Imagine one specific counselling situation where you as a professional encounter our fictitious family (see the examples we collected).

What do the three assumptions mean in relation to the family?

The father has a posttraumatic double vision (e.g. after work incident) -> because of a ocular muscle paralysis

Father: not able work due to double vision -> financial problems -> frustration because he cant provide for the family -> feeling of failure -> overwhelming -> employer doesnt understand what the problem is -> "excuse", "too lazy to work"

Mother: doesnt understand the symptoms & consequences -> frustration & fear -> existential crisis

Kids: fear of going back to refugee shelter & losing friends due to financial crisis -> new routine & surroundings, big changes

Individual occupational therapy session with the older child due to struggles in school

A: Teacher, Other students, Therapist, parents all have different views

B: teacher might perceive the action of the student as rude or lazy due to not understanding why he is acting this way

C: the language and the new cultural context are disturbance to the reality of the child

For the teacher the lived experience of the child might cause a disturbance to their reality

every Person from Family have an Own Reality and other „Problems“

When the family lived in Greece and was only living on donations it could have been really frustrating as the father would rather get a job as an accauntant than living on the donations but for the social workers and etc. it could have seemed as that they should be grateful just for the donations

specific Situation: second child receives Therapy (SLT and OT) while attending Kindergarten

Factor 1: In the reality/experiences of the family, an articulation problem may not be of much importance, especially if the sound doesn’t occur in the language spoken at home. Stigmas about their child receiving therapy might be present in culture/family.

Factor 2: Intentions and wishes about therapy outcomes need to be made clear and transparent. Important for us as therapists to distinguish our observations about the family from our pretences and opinions.

Factor 3: Parents may not want to hear or can’t accept information about the child needing therapy. Maybe in their own culture the problems the child faces or after their experiences they think that there are bigger problems.