Family Therapy
All families are unique and are comprised of a variety of different members and their own respective personalities, opinions and emotions. Families can be traditional, non traditional, biological or not! Regardless of who your family is made up of, family is important to many, and with that, it’s important to foster healthy, meaningful relationships with family members, which is often easier said than done. We’re here to help families achieve more peace, respect, and fulfillment and get on track to Bounce Back.
Who is family therapy for?
What issues can family therapy support with?
Communication Issues
Are you struggling to feel heard within your family? Is there an estranged member in your family you are hoping to reconnect with? Perhaps a member of your family is having difficulties opening up and communicating effectively. We’ll help your family establish healthier communication techniques and habits to ensure all members feel heard and respected.
Mental Health Support
Conflict Resolution
Conflict is often unavoidable within families, however unhealthy conflict resolution skills can lead to significant problems and relationship breakdowns. In family therapy, we work to establish healthier conflict resolution skills. Where applicable, we’ll explore deeper rooted issues, past hurts and underlying concerns in order to help the family move forward, leaving past issues behind.
Changes & Life Transitions
In a lifetime, families go through many changes. Whether its a relationship breakdown or divorce, a new child in the family, a recent loss or big change or transition, sometimes it’s difficult to adjust as a family unit. We work with the family unit to help all members work towards successful adjustment to new changes.
What happens in a family therapy session?
Every family is different and will be receptive to different approaches. Rest assured, depending on your family and your unique needs, our family therapists will tailor the work they do to the suit your family. Here are some of the things you can expect in a family session:
Talking together is a great way for the family to build rapport with the therapist and to allow each individual to have a space to be heard. Ensuring that each family member gets to speak, our family therapists offer a judgement free, safe and inclusive space for family members to talk.
For families with young children, our therapists may engage them in play and other fun activities in order to effectively incorporate them into the process and explore healing in a format that works for them.
Your family therapist at times might provide psychoeducation on new skills to target unhelpful patterns in your family relationships. The therapy session is an optimal time to practice these new skills with the help and guidance of your therapist.
Your therapist will work with the family to identify the problems and set collaborative goals for therapy. We work to get everyone involved in establishing creative and effective solutions to the problems you’re facing. In stead off ‘telling,’ we work alongside the family to discover new alternatives and solutions.
Members of the family work to determine what their own boundaries and limits are, and how they can respect one another’s boundaries.
Together with your therapist, you’ll learn how to more effectively communicate with one another and how to understand your family members communication styles. New communication skills will help to avoid confilct & furthering problems.
Navigate the most difficult conflicts in your familial relationships in a save, secure and judgement-free environment.
What are some strategies to help support my family?
Speaker Listener Activity
Many families struggle with communication and that’s no surprise! The speaker listener activity aims to allow each family member the opportunity to genuinely express their thoughts and GENUINELY listen to understand as opposed to argue. Once a week, spend time engaging in the speaker-listener activity. One family member speaks calmly and kindly about a topic on their mind, while the listeners are not allowed to speak until the speaker is fully finished talking. The listeners goal is three things
1) listen to understand (not respond)
2) find something to validate and empathize with and communicate that back to the family member
3) take responsibility for something that your family member communicated. Then, reverse roles!
We recommend starting with low conflict topics in the beginning!
Quality Time
Helping families navigate conflict, concerns, past traumas and built up tension can be difficult. When families take time to rebuild friendships and create new, positive memories together, this offers a strong foundation to support the therapeutic process. We recommend finding mutual activities that the family enjoys, set some ‘guidelines’ or boundaries together, then start making new memories together! We recommend you start small!
Family on the Bounce Back Blog
Transitions: The Parenting Edition
How Creating Space Can Improve Our Well-being
Healthy Holiday Boundaries –
Are you ready to begin family therapy with Rebound Total Health?