FAMILY COUNSELING

At the Julianna Poor Memorial Counseling Center at Houston's First Baptist Church we have developed a “Team” approach to meeting the needs of the families that come in for counseling. Often when a family has issues or a crisis one or two individuals are the focus. We have come to believe that the best way to see those individuals succeed and for the family to succeed is to get everyone involved. We see the family as a team with each person having an important role in change. Parent(s) are the leaders who often need some more specific direction in how to deal with their children. Children are still growing and learning and need some help sometimes expressing what they need or how to relate to siblings. Our goal is to help parents understand how to relate to their children in a way that is beneficial for both and provide a safe way for children to express themselves.

What’s available for parents and children at JPMCC?

A Family Team of 10 – 12 well-trained therapists, led by Greg Curnutte and Mary Ring, are ready to serve your family as the need arises.
Assessments are available to determine what type of service would best suit your family’s need. A child’s behavior is only a symptom of a needed change. If the focus of treatment is only a change of behavior, many times we are changing the symptom but not getting to the root of the problem.
Treatment processes are used to help the relationship improve among family members or help your child adjust to life changes or emotional difficulties that come into his/her life.
Parenting seminars are regularly scheduled as part of the treatment process and provide Biblically sound information and support for developing a parenting strategy as you go through the various stages of development with your child(ren).
Family Camps provide an opportunity to spend a day enriching your knowledge base for the parenting style you have while your child has opportunity to experience sensory rich activities with other children of similar age. Another part of this camp experience is multi-family group times when each family has some great experiential times together that enrich the family relationships. Family camps are held around the type of family formation present such as foster/adopt, blended or biological.

What types of problems does the family team serve?

Anxiety/Depression (not medication)
ADD/ADHD coping and management skills (not medication)
Anger/Aggressiveness
Relationship Issues either familial or social
Grief situations
Inferiority/Incompetency
Selective Mutism
Foster/Adopt issues
Behavioral management
School concerns
Divorce/Blended family
Sexual abuse or unhealthy exposure

These are some of the main issues, but others come up and are treated because of the many various kinds of life experiences that can happen.

If I should decide that my child or our family could possibly benefit by coming to the counseling center what could I expect when I make the call to the center?

Information would be taken about your need and given to the administrative assistant responsible for scheduling parent intakes. At the present time this is Miss Rebekah Anderson.
This designated administrative assistant would then soon return your call and set up a parent intake (with no children present) with one of the family team members to gather all the pertinent information needed to determine what assessments are best for your child/family.
The family team meets weekly to discuss the intakes and determine what assessments are needed. Shortly after this meeting you will be called to schedule the assessments that will help determine the treatment process that would best suit your concern.
Once the assessment is finished, a feedback session will be scheduled with the parents only to develop the treatment protocol that will be used either with your child or as a family depending on the concerns needing to be addressed.

What are the various types of therapy used to serve children and/or families?

Play therapy – when a child goes into the special playroom that is set up with various sets of play items to help elicit particular emotions as a child “plays” out emotions surrounding life issues that are disturbing for him/her. All team members are trained in play therapy and consult with one another and get supervision as needed to assure the best possible treatment.
Art therapy – an art therapy is an experiential process that is used to help children and families explore relationships and communication. Caroline Marcos is a marriage and family therapist that has been trained in art therapy and serves on the family team to guide the use of this modality.
Movement/music therapy – this is another experiential therapy that is used with children and families to explore and build better understanding of how to “move” through a difficult situation. Nancy Williams is a licensed therapist that is trained using movement and music for therapeutic purposes and helps the team to develop and provide what is needed in this area.
Theraplay – Theraplay is a modality that helps create a balanced and meaningful relationship between parent and child as well as among other family members. All family team members are trained in using Theraplay principles and Mary Ring is certified as a Theraplay therapist and trainer.
Talk therapy – talk therapy is used at times with children but many times they do not have the ability to express the depth of their emotions about in a particular situation and experiential therapies help in doing this to a greater degree and resolve the issue for the child at a deeper level.