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Family Triangle (Part – 2)

101 stories from the therapy room

(A non-clinical approach to psychotherapy and counselling)

After a brief introduction, I told the client to lead the session. The client asked her father, “Why did you not support me during the divorce procedures?” and she looked at her mother and asked “why did you not give me enough time?” I sensed blame in these statements so I interfered and said  to the client, “the way you are asking your parents is not helpful”. In response, the parents  said her tone always  scared them and they generally  froze.  All three of them acknowledged that this is exactly how they got stuck whenever they tried to talk.

“What should we do?”, they asked. I proposed that they sit in a triangle and hold each other’s hands and stay in silence for a few minutes. The next step was to say a word that came to their mind while holding hands. Client’s mother said, “understanding”, her father said, “love” and she said, “united”. Using these 3 words, I asked them to frame one sentence.  “We understand we have to love and feel united”. By framing the sentence the family was functioning together. 

As the next step, I introduced the speaker-listener exercise.  I proposed that while still holding hands, they could  say,  “I wish you had _______” to whomever they choose.   The chosen person will listen to this and repeat what they heard. Once they had repeated, they could give a response if they chose to

The client chose to start first and told her  father, “I wish you had used your power to talk to my ex-husband and condemn his behavior on my behalf.” Her father repeated what she said and it helped her to feel heard. The client’s father wanted to respond . He said, “I thought you were handling the divorce procedure well and any interference  may have affected the mutual consent.” She repeated what the father said. Now the father took his turn and said to his daughter, “I wish you hated me less.” The client repeated what her father said and she wanted to respond. “I am angry with you, but do not hate you. If I hated you, I would not have longed to connect with you or  express my anger towards you; I would have withdrawn and moved away. The very fact that I’m angry is because I still want you to be a part of my experience.” Hearing this there was a shift in her father’s face and he teared up. Listening to this, the client’s mother also said, “ I thought she hated her father and he was feeling helpless. Now, knowing that she does not hate him is a  great relief”. There was a different feeling in the room.

This process of “I wish you were ______” was expressed in various levels between the family members. We paused then, to take stock of how the family was feeling after expressing and being heard. They said that they realized that they had been building reactions about each other based on assumptions and did not have patience to clarify and feel connected. The family felt positive and connected. It felt like a good time to close the session as the family has made the sentence they formed together a reality – “we understand we have to love and feel  united”.

In that moment, as the session concluded, the atmosphere had shifted. The family had not just communicated; they had reached a deeper understanding, rewriting their narrative with newfound empathy and connection.