Welcome to the future of liberal family therapy working

Nick Radcliffe and Craig Newnes

This paper describes a recent family therapy session in which a therapist was surprised by the actions of a teenager. The therapist remains concerned that the incident was not handled well and, in the interests of reflexivity, welcomes any feedback from readers.

In the room are the family therapist Dan, who is interviewing the family; Rita, the mother of Gail, her 13 year old daughter, Tim, the 19 year old son home from college and Peter, aged seven. Also in the room is the reflecting team which is made up of three therapists; Simon, a child psychiatrist, Molly, family therapist, and Tom, a newly appointed mental health practitioner.
The family therapy meeting has progressed for 20 minutes. The family have talked mainly of Peter who is challenging his mother's authority in the home and has also been getting reports from school that he is very disruptive in the classroom and has poor concentration. He was recently excluded from school after stealing three boxes of condoms from the school nurse’s office. It was this incident that precipitated the decision to request an appointment with the family therapy team. He has still not revealed the whereabouts of the condoms and therefore has not been allowed back to school. Rita and Tim have talked with Dan, while Gail has sat quietly texting from her mobile telephone. Peter has been seated between his mother and sister on the floor and built a twin tower replica from Lego.
The family therapist decides to widen his field of enquiry: ‘So Rita, would you tell me a little about how people in the family get on with each other. How about Gail and Peter how do they get on?’ Rita responds, ‘Well, they don't really’. To which the therapist says, ‘What, not at all?’ Rita seems rattled, replying, ‘Don't get me wrong they love each other, but it's just that these days they always seem to be bickering and Peter thinks he can tell Gail what to do…He tells her she shouldn't be staying up so late. He has even started to follow her around, that's when he's not following me round.’
The therapist shifts the line of enquiry with, ‘How about Tim and Peter, how do they get on together?’ To which Rita answers, ‘Tim is so much older, he has always been a bit remote really. He was a teenager when I had Peter. He 's very good to him now though. He does try when he's home.’
Turning to Tim the therapist asks, ‘How do you see things? What are you noticing about these relationships (gesturing to Rita, Gail and Peter)?’ Tim thinks things were OK, ‘Until John, that's mum's ex; ‘til he left Peter seemed alright. Now he's just a pain especially to Gail.’ The therapist picks up, ‘And what about Gail and your mum, how has their relationship been since John left?’ Gail pauses from texting and looks over at Tim as he says, ‘Oh, they've always got on pretty well. They talk a lot together though I think deep down mum is worried about her.’
Dan then asks the family if they would be interested in hearing the thoughts and ideas of the reflecting team. Rita and Tim nod in agreement. Peter continues to build a tower that is beginning to resemble the twin towers. Gail speaks for the first time. Drawing attention to her mobile phone she says, ‘Mike says pants to that last comment of Tim's, but he also said he'd like to listen to the them refracting or whatever they do. Is that OK?’
At this point in the session the therapist realized that Gail had been texting details of the session to Mike, her boyfriend. Before Dan could think what to say about this, Gail asked, ‘Mike says he wants to see what you all look like.’ Without further ado she pointed her mobile phone camera at the team and said, ‘Smile.’
Dan quickly turned to the team to discuss the events of the last few minutes.
While this discussion was taking place, Gail revealed another dimension to her mobile: Internet access: ‘Mike says I should check up on what these people are up to. He’s given me some web addresses. I’ll try Google first.’ After a few minutes Gail called, ‘Hey, Pete, there are over a half million Ritalin sites and one and a half million for ADHD. You’re in good company.’ The mobile beeped and she checked her messages box. Now turning to Rita, she said, ‘Mike says Molly’s too young to be a therapist. He bets she hasn’t got any kids.’
The reflecting team were intrigued by Gail’s role in the room as the one in touch with the outside world at all times but considered the mobile too distracting and intrusive. Accordingly, Molly’s first action, on re-engaging in conversation was to ask that Gail turned it off. To Rita’s clear annoyance, Gail got up and left…still texting.

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