Family Therapy:

Life at home with your family should be a happy, healthy, and safe environment. Families of all types and economic statuses can experience challenges that affect family dynamics. Family therapy can assist in strengthen the family unit by building healthy boundaries, learning effective communication, developing individualization, and learning effective parenting skills. The process of therapy is not to blame, shame, or identify one person as the problem. Rather, therapy allows the whole family to work together to address and provide solutions with resources and strengths that already exist and to develop additional skills to promote family unity.

While divorce can often be difficult, especially when children are involved, it does not have to be. Therapy can allow the development of healthy co-parenting communication, consistency, structure, and understanding. The goal is to allow the children to experience two loving environments where they feel supported and loved.

Loss, grief and family transitions (such as death of a family member or a child going to college) can impact family relationships. Therapy assist the family in moving through these transitions with hope, healing, and understanding. Sometimes families will be conflicted during estate concerns, custody determinations, or have agency involvement such as CPS or Family Court. Therapy can address these concerns and assist the family in mediating what is best for the family or processing their concerns in family therapy sessions.

The purpose of family therapy is to build on each person’s strengths and contributions with a goal to establish a loving, safe, and supportive family relationship. Common concerns addressed in family therapy are listed below:

• Divorce and co-parenting
• Co-dependency and effects on family dynamics/relationships
• Conflict between children and step-parents/ significant romantic partners
• Lack of Communication between family members
• Conflict among parents and adolescent children
• Poor school/work performance and instability
• Parenting skills – Inability to manage children’s behavior effectively
• Addiction within the family and family interventions
• Domestic violence and the family
• Mental health and family functioning
• Court /CPS order family therapy – CPS involvement
• Adoption and Foster care
• Family mediation
• Grandparents raising their grandchildren
• Children parenting their parents
• Death of a family member
• Conflict settling estate concerns