Tuesday, August 20, 2013

What A Marriage And Family Therapist Does

By Essie Craft


It is actually very common to have families with a lot of deep rooted problems that cannot be solved just by sitting on the dining table and talking. Sometimes, there are problems that are so bad because of their nature that an objective third party may have to step in to help these families. Now this third party person is known as a marriage and family therapist and he would specialize in fixing problems in this type of area.

Of course if one would want to go into this sort of field, then it is very important that he would have to undergo formal education first. First of all, he would be needing a degree in psychology or any similar course. After that, he would be needing a masters degree also in that field and then he may proceed to take the exam so that he may receive his license to become an official counsellor.

The mental preparation of therapists is extremely important because they will be handling problems all day and some problems may be so bad that it may even break the heart of the therapist. That is why it is very important for him to have a very strong mind and personality in order to be able to take these things. If he does not, he will become too attached to the clients and will be involved in their problems as well.

Now these specialists are actually very different from traditional counsellors with regard to their approach to the client. Traditional therapists would want to take each family member as an individual person and deal with the problems of each one. From the internal problems, the external ones will be able to be fixed from there.

The specialists on the other hand, would approach the family as a collective unit. This would mean that he would be approaching them as a single entity and fix the problem at the core. What he would do is that he would focus on the main problem of the unit and then work from that part in order to make each individual more sensitive to the others.

Now before taking a look at the solution of the client, one must first be able to find out the main underlying problem that each party has with each other. Since a lot of clients do not respond well to dialogues at the start, one must prepare some written assessment methods. This may include some questionnaires, surveys, or probably even some written activities for the parties to do.

As far as the treatment goes, there are a lot of possible ways to be able to help with the problem of the parties. Basically, the goal with the treatment is to make sure that all of the parties are going to communicate with each other. Journal writing, communication exercises, written exercises and other activities are some of the most commonly used methods.

So for those who are interested in becoming a marriage and family therapist, these are some of the things to do. Now there is one very important quality to have. One must never be judgmental or pushy otherwise the client will never open up.




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