The therapeutic relationship with the teenage client

Sometimes when you run a workshop you end up leaving with more questions than answers. This happened to me recently at a workshop on “Counselling with teenagers” in Belgrade. Here is a picture of me with the group.

Sometimes I get a question or group discussion where I don’t have a response and it sparks some more thinking and research on the topic for me.

At one point in this workshop I was asked about my approach to the counselling of teenagers and did I come from a parent position. That is do I see my self in a parent type role with the teenager. This did not mean necessarily in a Critical Parent type of role but overall do I feel like a parent type person when working with the teenager.

As I thought about the answer I found this question perplexed me. I obviously had not thought about the topic in detail before. My initial response to the question was yes and no. Which obviously is not a clear answer because I did not have a clear answer. As I thought about it at the time the ‘yes & no’ answer was right for me but I did not answer the question to my satisfaction (or the participants I would imagine).

How do I relate to the younger client?

As the discussion continued someone then said that as I did not see myself in a clear parent position then did I relate to the teenagers in a sort of peer role. Like a friend to the teenager. My answer to this was with a more definite, “No”.

Then it was stated that if I did not come from a parent type role or a friend type role what was my role? My answer to this was, I don’t know.

Travelling to Serbia and Croatia from Australia means I am on the road for about 24 hours (well more in the air than the road). I find this very useful time in that I can do precisely what I did in this instance. On the trip back I basically sought to answer the question that was asked and could not answer for the group.

The time allowed me to make many notes and formulate my thinking on the question of the therapeutic relationship with the teenage client. I now have a much fuller answer to the question should I ever be asked it again.

I understand now why I was perplexed with the question and did not have a clear answer. After much deliberation on the subject my answer involves articulating a complex set of relationships which I will do in the near future.

It seems I got something out of the workshop as well!

Graffiti