Marriage and Family Counseling

There are many choices a marriage and family therapist can make in helping clients moving towards more satisfying relationships.  It is important to have an accurate assessment of family functioning and communication processes.  In so doing, an evaluation of how the family has coped with past developmental milestones can be helpful to determine if unresolved grief or unspoken emotion reactions are affecting current interactions. 

Patterns of communication can be formed by on the partners' experience in their family of origin's cultural influences.  This can affect each others expectations, as well as how  problem solving is approached.  If the differences in backgrounds has been unnoticed, invalidation and a lack of recognition of each other's strengths and contribution can occur.  In addition, a sense of isolation can emerge if the communication is not open and clear. 

Most people are not taught how to listen in their families.  If listening skills are not employed during conflict resolution, the conflict can increase and be experienced as unmanageable.  As a family therapist, I focus on how the communication processes might influence family members connectedness, and the work towards helping the family members use their strengths to learn new ways of relating to increase clarity of expectations and torecognize the positive elemnents of relating within the family.  In the process, clarifying family expectations and helping to increase consistency of follow through canhelp the family transactions become more transparent and more cooperative. 

As the family members express their feelings, needs and wants more clearly, then new opportunities for recognizing each others contributions and strengths can happen.  Problem solving techniques can be applied to help turn obstacles into oppotunities.  Communication can also to an increase in validation and well being and belonging within the family.