Marie Vakakis: [00:00:00] You know that moment when you are working with a teenager in therapy and their parent is sitting in the waiting room hoping for answers, you’re not sure how much to involve them. You’re juggling consent, boundaries, confidentiality. Maybe a part of you wants to bring them in, and another part of you is quietly panicking.

God, what if I say the wrong thing? What if they expect me to fix everything? Hello? And welcome to Inside Social Work. I’m your host, Marie Vakakis, accredited mental health social worker, family and couples therapist, and passionate advocate about strengthening how we work with people in complex systems.

I work with families all the time. I love working with teams. They are my passion. I’ve talked about this so many times before on the podcast, and there are a couple episodes that you can check out where I talk about working with teens and working with families. In today’s episode, I’m sharing a conversation that was originally recorded for the Mental Work podcast with Dr.

Bronwyn Milkins. We dive into something that doesn’t get talked about enough or doesn’t get enough airtime, how to [00:01:00] confidently include parents in the therapeutic work with young people. So this isn’t full family therapy, but young people come with parents, and the parents often wanna know what’s going on.

Maybe they’re anxious, overwhelmed, scared, nervous. What are their teens saying? Maybe they’re talking to you more than they’re talking to the parents, and the parents just wanna know, and they’re panicking and freaking out, or they just drop ’em off and don’t come back until it’s time to pick them up. So many different responses.

We talk about those early fears. Those fears of saying the wrong thing as being seen as too young or too inexperienced of accidentally overwhelming parents who are already stretched thin. We also unpack some of the practical ways to start involving parents, even if you’ve only got 10 minutes at the end of the session.

In this episode, we talk about how to set clear boundaries and expectations with families from the first session, how to manage confidentiality without excluding important carers. How to communicate your limits while still holding your authority and how to shift from fixing to holding the space even when emotions are high.

I share some stories from my early career and how I came to [00:02:00] realise that I was making big assumptions about what families could do, what resources they had access to. And also share some of the tools and scripts I use now to bring parents in with empathy and without overwhelm. Whether you are already working with young people or just starting out.

I hope this episode helps you feel more equipped to collaborate with families behind the scenes, not as a threat to the work, but as an important part of it. And part that can really enrich what you do with your clients and with your young people in therapy. And if you wanna find out more or learn more, there are some on-demand trainings about working with parents and families.

On my website, marie mccarthur.com au. There’ll be a link to that in the show note as well. I hope you enjoyed this episode originally aired on the Mental Works Podcast with Bronwyn Milkins. 

Bronwyn Milkins: Hi Marie. Hello. It’s so nice to have you on. Thank you so much for joining us. Yeah, it’s really exciting. 

Marie Vakakis: I love talking about 

Bronwyn Milkins: working 

Marie Vakakis: with families and parents.

Bronwyn Milkins: Yeah. That’s so cool. And so listeners, Marie is a mental health social worker. She’s a family and couples therapist, and she also has her own podcast called [00:03:00] This Complex Life, which normalises conversations about mental health and relationships, which I think is uber cool. I’ve listened to a few episodes and I think they’re really fantastic and just really practical as well.

So I’d recommend checking it out. And Marie, tell us something else about yourself. What’s outside of. Marie work life look like for you? What’s a 

Marie Vakakis: passion that you have? Oh, I’m an avid hiker. I actually just had a hiking trip planned that got rained out this weekend, so a little bit bummed, but, uh, I like to go out, um, for a couple of day hiking, kind of exploring trips with no phone reception.

It’s just so divine. And yeah, I do yoga in the gym on a more regular basis. 

Bronwyn Milkins: Wow. What a dream. That sounds amazing. The no phone reception in particular. Yeah. A, a dream for some and a nightmare for others, I think. I bet it would be. Marie, I’m curious to know what led you to wanting to come on and talk about this topic of working with families and parents.

Marie Vakakis: It’s sort of partly been my own experience starting off. Uh, my [00:04:00] bachelor degree was actually in psychology and then I realised it actually did have a very individual focus and it didn’t quite land for me. So I moved into social work and then over many years started working with young people and I was like, this is great.

