238 | Transitioning from Directive to Non-Directive: From Moms in the Room to Letting Go of Plans

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You're listening to the Play Therapy Podcast with Dr. Brenna Hicks.

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Your source for centered and focused play therapy coaching.

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Hi, I'm Dr. Brenna Hicks, The Kid Counselor.

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This is the Play Therapy Podcast where you get a master class in child-centered,

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play therapy

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and practical support and application for your

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work with children and their families.

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In today's episode. I am answering a question from Alyssa in California.

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Hello, Alyssa. Hello to all of my West coast friends.

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We have gone to three

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baseball stadiums in California.

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So that's about the extent of my knowledge of Cali, but

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actually my best friend from college lived there.

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I surfed in Dana Point with her and rock climbed in Dana Point. So

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those are my experiences in Cali, but

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glad to have you writing in Alyssa. Thank you for the email.

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And her question is about starting with

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a child dealing with separation anxiety

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and bringing the mom into the play session and then working back out of that.

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And then second question is going into play sessions.

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What should, what should there be in a play therapists mind?

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So I appreciate the question.

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We'll read through some of the email together and then we'll process.

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Hi, Brenna, I'm a therapist in training, working with children at my site.

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I'm doing my best to utilize CCPT in the playroom.

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Question number one,

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I began therapy with bringing the parent for the first sessions.

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The child has separation anxiety and she's six.

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We've had a couple of sessions with mom in the room and one with just her. And I,

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how can I start the process of it being just the two of us?

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I was reading your transcript for an episode

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and it said,

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I explain how to manage these moments by acknowledging the child's feelings,

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setting the limit that the playroom is just for the child and therapist

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and offering choices that help the child feel more in control of the situation.

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I was thinking of telling the child that after two more sessions,

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we would begin just having sessions with the two of us or something like that.

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What options do I give?

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And then the second question,

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should I come to play sessions with activities in mind?

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I'm the type to usually have a plan.

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Oh, you're gonna throw that out the window, Alyssa. So

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some of this is unfamiliar. Should I come into session with a few activities in mind?

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And the child chooses from those? What do you think?

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What if there's something specific that needs attention?

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I hope this makes sense. Ok.

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So let's do one and then the other.

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First,

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there are actually quite a few therapists

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that have reached out that said that they've

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started out with the parent coming back or the parent being in the session.

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I actually did a discovery call a while back with a therapist who

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protocol at her place of employment is the parent

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is present the whole time for every session.

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And I actually ended up speaking to her supervisor and I tried to

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kind of share some insight as to why in CCPT that's not

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advised.

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And

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she just, she really bucked me hard and said that

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every place she's ever worked for 20 years,

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the parent has always been included in the entire session.

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And I'm sitting there going,

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how are you preserving confidentiality? Then

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you either have to say that it's not therapy,

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it's parent coaching or it's family hangout or it's something.

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So if you want to call it something else,

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but you cannot call it therapy if the parent is in

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the room every single session because

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there's no preservation of confidentiality.

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So

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anyway, I was off on a tangent there, but

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I know a lot of therapists that

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have said that they've brought parents in

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and then they're not really sure how to backpedal their way out of that. So

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if the expectation is set from the very beginning that

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the playroom is just for

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the therapist and child, obviously, that's an ideal scenario. So

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when you set that expectation from the beginning,

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even with a child with separation anxiety,

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the child will eventually come back.

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So you may have sessions where the child is unwilling or

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unable to go back to the playroom at the start,

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but the child will eventually choose to go back

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and then the parent has never been a part of the process.

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But if at some point, the parent has already been included,

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the the most effective way to handle that, Alyssa is exactly what you said.

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So you provide expectations and you

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basically set a limit with enforcement choices.

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So I actually think it's a very helpful plan to say after two more sessions,

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we would just have the two of us.

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However, the fact that she's already done one session with just the two of you.

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I don't know that you have to wait two sessions.

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So if you were actively still bringing mom or dad in

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every single session, I think it would be helpful to prepare

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in two more.

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It's just going to be the two of us because that gives the child the opportunity

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to acclimate to the idea.

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However, it's, you mentioned that she's come in with you just the two of you.

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So at that point,

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I would say you probably could just jump to

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moving forward. We're not having any more sessions with mom.

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But

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if you're going to go through the process,

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you would say something like

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I know in the past sometimes mom has come in,

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but the playroom is just for you and me

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and then this is where we pivot to the choices.

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So

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the goal is that the choices

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make it clear that the child has control,

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but it is not about the parent being in the room.

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In other words,

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the choices are not about

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the parent at all. The choices are about

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other things over which the child does have control. So for example,

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you might say

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you can choose to run back to the playroom with me or

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you can choose to skip back to the playroom with me.

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Which do you choose?

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Notice? Now the choices are, how are we getting to the playroom

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versus whether or not mom is coming back?

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Or

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you can choose to have mom come in and see what

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we've been doing at the two minute warning or you can

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choose to have mom come and see what we did at the end of our session when our time is up.

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Which do you choose?

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Now it's when is mom going to come back after the session is already over?

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Another option would be

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you can choose to have mom sit in this chair and wait for you or

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you can choose to have mom sit in this chair and wait for you.

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Which do you choose?

