Psychological Counseling

Sometimes, parents are the ones who need more help from Napocensis specialists to understand first of all, their child disability and how this changes the life of all family members.
Counseling is done both individually and as a group or family.
Psychological counseling can improve a person or family’s life on the emotional, social, vocational, educational, health, development level.

COUNSELING A FAMILY WITH AN AUTISTIC CHILD

For a parent, the news of his child having autism comes as a shock and from this point problems appear.

Is it real? Can anything be done?
Many parents are facing difficulty accepting the new reality. Accepting is the first most important step because it leads to a correct diagnosis and a proper intervention afterwards. This intervention has been possible in Romania for some time now.
The effort to recover the child’s potential as much as possible is very high, it has to start as soon as possible and be sustained. Not everyone is prepared for such an effort.

What resources are most require: the financial, emotional or the physical ones?
In most cases these resources are not all available and sometimes not enough.

How can a parent cope with such an effort?
The entire family is being affected by the child’s condition. The challenge goes up to where the disability affects the core of the family.
Inevitably, the parents begin to relate differently to the child and will get involved differently in the child’s recovery. A powerful resource, the unity of the couple is also affected by this challenge.

How does a couple find the way and the strength to deal with the child’s situation and to have a happy couple life?
What to do if the challenge is too big and the family unity is in danger?
The integration of the autistic child into society is another very serious problem because the child has the social interaction capacity severely affected and he cannot naturally interact with other children and adults. Therefore, gradually, he will be avoided. The entire family will suffer. Most often, family with one child begin to be avoided by friends and be exposed to a social exclusion pressure.

What could be done in this situation? Can anything be saved? Could social connections remain the same?
All these questions and many others that appear in a family affected by autism can get answers only by having a clear image of reality. Reality, both inner and external, has unexpected resources to deal with the challenges and to escape many difficult situations. Sometimes, you just have to observe to figure it out. At other times, the resources road is tortuous or blocked. For these last situations, the counselor advice can help.
Do not hesitate! Get expert advice!

PSYCHOLOGICAL COUNSELING DURING EARLY INTERVENTION

Many times, immediately after they find out the diagnosis, if they are lucky, parents are advised to start intervention. They begin to find information on what intervention means, how many people must be involved, how they are supposed to work. Everything is done in a rush that comes with the desire not to miss one moment.
In this flow of events, something very important gets lost: after assessing the child, parents fail to have an assessment of their own resources.
As a matter of fact, early intervention in autism starts with the counseling with parents. They are the ones who have the resources that need to be evaluated, managed and used. In most cases, the financial resources are considered to be the most important. The emotional resources matter as well because these are the ones that will ensure family stability and thereby the continuity of intervention. In addition, the emotional frameworks promoted in the family will be more useful to the child then teaching the behaviors.

THE PARABLE OF TALENTS – THE IMPORTANCE OF FAMILY COUNSELING

“… a man going on a journey […] summoned his slaves and entrusted his property to them. To one he gave five talents, to another two, and to another one, each according to his ability. Then he went on his journey. The one who had received five talents went off right away and put his money to work and gained five more.

In the same way, the one who had two gained two more.

But the one who had received one talent went out and dug a hole in the ground and hid his master’s money in it.

After a long time, the master of those slaves came and settled his accounts with them.

The one who had received the five talents came and brought five more, saying, ‘Sir, you entrusted me with five talents. See, I have gained five more.’ His master answered, ‘Well done, good and faithful slave! You have been faithful in a few things. I will put you in charge of many things. Enter into the joy of your master.’ The one with the two talents also came and said, ‘Sir, you entrusted two talents to me. See, I have gained two more.’ His master answered, ‘Well done, good and faithful slave! You have been faithful with a few things. I will put you in charge of many things. Enter into the joy of your master.’

Then the one who had received the one talent came and said, ‘Sir, I knew that you were a hard man, harvesting where you did not sow, and gathering where you did not scatter seed, so I was afraid, and I went and hid your talent in the ground. See, you have what is yours.’ But his master answered, ‘Evil and lazy slave! So you knew that I harvest where I didn’t sow and gather where I didn’t scatter? Then you should have deposited my money with the bankers, and on my return I would have received my money back with interest!

Therefore take the talent from him and give it to the one who has ten. For the one who has will be given more, and he will have more than enough. But the one who does not have, even what he has will be taken from him. And throw that worthless slave into the outer darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth’” (Matthew 25:13-30).

THE THERAPEUTIC PROJECT

The roles in a family are often contaminated, autism being symbolically transferred in parents’ couple relationship.

THE THERAPEUTIC PROJECT:

Proper integration of family roles (their balance)

- Objectives:

• To learn that parents have two categories of roles (as parents and as husband and wife)
• To learn how to communicate (to learn to make contact, to develop empathy to be prepared to come into contact with their child)

Diagnosis of roles:

• How aware are the parents of the roles they play?
• What is their communication background? (family of origin wise)
• How do they feel in their roles as man-woman/ father-mother? How much accepting these roles costs them?
• What do the father, mother, man and woman have to deal with and what resources each one has?
• Are there any dysfunctional issues brought from the family of origin? (Who from this family was also not accepting his/her role?)

Carrying separate sessions with each parent to understand the problems each one of them is facing and finding solutions together:

• Objectives for the mother
• Objectives for the father

Integration of the child in the family (to avoid the family dissolution):

• How has the child’s birth changed family dynamics?
• How has the child’s diagnosis changed the roles and the family dynamics?

Resources awareness: family and couple resources and their restructuring

COVERED THEMES:

• The parent-child relationship: managing difficult behavior
• The couple relationship of parents: accepting responsibilities and the diagnosis
• The available resources: financially, emotionally
• The family therapy: implications; How do we turn others in co-therapists? What can I do when no one gives me their support? Can I accept that?
• The insertion in society: modeling and managing child behaviors and own behaviors
• Obligation to respect the limits:

How do I see myself as an “agent of frustration”? How do others see me?

Who am I from their perspective? How much does this matter to me?

How can I motivate the child to accept the limits?

What are my own limits?

The management of specific emotions: How do I feel in front of my child? Should I feel guilty? Is it unfair for the child?