Working with Kids and Their Parents Mitchell Greene Sports, even at the youngest developmental levels, has become a source of great stress for kids and their parents. The final results of games and kids’ individual statistics are immediately broadcast on the internet, and recruiting videos of middle school age athletes are all over YouTube. RecreationRead More…
Avoiding the Mistakes Therapists Often Make Patricia Papernow Although divorce and marriage rates are generally falling, they’re skyrocketing among those over 50. That’s why so many of us are seeing an influx of later-life uncouplers and recouplers in our offices. In this workshop, learn how to effectively manage the competing needs of all the players in these families: theRead More…
How to Help Our Clients Heal Anita Mandley Exposing the family secret of incest is a transgression that makes everyone deeply uncomfortable, both in the families in which it occurs and for the mental health professionals who try to help them. One reflection of this discomfort is the avoidance of even using the term itselfRead More…
An Introduction to Attachment-Based Family Therapy Guy Diamond Most of us have faced intense parent-adolescent conflict in sessions: no one listens, everyone blames, and some walk out. Or we’ve met adolescents who are silent, withdrawn, and indifferent. Often these teens struggle with trauma, depression, and/or suicide. This workshop will demonstrate how in the first sessionRead More…
Strategies for Recognizing and Responding to Them Signe Whitson Young people who bully often master the art of blending in with the crowd, flying under an adult’s radar and wreaking havoc in subtle ways. In fact, many socially aggressive kids actually top an adult’s “what a nice kid!” list and make their way into their victims’Read More…
Is It Gender . . . And/Or Something Else? Margaret Nichols & Laura Jacobs Transgender identity has achieved so much cultural support and affirmation that it may be easy to overlook—or miss—the fact that some young clients may be struggling with issues other than, or in addition to, gender dysphoria. With many of these childrenRead More…
It’s a Family Affair Lynn Lyons When obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) shows up in a child, it’s likely that other family members have it, too. OCD is the ultimate cult leader, demanding acceptance of a skewed view of reality and often ruling families for generations. This workshop demonstrates how to recognize OCD, the common pitfallsRead More…
Gratitude and Meaning in Caring for Aging Parents Barry Jacobs & Julia Mayer While caring for aging parents is often portrayed as a physical, psychological, and financial burden, there’s a growing body of research suggesting that caregivers can derive important benefits from their role, including increased life satisfaction and even improved health. In fact, caregiversRead More…
How to Get Unhooked Martha Straus To work with troubled and traumatized adolescents, it’s crucial for therapists to first foster their own capacity for self-awareness and self-regulation. It’s not easy, especially when our young clients’ extreme reactions—ranging from angry arousal to frozen shutting down—can trigger our own sense of helplessness, failure, dissociation, and rejection. InRead More…
We’re Older. Are We Better? Daniel Siegel & Bessel van der Kolk On the occasion of the Symposium’s 40th anniversary, two of the most influential figures in our field reflect on the most important advances of the past four decades as well as the prospects for improving our therapeutic effectiveness in the future, with aRead More…
A Dialogue with Salvador Minuchin Parts 1 & 2 Salvador Minuchin, Jeffrey Zeig & Susan Johnson At 95 years old, Salvador Minuchin is the world’s most famous living family therapist and probably the most imitated practitioner ever. In this special workshop, he’ll show a series of excerpts from some of the most memorable therapy sessionsRead More…
How They’re Changing You and Therapy Forever Parts 1 & 2 Ron Taffel As the first generation brought up entirely in the digital age, millennials (18-35 years old) represent a sea change from previous generations of psychotherapy clients. Along with a review of the research on the distinctive lifestyle choices, diagnostic patterns, and self-regulatory issuesRead More…
How We Can Help Our Clients and the World at the Same Time Parts 1 & 2 William Doherty Let’s face it: we therapists have had an ambivalent relationship with commitment, often opting for Polonius’s individualistic admonition “to thine own self be true.” But now that we’re coming out of an historic era where weRead More…
Overcoming the Challenges in Therapy Sandra Wartski Most therapists know that treating eating disorders (EDs) can be a very rocky journey. They also know that a culture awash with unrealistic ideals of body perfection can further exacerbate clients’ distorted relationships with food and body image. This workshop will provide therapists with a step-by-step approach to navigating these clientsRead More…
A Family Approach Jean Malpas Therapists working with the families of transgender and gender-expansive youth (TGEY) are facing questions for which there are no easy answers. What’s the best way to respond when parents of a transgender teenager refuse to give access to hormone therapy? Or when the parents of an 8-year-old gender nonconforming childRead More…
Strategies for Surviving and Thriving Patricia Papernow Stepfamilies begin with such high hopes, but all too often they find themselves stuck in toxic cycles of tension and conflict. Although 42 percent of Americans have a close stepfamily relationship, few therapists ever receive solid training in helping their clients in stepfamilies to meet their intense challenges.Read More…
A Radical Approach to Healing Interpersonal Wounds Janis Abrahms Spring Forgiveness has been held up as the gold standard of recovery from interpersonal injuries, but in real life, hurt parties often find that they can’t or won’t forgive, particularly when the offender is unrepentant or dead. In this workshop, you’ll learn to reframe the healingRead More…
Changing the Family Dance Lynn Lyons Anxiety can be a very persistent master. When it moves into families, it takes over daily routines, schoolwork, and recreation. To make matters worse, the things adults (including many therapists and school staff) do to help anxious children can actually make the anxiety stronger. Fortunately, research shows that what weRead More…
How Therapists Can Help Parts 1 & 2 Phyllis Booth & Dafna Lender Unlike teens, young children can’t readily talk about feelings, don’t sit in one place, and often can’t follow rules and directions, even when you’re playing a game. So how can you incorporate these crucial family members into your sessions in a wayRead More…
