Structural Family Therapy Theory
“The purpose of this book is to teach couples how to discover, and then learn to meet, each other’s most important emotional needs”, (Harley, 2011).
The main reason why I choose this book, and have taken this class was for the purpose of pre-marital counseling for myself. I am a single woman with, who wants to be married someday. I believe that marriage is ordained by God and should last a lifetime. However in the real world it doesn’t always last. I often think about why the divorce rate America alone is so high. Before reading this book, I assumed it was because they were bored from being together for so long, and were no longer compatible. However after reading this book, I now know it is because one partner is no longer meeting the others …show more content…
The theory I found in the text was structural family therapy. Family structure “refers to the way a family is organized into subsystems whose interactions are regulated by interpersonal boundaries”, (Nichols, 2013, pg. 124).
How structural family therapy is applied is when the subsystems have unclear boundaries. Those unclear boundaries force the family member to become isolated or disengaged. The reason why they become disengaged is because their partner has enmeshed or became closer to someone else in the family. In return leaving the spouse feeling left out (Nichols 2013).
Harley uses a great example of this theory and the neglect of needs being met. For example; when a couple first meet, they spending a lot of time together from the moment they meet, to the engagement, to the wedding. Now where things change and boundaries become unclear, is when the family grows and the children come along. If there are not clear boundaries set between the couple and the children then the enmeshing happens between the parent and the children instead of the partner and the partner. If the disengaged feelings are not resolved then relationships form outside the marriage causing …show more content…
I would recommend this book to a client because of the valuable tool that can be used for more than just marriage problems. I believe that I could have applied some of the information from this book in a number of marriage case studies in this calls alone.
After reading this book I was able to apply the tools for: pre-counseling for a single person, pre-counseling for a couple that is dating and considering marriage, pre-counseling during their engagement, and regular counseling after marriage.
This book is also a great tool for learning how to avoid extramarital affairs by refilling our love banks. Love Banks are points that are deposited each time a spouse has a, “Pleasurable interaction with their spouse” (Harley, 2011, pg. 265). Love Banks can also be withdrawn when a need is not met or a spouse is disappointed in an action that has occurred with their mate. When the love bank is empty because our needs are not being met, we look for others outside the marriage to make the deposit that our spouses have been lacking. I would recommend this book to my clients as a way to retrain them how to refill those empty love
The main reason why I choose this book, and have taken this class was for the purpose of pre-marital counseling for myself. I am a single woman with, who wants to be married someday. I believe that marriage is ordained by God and should last a lifetime. However in the real world it doesn’t always last. I often think about why the divorce rate America alone is so high. Before reading this book, I assumed it was because they were bored from being together for so long, and were no longer compatible. However after reading this book, I now know it is because one partner is no longer meeting the others …show more content…
The theory I found in the text was structural family therapy. Family structure “refers to the way a family is organized into subsystems whose interactions are regulated by interpersonal boundaries”, (Nichols, 2013, pg. 124).
How structural family therapy is applied is when the subsystems have unclear boundaries. Those unclear boundaries force the family member to become isolated or disengaged. The reason why they become disengaged is because their partner has enmeshed or became closer to someone else in the family. In return leaving the spouse feeling left out (Nichols 2013).
Harley uses a great example of this theory and the neglect of needs being met. For example; when a couple first meet, they spending a lot of time together from the moment they meet, to the engagement, to the wedding. Now where things change and boundaries become unclear, is when the family grows and the children come along. If there are not clear boundaries set between the couple and the children then the enmeshing happens between the parent and the children instead of the partner and the partner. If the disengaged feelings are not resolved then relationships form outside the marriage causing …show more content…
I would recommend this book to a client because of the valuable tool that can be used for more than just marriage problems. I believe that I could have applied some of the information from this book in a number of marriage case studies in this calls alone.
After reading this book I was able to apply the tools for: pre-counseling for a single person, pre-counseling for a couple that is dating and considering marriage, pre-counseling during their engagement, and regular counseling after marriage.
This book is also a great tool for learning how to avoid extramarital affairs by refilling our love banks. Love Banks are points that are deposited each time a spouse has a, “Pleasurable interaction with their spouse” (Harley, 2011, pg. 265). Love Banks can also be withdrawn when a need is not met or a spouse is disappointed in an action that has occurred with their mate. When the love bank is empty because our needs are not being met, we look for others outside the marriage to make the deposit that our spouses have been lacking. I would recommend this book to my clients as a way to retrain them how to refill those empty love