Family Counselling
Families
Family counselling is recommended when the issue involves or affects more than one member of the family unit. For instance, when a child's negative behaviour has an impact on the siblings and parents, it is usually more helpful to work with the entire family rather than just the child or the "identified client." Families typically attend counselling to work on issues around communication, blended (step) family relationships, separation and divorce, parent/child conflict, child behavioural problems (such as anxiety, acting out, aggression), life transitions, substance use and building family relationships.
Parents
Parent counselling is suggested when it is more practical to work with the parents only. Examples of such times are when children are too young to understand, children do not want to be involved in the counselling process or the issues can simply be resolved by focusing on parenting. Parents may seek help to: learn how to discipline effectively, deal with youth substance use, transition as new parents, learn how to manage child issues, co-parent through separation and divorce, enhance communication skills to improve parenting effectiveness.
Couples
Couples counselling is for heterosexual and same-sex couples who are experiencing problems in their relationship. Some of the common reasons to attend counselling include conflict resolution, communication, trust and forgiveness, relationship enrichment, marital transitions (e.g. commitment, marriage, children), infidelity, exploration of separation/divorce/relationship termination.