Family Therapy
Transform Family Conflict and Communication Breakdowns
into Understanding, Unity, and Stronger Bonds
When Family Therapy makes sense
Family therapy is most effective when the root of the problem lies in the dynamics of the family rather than just individual behavior. If communication breakdowns, unresolved conflicts, trauma, or loss are affecting the whole family, family therapy can help everyone work together to build healthier relationships and support systems. It is particularly useful during major life transitions or when chronic health conditions impact the entire household.
Who Family Therapy Is For
Family therapy supports families experiencing communication breakdowns, conflict patterns, unresolved tension, or significant transitions where problems involve more than one individual. This includes blended families, siblings who struggle to understand each other, and families facing repeated conflict that doesn’t resolve on its own.
Common Reasons People Reach Out
- Communication repeatedly breaks down
- Conflicts involve more than one family member
- Trauma or loss affects the family system
- Major changes (like divorce or blended family stress) cause tension
- Parenting differences create ongoing conflict
- Emotional distance or misalignment keeps resurfacing
Family Therapy, Parent Coaching, Couples Counseling, or Individual Therapy?
Many times people reach out for ‘family therapy’, when another type is more appropriate. Choosing the right approach can feel overwhelming, so here’s a guide that outlines the differences and where each is most appropriate to help you select the best option:
Family Therapy
Issues such as communication problems, unresolved conflicts, trauma or blended family struggles can impact the entire family. To address these, sometimes family therapy is the best option. It provides a space for everyone to contribute to solutions, focusing on creating new understanding rather than following one family member’s lead. Family therapy does not always mean two teens and parents. It might mean a subset of relationships such as two adult sisters, parents and their adult son or daughter, a couple along with ‘his’ brother and wife. This is about getting people to understand each other.
Appropriate goal: This is best if your goal is to hear everyone’s voice, improve communication, and resolve long-standing family issues. Family therapy can create lasting changes in how your family functions. Typically, appropriate for children 14 or older.
Parent Coaching
If the challenge is more about leading your family effectively or getting your children to follow family rules and routines, parent coaching can help you develop tailored strategies that suit your children’s ages and needs. Parents work best as an aligned team; parent coaching can help get you on the same page with parenting.
If your child is not ready to engage in family therapy, parent coaching allows you to still change the dynamic and impact your relationship with your child without involving them directly in the sessions.
Appropriate goal: If you want to learn practical strategies to address your child’s behavior, feel more connected and improve your leadership as a parent, parent coaching offers a quicker, more targeted solution.
Couples Counseling
Sometimes the root issue is that the parents are not aligned in other areas of their relationship. Parenting issues might be the topic; however, their negative cycle of communication might occur over any topic that arises. Children thrive when parents are aligned in creating a low conflict environment. Breaking this negative cycle is often the focus of couples counseling.
Appropriate goal: When you want to be able to solve problems together and not fight about feelings. When you want to feel good about your ability to communicate, which means feeling understood.
Individual Therapy
When the primary issue is an emotional or behavioral challenge for one family member — such as anxiety, depression — individual therapy may be the best approach, (e.g., play therapy for younger kids), allowing them to explore their emotions and develop coping strategies in a one-on-one setting.
Appropriate goal: If your aim is to help a family member build personal coping skills and emotional resilience, individual therapy is likely the right choice for them.
Child Therapy
Children feel powerless. When you want to help your child understand you, or comply, bringing them into a room with yet another adult does not empower them. In these cases, parent coaching to help you create a better foundation for them, and/or child therapy to give them ways to express their emotions and tools to navigate them, is a far better choice.
A Word About “Family” Therapy
We highly recommend that parents be involved in the child or teen’s therapy, however this would not be “family therapy”. We begin with an Initial Parent Session without the child or teen, where you can meet the therapist, talk about history, goals, discuss an approach and how to keep you, the parents, involved in the process of therapy.
You can schedule your Initial Parent Session directly by using the “Request an Appointment” button. If you are not sure which therapist to select, you are welcome to visit the Meet the Team page and look through our appropriate providers. You can also complete this form and we will help you find the best fit with our providers.
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Please answer a few questions to briefly describe the issue & goal, along with ages of anyone 18 or under.
