 Hosted by the Family Institute for Education, Practice & Research For audio please call and enter the code # Any technical difficulties please call: This webinar will begin shortly….

 Hello & Introductions  Case Presentations o Scenarios 1-5  Open Share after each scenario is presented  Wrap up & Discussion  Survey

Hello & Introductions

A goal in one consultation I completed was to assist an adult client gain more independence from her parents. We began the meeting with a list of the client’s accomplishments from the past year. The parents seemed to be very proud of her. When we began talking about the fact that the client is a grown woman and should be making some decisions on her own to gain more independents, the parents refused to accept the fact that this young woman could manage anything on her own…right down to how she should dress. It was like a wall came up right in the middle of the consultation that I could not budge. The client shut down as the parents argued their case. I felt I couldn’t protect my client at that moment so I quickly ended the consultation by telling them we could reschedule another one in the future.

I met with my client numerous times to prepare for the CCFC. We seemed to be on the same page with who to involve (the client had identified many support people) and we spent a lot of time on the “What Ifs” section during the pre-planning. The client wanted me to outreach to the particular support person on my own which I did. This person refused to partake in the CCFC. When I told my client about the situation he was truly disappointed to the point where I couldn’t get him to discuss any of the other support people that he had mentioned in the past.

During a CCFC my client’s father just kept telling him he needed to get off social security disability and get a job. We were there to talk about housing but the father dominated the CCFC by constantly turning it back to my client getting a job. I couldn’t get the father to talk about anything else.

My client wanted to have a CCFC to talk to his mother about joining a community social group that works with people that have mental illness. The mother was on board with idea and agreed to come in for the CCFC to discuss the details. However, the client’s sister also came in for the CCFC and was completely against her brother joining the group because she didn’t want anyone in the neighborhood to know that her brother suffered from mental illness. The agreed agenda between the client and myself was to discuss the details of the community social group. I was not aware that the sister, who is very influential to my client, was not okay with this idea. I felt like I needed to do some education on stigma and mental illness but didn’t want to change the agenda without talking with my client first.

Often when a family member is trying to support the recovery of the of their loved one, they struggle to allow the client to experience the natural consequences ( having increased symptoms or moving away from the family’s care and tracking for safety, sometimes even becoming hospitalized or homeless). Helping families to understand the importance of taking these risks can be scary but can often be the most supportive way of helping their loved ones.

Can anyone think of any other challenging family Issues that they have concerns about?

 The next webinar will be made available on our website at  The next webinar topic will be on feedback from the Learning Community webinars, online meetings and booster sessions in o Discussion questions o Format of the webinars, online meetings and booster sessions o Which ones were helpful and not helpful?  Topic suggestions for future webinars, online meetings, booster sessions and/or guest speakers.  Open Discussion o Would like to hear from programs about any suggestions or thoughts concerning any of the webinars, online meetings or booster sessions.  Please complete the following survey