Collaborative Therapy Approach

Overview

Collaborative therapy is a two-way effort between therapist and client. They "co-explore and co-create" (Gehart 2014 p. 380) together for a solution. They share a mutual puzzling around the questions of how things started and how they can be resolved.

Definition of Collaborative

Shifting the Meanings and

Beliefs of Clients

Collaborative is an adjective that is used to describe an accomplishment of two or more parties working together.

A good therapist will use the clients own story to start to change the way they look at things. Continue to be curious, ask the client more questions and you will see the direction start to change as well as the clients beliefs.

Collaborative Therapy Approach

How this model will help the therapist succeed

Restructure Client Interactions

In the video, Harlene asked Anita to list her failures. In doing this, she was able to help Anita shift her focus from an unsolvable issue to a solvable one. Her "failures" as she saw them, were not failures at all.

Therapy as a partnership: This model will help create a partnership with the client and therapist, thereby sparking a common interest and mutual respect.

The client and therapist work together to bring their expertise together and create a mutually beneficial partnership.

Not-Knowing This allows the therapist to be humble and allows the client to feel more in control.

Allow the therapist to be more open with their invisible thoughts.

Everyday Ordinary Life.

A collaborative therapist will focus, listen and question in a way that is comfortable to the client's language and nature. Being somewhat humble with the client and allowing them to lead the direction that the therapy will take will allow the client to better participate and explore more options.

Uses in the Recovery model

Change Clients Meanings

and Behaviors

The goal in therapy is to recover, to gain and maintain some sort of normalcy in the clients life. If the client is able to change their focus and shift behaviors enough to reenter their life as it was before, still having issues, and now able to control them....job well done.

Giving credence to negatives is detrimental to the client. Giving recognition for expressing a problem is very beneficial. Allow them to see another way of looking at their issue; in the video the clients focus shifted from being a failure as a mother to having a failed relationship with her daughter.

Additional techniques used by Harlene Anderson

Reference Page

example: Harlene shifted Anitas focus to see "more possibilities to create, to have the kind of relationship

she wants with her daughter

than to correct her past failures as a mother."

Anderson, H. Good Mother, Bad Mother: A Dissolving Dilemma [Video File].

http://www.viddler.com/v/f67bef08?secret=82067950

Gehart, D. R. (2014) Mastering competencies in family therapy

Client is the expert: This concept is about respecting the client in the beginning to allow for a more amicable mutual puzzling. The client is the expert in the content where the therapist holds the expertise in the area of process. Each is beneficial and pertinent in the recovery process.

Everyday, ordinary language: therapists need to listen, focus and communicate in a language that is understandable to the client. Don't talk over their level.

Focus on strengths and resiliency

Stabilize, normalize and create

acceptance in clients

Clients come into therapy for a reason, and more often than not, they feel worthless and not strong. In this therapy, it is imperative to let the client know that they are strong and resilient. After all, they have survived this long, they had to be doing something right. If a client tells you something that they deem as a negative, find a way to spin it to their advantage.

Social constructionist therapist work with their client to help learn their thinking and not impose a specific way of problem solving. This is also known as withness. "It is a committment to walk alongside the client, no matter where the journey leads." (Gehart 2014 p. 384) The client is the "knowing" and the therapist is the "not knowing", therefore it is imperative that the therapist creates an atmosphere that will allow the client to feel normal and accepted.

Anita was able to admit that getting angry had not gotten her anywhere and recognized that she needed to not be so sensitive. Voicing her own strengths and not dwelling on her weaknesses allowed her to create a better relationship with her daughter.

Anita felt as though she were a failure when it came to being a mother. After being allowed to speak openly and actually "heard", which may have been something that was missing from her life, she was able to see her behavior as somewhat normal.