The therapist's experiencing in family therapy practice

Abstract

The question posed in this article is how the therapist should deal with strong emotions she might experience in the session. This question is especially important if it concerns emotions that –at least on the surface‐ cannot be considered to contribute to a therapeutic alliance. We offer some reflections as preliminary steps towards answering this question and propose that therapists be sensitive to their own experiencing during the session, be careful to monitor the implicit invitations to join the family members in potentially destructive relational scenarios, reflect on the possible negative and perpetuating effects of her interactions with the family, and explore opportunities to proceed with the session in new and more constructive ways. In our approach the therapist's experiencing is seen as a tool that may be used to further the therapeutic process. This is consonant with the view of family therapists exploring the importance for the therapist of holding open a space of reflection, while it also fits with a dialogical approach to family therapy, in which the therapist's task may be described as listening to the stories the clients tell, and making room for other stories that have not been told before. Two case discussions illustrate our ideas.

Practice Based Evidence Based Practice. Navigating based on coordinated improvisation, collaborative learning and multi‐methods research in Feedback Informed Systemic Therapy

“…What will I do next?” and so on’ (Rober, , p. 159). The therapist is ‘careful to monitor implicit invitations to join the family members in potentially destructive relational scenarios, reflect on the possible negative and perpetuating effects of her interactions with the family, and explore opportunities to proceed with the session in new and more constructive ways’ (Rober, , p. 233).…”

Addressing the Person of the Therapist in Supervision: The Therapist's Inner Conversation Method

“…In particular, to deal with the challenge of the specificity of the therapeutic alliance in a family therapy session (Friedlander, Escudero, & Heatherington, ), they have to learn to use themselves in exploring the family members’ storied life experiences and making empathic connections with the different family members’ suffering, while having an eye on hopeful potentialities and resources. Furthermore, as Rober () writes, the therapist's experiencing and self‐reflection can be important tools to carefully monitor the implicit invitations to join the family members in potentially destructive relational scenarios, and explore opportunities to proceed with the session in more constructive ways. This has been proposed earlier by different authors (e.g., Andolfi, Angelo, & De Nichilo, ; Flaskas, ; Haber, , ).…”

A dialogical research methodology based on Buber: intersubjectivity in the research interview

“…All interviews were professionally transcribed in order to enable analysis to begin as soon as possible after each interview. Immediately following each interview, the first audio listening resulted in written case notes and researcher reflections, primarily on the interview content. Upon completion of each transcript, a second listening with observation of participant video (hands only) resulted in a two‐column document, comprising interpersonal process recall, participant's embodied and vocal markers (Sorsoli and Tolman, ) and researcher's inner conversation (Rober, ). A third listening and observation, this time of the researcher video (whole body), sought to highlight the ‘actual spokenness’ of language (Buber, ). Elements of the interview were highlighted in terms of poetic elements in moments that included the appearance of (i) possibly important quotes, including strong or evocative terms; (ii) emotive words or moments including tone, pace, silence; (iii) moments of doubts, not‐yet‐said, broken speech, questioning or third person speech; (iv) words or phrases including repetition, metaphor; (iv) moments of reflection, including wondering, pause; (v) moments of shift in the quality of the interview. These listenings and observations led to a heightened sense of the quality of the interview, particularly any shift towards intersubjectivity, which suggested the presence of a dialogical process and the possible emergence of dialogical knowing. Further confirmation of the dialogical process and dialogical knowing was sought in the triangulation of a fourth reading, listening, observation of relevant intersubjective portions of the transcript, participant video and researcher video (split screen), with particular attention to verbal, affective and embodied processes. If a dialogical process and dialogical knowing was confirmed, these specific portions of transcript were taken into the first layer of the Buberian intersubjective analysis.…”