Essay Sample on Structural Family Therapy

Introduction

A real conversation between individuals results from the understanding of others and issues involved in the conversation. Such conversations always allow le tomato ring, nurturing, and deepening of the relationships. Real conversations come from the position of curiosity assumed by the person controlling the conversation. In the video, the therapist makes use of this technique to make Donna be comfortable discussing her relationship with Jeff (Dallas Theological Seminary, 2014). The shift is not surprising because of the choice of communication technique taken by Bob to make Donna comfortable to communicate. If Jeff's behavior were identified as the issue, Donna would have overreacted letting emotions to take control of her. In that case, she would not have been comfortable talking about her relationship with Jeff.

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The physical rearrangement during the conversation is to ease the tension that existed between Donna and Jeff and helps create a more open atmosphere that would help Donna in expressing her displeasure. The movement of the therapist allowed Jeff to move further to Donna to enable him to release the pressure which was building up between them. It also gave Jeff an opportunity to have a deeper understanding of what he needed to change for his relationship with Donna to work. The physical movement is also important to Donna as it showed a sign of interest from Jeff. It enabled Donna to achieve more calm and fully express her pain in the relationship between her and Jeff. I was also a sign that Jeff was interested in knowing his weaknesses enabling her to be more open while expressing them. The movement also allowed the therapist to have one on one conversation with Donna while maintaining the eye contact.

The therapist aims to create a conducive atmosphere to enable the family to have an open discussion on the issues that affect them. Thus, his suggestion of Bob being the teacher to Donna as seen in the video was intentional with an aim to get Donna's reaction (Dallas Theological Seminary, 2014). From Donna's reaction, he could understand on the difficulties that the family goes through regarding social roles resulting to his compliment on the ability of the family to cope up with and manage the difficult situations that they might face. Managing difficult situations is a key aspect of unity. A family that has mastered this art is always happy together and less often cross each other's path. It is also important for Donna to appreciate Bob's role in the family as the head and the fatherly figure to the children.

The therapist identifies the problems with the social roles within the family. As a result, he tells Donna of the position of Bob as the head of the family which does not go well with her. He also identifies the emotional distance that exists between the family members. Donna is distancing herself from Bob and turning Jeff into her emotional teddy bear. He also notes that there are things that need to be changed in the family and prompts both Donna and Bob to say what they would like to change in each other (Dallas Theological Seminary, 2014). The video provides useful insights into the importance of family unity and acceptance. From the video, the heads of the family; fathers and mothers need to be emotionally closer to each other because it has a greater influence on the children.

References

Dallas Theological Seminary. (2014). BC428 Unfolding the Laundry Session 2 [Video]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9DXghgwr_DI&feature=youtu.be