Filial Therapy - Say What?

The most common question I actually get asked about Filial Therapy is how do you pronounce it! But also, how can it work if the child isn’t coming to see a qualified play therapist? If you read last week's blog post on play therapy (visit here in case you missed it), you may recall the unique thing about play therapy is that the relationship between the therapist and the child is actually where the power of the intervention sits. So if we teach a parent or caregiver who already has a relationship with the child some of our therapy tools it can only mean positive things for that child!

A QUICK HISTORY

Filial therapy was developed in the early 1960s by husband and wife, Bernard and Louise Guerney – so it’s been around for over 60 years! The Guerney’s leant into the trending research at the time about the effectiveness of family therapy models and skills training in therapy – they were way ahead of their time in the development of Filial Therapy and were actually “booed” regularly by other professionals when presenting filial therapy at conferences as it was felt it took away from the skills and expertise of mental health professionals.

HOW DOES IT WORK?

Filial therapy is an evidence based therapy and it beautifully mixes play therapy and family therapy for the purpose of strengthening child-parent/caregiver relationships. Filial therapy can actually be a faster and more direct way of supporting a child with behavioural and emotional challenges due to the pre-existing relationship between a child and their parent/caregiver.

In filial therapy we train and supervise a parent/caregiver in play therapy so that parents/caregivers can use these skills at home for their own regular weekly therapeutic play sessions.

We usually offer 10 sessions but this is dependent upon individual need.

WHO IS IT FOR?

Filial therapy is not appropriate for everyone, the major reason a parent would not be considered to be appropriate is if they cannot reliably attend training sessions or consistently provide filial sessions at home with their children.

Filial therapy is also not appropriate in the instance where a child or young person has experienced physical or sexual abuse or ongoing trauma. These experiences are best left to a qualified play therapist, with the option to engage in filial therapy after some success with play therapy.

We are available for filial therapy sessions in our therapy rooms in Hewett or via telehealth. If you would like to know more about filial therapy you can email us at hello@thrivetherapeuticplay.com.au or reach out via DM on Instagram.

REFERENCES

Cochran, N.H., Nordling, W.J. and Cochran, J.L. (2010). Child-centered play therapy : a practical guide to developing therapeutic relationships with children. Hoboken, N.J.: John Wiley & Sons. ‌Landreth, G.L. and Bratton, S.C. (2019). Child-Parent Relationship Therapy (CPRT). Routledge.