The Centre provides the following counselling services :
- Counselling for families, couples and individuals using a systemic approach - is this for me? read more familytherapistsareasofex/
- Low fee counselling services for families, couples and individuals lowfeecounsellingservice/
What is a Systemic Approach?
T.S. Eliot in œ The Cocktail Hour (1940). His definition!
œBefore I treat a patient like yourself I need to know a great deal more about him than the patient can always tell me. Indeed, it is often the case that my patients are only pieces of a total situation, which I have to explore. The single patient who is ill by himself, is rather the exception.
- Systemic therapists have a view that difficulties do not arise within individuals but in the relationships, interactions and the language that develop between individuals.
- In understanding difficulties, systemic therapists explore the connections between the beliefs and behaviours within families.
- Systemic Therapy uses the idea that people have their own meaning systems and therefore they will make sense of events from this personal frame of reference. This means that systemic therapists will explore how individuals and families give meaning to the behaviours of others and how this then guides their responses and feelings towards one another.
(Adapted from the Leeds Family Therapy and Research Centre)
What is the Systemic Consultation Centre's (SCC) definition of family?
Different cultures and different groups of individuals have very different notions of what 'family' means. SCC takes 'family' to mean any group of people who define themselves as such, who care about and care for each other.
Do family therapists only work with families?
No. Family therapists most often work with family groups but they will also work with people on an individual basis, or suggest individual sessions within a series of family meetings, when appropriate. They will also, when appropriate, work with the professional and/or social networks around families. Some also specialise in work with organisations, transferring their experience and insights into human relationships and group interaction to other systems, such as businesses and public and voluntary services.