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Notice that in every scenario,

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there is empowerment,

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there is giving the child a measure of control.

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But the choices are actually about

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other things not related to the parent being in the room.

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And the fact that she's already gone back with you.

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I don't think this is going to be a big power struggle for her.

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I think she already feels more comfortable

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and the separation anxiety is probably not so alarming to her with you.

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At this point, I'm not saying she still doesn't have separation anxiety, but

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I think you've proven going back to the playroom with her that she can

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trust you and that the playroom is safe and the relationship is there.

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So that's the way that I would handle that.

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But keep in mind for all of you that are struggling to kind

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of get your way out of the parent has been in the room.

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It's about setting clear expectations.

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It's about warning the child ahead of time

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and it's about enforcing those choices because I've had a lot

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of therapists email me and reach out to me and say

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the child started uncontrollably screaming and crying

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and I felt like I was torturing the kid and I thought it was traumatic and

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I thought that I had to let the mom and dad come into the room.

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You don't,

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you reassure and you reflect and you validate and you acknowledge and you

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continue to return responsibility and you continue to remind them of the limit.

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They have separation anxiety because

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they have used a parent as a crutch to help them regulate their emotions.

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So yeah, are their emotions going to get big sometimes? Absolutely.

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But you reassure and you validate and you reflect the feeling

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and you continue to remind them as soon as our play time is over,

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you get to go see mom again

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and it helps them realize that they do not need to have their parent present.

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Now, we never force a child to come back to the playroom.

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I wanna make that really clear.

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But if the child chooses to come back

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and then immediately says, I wanna go see mom,

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that's where a limit is set because

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our play time isn't up yet and our play time is for having

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in the playroom and the playroom is just for you and me,

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the child can regulate and comply with those boundaries.

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But we have to be very clear on them and

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we can't waiver on them once they've been established.

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Ok.

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So I hope that's helpful. Now, let's move on to question two.

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Should I come to a session with play activities in mind?

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Hard. No.

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Said lovingly and gently. All right.

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I'm usually the type to have a plan. So some of this is unfamiliar. Alyssa.

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Welcome to the recovered control freak group.

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I,

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I suppose some of us were never control freaks and that's why

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we loved CCPT but I am a recovered control freak.

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My husband tells me that I want control in

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almost every arena of my life except with kids,

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which is really bizarre.

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I guess I've learned how to manage that.

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Here's the thing, Alyssa,

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you don't ever come into session with activities in mind.

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The child-centered playroom

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is the child chooses,

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it's child led

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so the playroom is full of choices.

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Everything in the playroom is a choice.

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Everything in the playroom is an activity.

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So we do not need to come with anything planned, anything on the agenda,

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anything in mind

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because our prompts to the child is you can play with

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all the toys in most of the ways that you'd like.

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And then the child chooses the activity, the child chooses what they play.

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We do not have to have anything scripted.

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So your final question,

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what if there's something specific that may need attention?

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The child knows what that

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specific thing is

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and they know they need to address it

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and they will

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given the time the tools and the opportunity.

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So I, I actually started, I think I've shared this story before,

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but it's relevant here too.

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I started my Florida Association for play therapy

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training.

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It was basically a seminal

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course in CCPT

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and I started the whole thing with,

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if you are a control freak,

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you are probably not well suited for CCPT unless you can curb it.

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So be mindful that

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the fact that you like to have a plan for

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things that works in lots of arenas of your life,

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I'm sure.

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But the CCPT way and the child-centered playroom

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is that we trust that the child knows, we trust that the child will do the work

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and we do not have to have an agenda. And this flies in the face of managed care.

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It flies in the face of EHR

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it flies in the face of soap notes,

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it flies in the face of smart goals.

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It flies in the face of documentation for reimbursement

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because they think that you're supposed to quote, do something.

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Well, let's circle back. My vets are gonna know this.

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If you're new, I might blow the lid off your mind right now.

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We don't do CCPT.

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Therefore,

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we don't have to have an activity.

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We don't have to have a plan.

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We don't have to have an agenda

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or curriculum or intention

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or anything.

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We need to know the child's name and the child's name only.

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We don't even need backstory.

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That's really gonna blow people's minds.

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Talk to a directive play therapist and say I don't even need to do any intake.

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All I need is the child's name. What?

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You're crazy.

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You need biopsychosocial, you need history, you need this, you need that.

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You need reports from mom.

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No, you don't.

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You need the child's name.

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You don't go in with anything

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because it's not that we're doing CCPT.

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We are

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CCPT

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it's just that simple.

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It is a way of being.

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So you go into the playroom

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with the child's name,

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you get out of the way

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and you let the child do what the child knows that they need to do.

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It's that simple.

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It is very, very complex and it requires so much,

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but it is just that simple.

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So Alyssa, thank you so much for the questions. I hope that that was helpful.

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I hope it was helpful for all of you.

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If you all want to have me answer a question,

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please email me brenna@thekidcounselor.com. You can also leave a message

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in the States on the voicemail line 813-812-5525.

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I love y'all. We'll talk again soon. Bye.

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Thank you for listening to the Play Therapy Podcast

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with Dr. Brenna Hicks for more episodes and resources.

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Please go to www.playtherapypodcast.com.