My Best Friend B. Jr.

Making a genogram can enhance one’s training as a helping professional by laying out points in a person’s life and family that have caused distress and could affect practice in the future. By self realizing the crisis points in one’s family it can help to identify triggers that could lead to countertransference as well as resurfacing of old traumas during counseling or leading a group. Plotting out one’s life is a way to organize a family especially if there are multiple marriages of parents and non-traditional family ties within a standard family tree. By knowing where you come from and the experiences that shape your family you can better

A genogram is more than a family tree. It is a visual interpretation of a family and their relationships. A genogram says a lot about a family. It uses symbols to describe the relationships between family members. One can use a genogram to tell the dynamics of a family. Sometimes, there are patterns that are passed down generation to generation. The purpose of this paper is to go into more detail about what a genogram is and what it means. Also, I have provided a genogram of my family on the last page. I will spend most of the time talking about my family and what our genogram means. Different people in my family have different relationships with one another. There are several characteristics I see that have been passed down.

My genogram has three generations and includes the most important or influential people in my family life. The genogram includes my grandparents on both my dad and mom’s side, my parents, their siblings, and spouses, and on the bottom row, my siblings and I. My family has had unique challenges personally and systematically that created a stronger bond as the years went on. Though, today, we are spread out around the country, our familial connections have been strong overall.

There are two approaches that I would like to somehow integrate into the assessment process which are Bowen’s genogram and narrative therapy line of questioning. Both approaches can help come up with a complete picture of the family, along with uncovering the family’s story. An article written addressed how integrating a classic family therapy technique can be used in the context of narrative therapy. The author suggested that genograms create a unique opportunity to explore and re tell stories which assists the family in re-authoring (Chrzastowski, 2011). According to our reading Re authoring is when a family member already ascribed a certain belief about their lives. Furthermore, visual devices used in the assessment process can be a great

The Blackford family was the first family that I interviewed. The family consists of three members. Brenda Blackford, the mother, is 53 years old and is a pre-school teacher at Methodist Temple Children’s Center of Evansville, Indiana. Brenda dropped out of college to be with her now husband, and the father, Kurt Blackford. Kurt is 56 years old and is a lot manager at the auto dealership of D-Patrick Nissan, also in Evansville, IN. They have an 18 year old daughter, Caitlin Blackford, who attends Indiana University Bloomington as a freshman. Both parents, and daughter, are Caucasian.

Additionally, incorporating the emotional and relational components into the genogram and asking for input from each family member could elicit thought-provoking discussion and insight for each individual member of the family, in addition to the

Since all families are different, a diagram could potentially assist a client to become aware of many aspects of their family. They construct a diagram in which they are familiar with all of their biological family members or they could construct a diagram in which they are not familiar with their biological family. Although they may not be familiar with their biological family, their adopted family is their family. Being able to see the members represented within the digram can allow the client to understand how theories and therapies can influence knowledge of the client’s

The genogram is an analytical tool, which enables one to visualize the family structure by a succinct and rapid graphic image often over several generations. It shows the alliances and ruptures, the generational repetitions of behaviors of dependence or vulnerability (Phaneuf, (n.d.)). Genograms are used as practical tools in social work practice, both in terms of assessment and intervention. Historically, the genogram is the most commonly thought of in relation to practice with children, adolescents, and families to explore the quality of relationships and behavioral patterns across generations. Diagrammatically, the genogram is an inter-generational map of three or more generations of a family and a primary assessment tool that focuses on inter-generational patterns and relationships among family members. It can represent

derived at this time in life, and quality of relationships. According to Pope, N. D., & Lee, J. (2015) the genogram and ecomap may be defined as a visual tool for exploring a client’s social relationships across time. Typically, these are familial relationships. In general, the genogram is useful in gathering information, understanding relationship dynamics and behavioral patterns, promoting the client’s self-understanding, conducting assessments, and guiding the practitioner to interventions (Pope, N. D., & Lee, J.,2015). Social workers use genograms to gather information like values and ethics. Genograms and Ecomaps are great assessment tools to reduce resistance as family members can see connections, concerns, and family patterns. Furthermore, after processing the information and helping construct the diagram the Ware family seemed to have close bonds with promising relationships. The family has normal misunderstandings like other families but they strongly value each other by working together when they need to collaborate.

The structure of a family is composed of multiple different dynamics. This paper includes an analysis of a family that resides in Central Minnesota and how they function day to day. The family we chose is a family of four, with two daughters; ages two and ten. The information collected from the family during the interview will be broken down into different stages and placed into diagrams to evaluate the strengths and weaknesses within their family. The different aspects relating to the family are: (a) description of the family, (b) genogram showing the relation between each family member and what role they play in the family structure, (c) ecomap demonstrating important features in the family's life, (d) the families stage in relation to Duvall's

The objective of doing the genogram is to get to know the patient by gaining understanding of his/her family background. Assessing the family using systemic approach enables health care providers to learn about the ways in which family members interact, what are the family expectations and norms, how effective is the members communication, who makes decisions and how the family deals with life time stressors (Hockenberry & Wilson, 2007). This paper outlines the assessment and analysis of the three generation of Wits’ and Smiths’ families, its relationship, health pattern, habits, tradition and structure. It also provides a nursing teaching plan. The interview was conduced with Alina Wit, a second generation mother of three.

It was only the second day of school and already our period 2 english class was thrown into a partner activity. We each were assigned a classmate, and Jarrett Borer was mine. I began the interview with a question about his household and family which very quickly brought up sensitive subjects. Jarrett has moved a lot: a total of fifteen times. And he lives with his mother in Florence while only seeing his father infrequently who lives in Texas. The separation of parents is always difficult and a distance of over 2,000 miles is even more so. Although Jarrett’s life at home here is marvelous. His mother is a great cook (so I hear), and uses her southern background in her cooking. Jarrett himself seems at first a classic teenage boy: not interested

(Cohen, 2017) By following the Family development theory you are able to better understand the running of a family and the different dynamics that occur within it. As for the genogram, it can detect patterns in psychological health and hereditary diseases and can show how families can better their relationship for the

Last year, basketball district was the start of it all, but we had no idea. He was sitting there with my best friend, holding her hand but I couldn’t help but to look at him and smile. He was stunning, his smile, his personality, his looks, everything. His name was Jadon. He was so easy to talk to but what we didn’t know is that we would end up together.

Throughout this interview process, it was extremely difficult to find a family not similar to mine. However after many weeks of searching, I found a wonderful family that lives not to far from my hometown, the Lindsay family. While interviewing this family, I spent approximately four hours at their small home in Lake City, TN. This experience was difficult and rewarding at the same time. To me, meeting new people is very hard because I am a really shy person. However, I strived to gather a lot of information from this family because it is very important to get a lot of details. So, therefore, this paper will explain my own family, the Lindsay family, and the comparison amongst our families.