Family Mental Health Services

Family Therapy for Mental Health

When one person struggles, the entire family struggles.

Banyan Mental Health designed our family therapy services to strengthen relationships, improve communication, and support the mental health of everyone in your family. With locations in Florida, Colorado, Massachusetts, and Pennsylvania, we're making quality family therapy accessible. 

We recognize that families are complex systems with their own dynamics, patterns, and strengths. During family therapy, we work collaboratively to identify challenges, build on existing strengths, and develop new skills for healthier interactions. Getting the entire family involved in the therapeutic process allows us to create a supportive environment for lasting change and improved mental health.

Family therapy is more than just a treatment – it's an opportunity for growth, understanding, and reconnection.

What is Family Therapy?

Family therapy is a form of psychotherapy that works to improve relationships. At the heart of family therapy is an understanding that relationships lie at the heart of personal growth and development. 

"Family" doesn't have a firm definition in family therapy. Your family unit may include your parents, siblings, aunts and uncles, spouse, and close friends. As long as the people in the group care about each other, they can be considered family.

While family therapy can help support loved ones when one member has a mental health or behavioral condition, that is not its only use. Your family may benefit from therapy together following the death of a loved one, a major life change, a medical diagnosis, or during relationship conflicts. The overall goal of family therapy is to improve well-being and functioning.

Our Family Therapy Services

Family therapy can take multiple forms, which may vary in terms of length, treatment goals, and techniques used. Our licensed therapists use a range of evidence-based techniques and complementary methods.

Individual Family Sessions

During an individual family session, you and your family members work with a therapist alone, in. In a private space, you can address your specific challenges and work towards your unique goals.

In these sessions, our therapists help families:

• Identify and understand interaction patterns
• Improve communication skills
• Learn conflict resolution techniques
• Build empathy and understanding
• Support a family member with mental health issues

A popular type of individual therapy is functional family therapy, which is commonly used when a child has behavioral issues. During therapy, you'll assess family dynamics that may contribute to the behavior, improve your parenting skills and learn positive reinforcement.

Multi-Family Group Therapy

While it may be true that each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way, your family may have a lot to learn from the experiences of others. During group therapy for families, you participate in therapy sessions with one or more other families. 

Multi-family therapy helps you feel less alone and also reduces the stigma associated with going to family.

Couples Therapy

While not strictly "family" therapy, our couples therapy services are an essential part of our family-focused approach. Many family issues stem from or impact the couple's relationship, making this a crucial area of focus.

Benefits of Family Therapy

With therapy, your family can learn to get along better and support each other. Benefits include better communication and problem-solving, stronger family bonds, increased empathy, and less conflict.

Family Therapy Techniques and Activities

Through various techniques and activities, your family can improve its functioning. During therapy sessions, each member will have the opportunity to speak openly about their concerns and issues related to the individual’s condition. Our staff members guide our patients, family members, and spouses through every step of our family assistance program to ensure they all get the most out of treatment possible.

We use several activities to foster communication, increase understanding, and promote positive change within your family.

1. Genograms: Genograms illustrate family relationships, medical histories, and patterns of behavior across generations, so you can identify recurring issues and work to break negative cycles.
2. Reframing: Sometimes, a different perspective is all you need. By presenting alternative interpretations of behaviors or events, your family can develop more positive and constructive outlooks.
3. Empty Chair Technique: A family member speaks to an empty chair as if it were occupied by another family member. This can help express unspoken feelings, practice difficult conversations, or work through unresolved issues with absent family members.
4. Role Play: Family members act out scenarios or switch roles with each other, leading to greater empathy and understanding.
5. Narrative Therapy: When you rewrite your family story, you externalize your problems,  separating them from individual family members. It can help you develop new, more positive narratives.
6. Structural Family Therapy: To change the family's organization and hierarchy, the therapist may rearrange seating during sessions or give specific tasks to alter typical family interactions.
7. Strategic Family Therapy: Here, the therapist designs specific interventions to address particular family problems. This might involve assigning "homework" or suggesting changes in daily routines to disrupt problematic patterns.
8. Family Art Therapy: Creative activities like drawing family portraits or creating collages together can reveal subconscious feelings and dynamics while promoting bonding and communication.