Teen Views on Social Media

Family Therapists in Schools Join us today! therapy talk Hal Runkel, LMFT, author of Scream Free Parenting, believes parenting has changed in recent decades as a result of the 24/7 news cycle, the internet and the ability to check children's grades, school attendance and whereabouts at any moment. Runkel says, “If we think our number [...]

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The Road Ahead

Happy New Year 2020! Just saying that conjures a sense of vision. My hope is that this year—indeed, this decade—is one of vision, foresight, and generativity. I’m staring down the road of my second year as president—and thinking beyond. I’m reflecting on the thematic aims and hopes I expressed last year for my term of [...]

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Four Metaphors Useful in Couple Therapy

Maladaptive couple processes are a core feature of couples in distress and are among the best predictors of marital decline (Gottman, Coan, Carrera, & Swanson, 1998; Lebow, Chambers, Christensen, & Johnson, 2012). The likelihood of therapeutic success is maximized when the therapist and the couple focus on this pathological dance, in which the emotional music [...]

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The Ethics of Teaching Ethics

A few years ago, I was asked to teach an ethics course to satisfy Washington State requirements for MFT license renewal. The state requires six hours of ethics for each renewal period. While I had always prided myself on practicing ethically, I had never even contemplated that I knew enough to teach ethics. Somehow, I [...]

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Respect—Is this the Key Ingredient in the Recipe for Successful Family Relationships?

There are times in the life cycle of a family during which there may be a lack of respect for other family members by some of the individuals within the family. While this does not necessarily indicate an inherent pathological problem or pattern in the family system, the reality is that this presents a challenge [...]

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Supporting Clients Facing Infertility

Infertility—a word we usually don’t hear until we are actively trying to get pregnant. Infertility is defined as the inability to get pregnant or remain pregnant after one year of unprotected sex, or six months if the woman is above the age of 35 years (Center for Disease Control and Prevention, 2019). I remember when [...]

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Divorce, Remarriage, and Blended Families: Checklists for Therapists

There is a strong correlation between marriage and family therapy and significant improvements experienced by clients with regard to their management of family discord, marital relationship conflict, parent-child struggles, and overall systemic distress (Tao & Randall, 2017). In addition, the specialized education, professional training, and therapeutic interventions employed by marriage and family therapists (MFTs) have [...]

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The Social Media Battle Ground

A parent recently sat with me during a session, and she talked with me about how she is coping, and accepting, that things have changed since she was young. She stated to me, “When I was a kid in the 70s, my summers were spent almost every day outdoors until the streetlights came on. That [...]

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Screening Screen Time: Evidence-Informed Guidelines for Parenting in the Digital Age

Those are texts from my nine-year-old that I see on my phone between sessions. He’s wanting “time” on his iPad because none of his games or YouTube app are visible. I have locked down all third-party apps except for the half-hour I give him after he has done his homework and chores. Like most parents [...]

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