Marriage and Family Therapy Discussions

Therapy is a way to get in touch with yourself, get to know yourself and get to know other people as well. Another way is through personality testing like the Myers-Briggs personality test and the Enneagram.

The Myers-Briggs a few times to help direct me in career choices but not as often used as a tool for self-discovery.

There is a great book: The Road Back to You: An Enneagram Journey to Self-Discovery by Ian Morgan Cron and Suzanne Stabile. Reading this book, one can be better understood as to why they react in certain ways to life events, relationships, etc.

What Is the Enneagram?

The Enneagram is a model of human personality that involves nine interconnected personality types. Each personality is represented by a number.

The Nine Types

Here are the nine personality types as described by Cron and Stabile:

Type One: The Perfectionist. Ethical, dedicated and reliable, they are motivated by a desire to live the right way, improve the world, and avoid fault and blame.

Type Two: The Helper. Warm, caring and giving, they are motivated by a need to be loved and needed, and to avoid acknowledging their own needs.

Type Three: The Performer. Success-oriented, image-conscious and wired for productivity, they are motivated by a need to be (or appear to be) successful and to avoid failure.

Type Four: The Romantic. Creative, sensitive and moody, they are motivated by a need to be understood, experience their feelings and avoid being ordinary.

Type Five: The Investigator. Analytical, detached and private, they are motivated by a need to gain knowledge, conserve energy and avoid relying on others.

Type Six: The Loyalist. Committed, practical and witty, they are worst-case scenario thinkers who are motivated by fear and the need for security.

Type Seven: The Enthusiast. Fun, spontaneous and adventurous, they are motivated by a need to be happy, to plan stimulating experiences and to avoid pain.

Type Eight: The Challenger. Commanding, intense and confrontational, they are motivated by a need to be strong and avoid feeling weak or vulnerable.

Type Nine: The Peacemaker. Pleasant, laid back and accommodating, they are motivated by a need to keep the peace, merge with others and avoid conflict.

Each Type Has a Deadly Sin. This is because each strength often has weakness or can become out of balance into something possibly unhealthy.

Your Type and Your Marriage/Relationship

By looking at your type you can begin to look at how you interrelate in relationship to others. This often comes from early childhood modeling and/or possible traumas.

To test yourself: https://www.eclecticenergies.com/enneagram/dotest.php

Need Counseling? Contact us for therapy in Grass Valley and/or Nevada City area 530-913-5054

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Research shows that 10-15% of teens report to being depressed. When looking into depression researchers discovered that the majority of adolescents reporting that they were depressed said that the number one reason was because of a parental conflict. Also, divorced parents who are still fighting have the highest rate of depressed children (18%).

Parenting is not easy and children who are depressed can be even more challenging to parent. For example, males tend to show their depression in the form of anger and this can create a vicious cycle of argument in the family dynamic.

What can you do as a parent? Talk about it. Just the simple gesture of showing that you care and are concerned can help alleviate your teens depression. Leave open room for communication and be non-judgmental. It is not helpful to minimize the experience of your teen (for example, “it’s not that bad” or “you’ll get over it” or “you’re fine). Also remember that you can validate feelings without validating the behavior (for example, “you must feel really sad but I’m worried that you are cutting”).

Seek counseling. Whether it is for your teen or your marriage (in the case of conflict), counseling offers a safe place to discuss feelings and thoughts without judgment.

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My Clients often ask me if they should use their insurance (for example, Blue Cross) to pay for their sessions:

Pros:

• Using insurance can take some of the financial burden away from going to therapy. Your insurance will often pay for these services with a co-pay. Most insurance companies allow their subscribers a certain number of therapy sessions per calendar year. Blue cross often gives unlimited sessions. 

Cons:

• This happens to be my biggest issue with billing insurance: When a therapist provides an insurance company with a bill the of their therapy services then any person in the insurance company may have access to your mental health information.
• My second biggest issue is that in order to receive services therapists are required to diagnose. This goes on a permanent record for the future. 

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Something that is important for couples to recognize is that some amount of conflict in relationships is normal. I always say there are a lot of unhappy couples out there that never fight or argue. Anger and conflict can make relationships stronger. In fact, it means that there is passion and caring. If you didn’t care, you wouldn’t be upset, right? The goal is to be able to express your needs so that you partner can hear them without blame or without them being defensive. A soft beginning helps set the tone and helps your partner hear what you are trying to convey. 

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