is Family Therapy?
Family therapy is a type of psychotherapy that’s designed to help with issues that specifically affect family dynamics and functioning. Family therapy activities may aid in trust-building, improving communications, and even resolving long-standing issues. Family therapy sessions can be offered by themselves. Still, it’s often part of more comprehensive treatment programs for mental health disorders, such as substance use disorders (SUDs), anxiety disorders, or clinical depression. Family therapy normally comes up when a family member is undergoing one of these comprehensive treatment programs, and their loved ones are invited to participate in therapy sessions with them and a therapist.
Some of the primary goals of family therapy are to create a better home environment for the client, solve family issues, and understand the unique issues that a client’s family might face.
What Are Some Common Family Therapy Activities?
1. Animal Identification
This activity helps family members and therapists learn more about the relationship dynamics within the family. First, the therapist instructs each family member to pick an animal that represents them based on their potential strengths and weaknesses. After this, they’re asked to do the same for each family member. The therapist then facilitates a discussion among family members for them to understand each other’s failings in fulfilling family roles.
2. Chinese Whispers
This activity is an excellent tool in family therapy for building active listening skills and responding skills. These capabilities foster positive relationships. The therapist makes family members stand in a line, then shares a sentence with the first person in line. The family members communicate the same sentence to each other going down the line, whispering so others can’t hear it. In the end, the last person in line says aloud whatever is communicated to them. The result is often a garbled sentence that’s different from the one the therapist shared.
3. Draw My Family
This activity is used in family therapy by the therapist to gain insight into the current bonds that members of the family have with each other. The family members are instructed to draw their family and place their drawings of family members on the paper according to the quality of relationships they have with them.
4. Family Tree
This activity serves as a reminder that every family member is a branch from the same tree. It also reminds everyone of the nature and hierarchy of their family relationships. If this activity seems too easy or not effective enough, the therapist may move on to having family members draw genograms instead. A genogram is a classification of family relationships based on the types of bonding among specific family members. Different symbols and colors can be used to connect family members that have good relationships with each other.
5. Feelings Jenga
This activity uses blocks with customized labels — for example, “things we like in a family” or “things we don’t like in a family” — while the entire family plays a game of Jenga with them. With the removal of blocks from the Jenga tower, the family discusses what’s on each block label as the therapist facilitates the conversation.
When Should You Consider Family Therapy Services?
Family therapy can help with many different issues, such as the following:
- Behavioral problems in children or teens
- Communication problems
- Death of a loved one
- Divorce, separation, or marital problems
- Parent-child conflicts
- Problems between siblings
- Parenting issues
- Shared trauma
- Stressful events or major life transitions
This type of therapy can also address mental health problems of family members that can affect the entire family — such as SUDs, eating disorders, anxiety disorders, chronic illnesses, or clinical depression.
Learn More About Gulf Breeze Recovery Center’s Family Therapy Services
If you’re searching for family therapy services in Florida, contact Gulf Breeze Recovery Center today. Call 833.551.2304 or reach out to our team online. We can help.
