logic in therapy?

[Themightytom]

I'm working on a MA in MH counseling which happens to be a double in school cousneling as well. the other night in class we were discussing the importance of addressing the relationship between a client and their family. The client's family represents cushioning from mental illness was the gist, and promotes resilience was the gist. I would like opinions on what followed in the conversation.

I proposed that we should consider it a reiprocal relationship. The clients behavior affects the client, the client ALSO affects the family structure. The class started to discuss family hierarchies, norms etc, and and began a group affirmation of the value of support groups. They started trying to identify support groups in the area, and began bemoaning the fact that not many were offered.

i redirected the discussion by pointing out that in order to evaluate the afffect that a family member's mental illness would have on a family, it should be determined how the family viewed such things. Do they subscribe to the illness model? Do they subscribe to a religious model, or a justice model? The teacher gave me an absurd look and said "Well those models don't apply to a person suffering from mental illness.

I pointed out off course they did, for example the religious model was recently applied to homosexuality, someone tried to exorcise sexual preference. Likewise homosexuality was in the DSM I and II because it was a behavioral phenomanon evaluated through the illness model. Though it doesn't rationally follow, such models ARE misapplied. In essence I pointed out we could go through all of the trouble locating a support group for the family, but wouldn't it be a good idea to find out if they would GO?

It might be more advantageous to our client clinically speaking, to develop relationships with spiritual counselors in the area and figure out which ones were more grounded for purposes of referral. Rather than kicking their spiritual crutch out from under them with poor chances of success we acknowledge the way the family sees things and use conceptual language they are familiar with the effect recovery. We could then work within the family's model without having to alter the viewpoints of entire group, stampeding over boundary issues, ethical practices diversity and commons ense in the process in order to effectively treat an individual..

The teacher looked at me and said "Your problem is you are being logical here Tom, in order to effectively meet your client sometimes you have to see it through their eyes and not your own. The best way to do that is by advocating for a clinical treatment model."

so my framing questions I guess are:

Wouldn't "seeing it through ttheir eyes" be exactly what I was suggesting, as opposed to forcing all conceptual frameworks into an illness model?

Is being logical a problem in counseling? I don't think I dispensed with any due empathy, i thought i demosntrated some by considering how a hypothetical family would react to a model they avhe little or no experience with.

any thoughts?

[Broomstick]

The teacher is full of shit.

Logic is necessary in ANY therapeutic relationship.

You were trying to see things from the patient's viewpoint, and the teacher was trying to shoehorn the patient into a static model. People do not exist in isolation, and there are few influences greater on a person than their family. There is a world of difference between a mentally ill person in a functional, largely rational family and one from a family of ignorance, superstition, and rampaging maladjustment. Failure to understand that is.... well, it's not something I'd want in any therapist I'd go to!