What is Family Consultation? CanAm Interventions Services offers Family Consulting and Case Management for families and their loved ones that has been proven for a high rate of recovery success.
Patti’s beliefs about working with families as interventionist, addiction specialist and family consultant comes from her own research and from helping many families recover.
- What is often heard from families that sent their loved one to treatment is this: “Our loved one did so well in treatment – he conformed to all levels of primary, secondary and outpatient treatment. They were so solid. I don’t understand what happened.
- He was the model recovering person in treatment while he was getting treated for addiction/behavior issues. Then he relapsed as soon as he was not in a confined environment with someone telling them what to do.”
- The next part of the story goes like this: “This is the fifth time he been in treatment and as soon as he completed the treatment program, he relapsed.”
Family Consultation:
- It is best to treat the entire families and advocating for the identified patient.
- The aim of family systemic education/therapy and using recovery tools adaptations is to work on these problems by encouraging family members and their loved ones to build on family strengths and ultimately make useful changes in their lives and relationships.
- Families coming together and learning to work together, leads to new opportunities to obtain resources and appreciate the needs for emotional wellness of each member within the family unit.
Goals of a Family Program: 
- Gain better understanding of how your family functions
- Identify strengths and weaknesses within your family system
- Set family goals and devise strategies to resolve problems
- Develop and build healthy communication skills within your family
- Make useful changes to make your entire family unit stronger
- Establish family agreements and make useful changes for a stronger family unit
Who can benefit from Family Consultation? The purpose of Family Consultation is for the whole family to help to gain education on how to stop destructive patterns, negative reactions and learn how to have a different relationship with your loved one.
- When your loved one accepts Drug Rehab and/or Alcohol treatment – either inpatient, outpatient and/or community-based treatment, family members are so excited that their focus is on the loved one making changes.
- It is the family that needs to make personal changes, too, by gaining support and direction from a family consultant. If the family does not learn a new language on how to communicate with your loved one, the family member can sabotage and interrupt your loved one’s treatment.
How long is Family Consultation? Family Consultation can be available for 3 months, up to 5 years.
- The statistics show that it takes 90 days of recovery treatment to change old behaviors and two years of consistent recovery to change old ways of thinking.
- Engaging families in an exploration of strengths, values, and goals helps to build mutual trust and respect between them. This, in turn, often leads to more successful outcomes.
- This relationship can be built upon when problems arise. In the presence of open communication, families and helpers can work together to identify the informal and formal supports that can reduce or eliminate the factors causing harm or risk.
Steps of Case Management:
- Initial Consultation – Develop a thorough history of the problem and the family dynamics. With this information, we can begin formulating a list of options and a direction of how best to deal with your loved one. It is important to learn effective communication without any debate or negative engagements.
- Preparation – Family consulting requires a commitment from family members by using: Skype, telephone, emails, and texting as needed, to gain better awareness and to learn to communicate with your loved one with a goal of not enabling or feeling like you are being held hostage by their addictive/mental health behaviors.
- Treatment Coordination – Treatment planning, helping your family research Drug Rehabs for your loved one’s placement into treatment and follow up with the recovery center, after the clients enters also following up with the family.
- Family/Patient Assessment – The family consultant will assess each family member and/or patient to make recommendations as needed. The family consultant will also collaborate with the treatment team weekly to follow up on the progress and report the outcome to your family.
- Family Consulting – Family Consulting Session includes: working with individual family members and/or a family group. Sessions are led by Patricia M. Pike and/or her team with a detailed appropriate action plan that is focused on personal self-awareness, gaining new insight and finding solutions on best approaches to support your loved one in treatment.
For more information on interventions, contact www.canaminterventions.com