I know how to do this. And then. They came with parents and they’d bring the parents in. I’m like, ah, I don’t know what to do right now. And I felt, you know, I really did them a disservice. I felt like I was just giving parents a flyer or a leaf little saying, this is what you need to do. And really had no understanding of the impact of the system on the young person and making some really, really simple mistakes.

Like I remember giving someone this journal. It was a gratitude journal prompt saying, why don’t you do this at home? Over dinner. You know, Monday had three prompts that you talk about Tuesday, three prompts. And they kind of looked at me and like, we didn’t have dinner together. You know, they didn’t even have a dining table.

And so it was all these assumptions that I would make about, well of course parents are just gonna be capable of doing that, or of course they’re doing this, or why wouldn’t they just do that? And so I went [00:05:00] back and started family therapy. And sort of did some couples therapy training as well and have brought that all in.

And it’s one of the things, once you know it, you can’t unsee it. And so it’s really hard not to think of the impact of the system, especially when working with young people, with people who still live with their parents, who are very much trying their best to navigate their parents’, hopes, dreams, desires, any parent or you know, marriage or conflict, multiple siblings.

Uh, I think it was really important to find a way to. Give that voice, voice and understand that as part of conceptualising what’s happening for that young person. 

Bronwyn Milkins: Yeah. So it was really tapping into your own experiences and noticing perhaps that the strategies that you were giving parents had made some assumptions about what their system looks like and wanting to upskill in that area.

Marie Vakakis: Yeah, absolutely. And even putting words to what. Sometimes families think is really obvious, but they, they don’t say it explicitly. And I’ll, I’ll give you a recent example of a young person. I had the them and their parent in [00:06:00] for a session, and I know the parent thinks their young person is amazing. I think she’s an amazing young person as well.

But throughout the week, they’re fighting about technology, bedtimes, curfews, homework, you know. All the stuff that you would fight about. And she slowly started to forget that her parents actually think she’s this awesome person. So really when I had them in the room, a part of me had to pause the conversation and say, mom thinks you’re amazing, wonderful human.

I actually think you’re incredible. And I don’t know if you get told that or not. And mom’s sitting there going, yeah, of course. I think that, but had never actually said that. And once we could put words to it, the young person could soften to realise mom wasn’t trying to be controlling. Mom was scared and mom couldn’t articulate that.

So then I was able to say, I think mom’s really scared of what might happen. If these things aren’t in place, and then we can have the conversation from a very different position than just, all right, what’s a reasonable curfew and what’s the consequence if you don’t hand your phone in at that time, [00:07:00] and what happens if you’re not home by this time on Saturday?

That would’ve been so just, it wouldn’t have done anything really useful, but actually coming at it with empathy and understanding and thinking what’s happening between them, what’s not being said was so much more powerful in that moment. 

Bronwyn Milkins: Yeah, I think that’s a really good example and a really powerful demonstration of how, considering how the parent feels and how the young person is perceiving their parent.

Is really important to consider rather than just jumping straight to a, a stock standard, say behavioral intervention. 

Marie Vakakis: Yeah, absolutely. ’cause I don’t think it, it lasts. And for, especially for adolescents, attachment and connection are the biggest tool you have. So behavior intervention, you might get compliance if they’re scared of you.

They might be compliant if they’re terrified of being punished. But that’s not respect, that’s not attachment, that’s not security and safety. It might be compliance. Yeah. And I don’t know if that’s what people really want. Mm. 

Bronwyn Milkins: No, it’s a really [00:08:00] great point, and I think even just hearing you speak, it highlights a lot of gaps in my knowledge around this area.

So I don’t work with young people under 18 anymore. I used to, but we didn’t have any parents come in, and we certainly weren’t encouraged to have parents come into our sessions. And I did work with young people. I remember that we were encouraged if the parent requested. To set aside 10 minutes at the end of the session to talk with them, which I always felt was very inadequate, but we just never had the encouragement and the training.

But the way that you are talking about it, it seems essential. 

Marie Vakakis: Yeah. We don’t do it. In my practice, in the therapy hub, we don’t have, um, young people under 18 come without their parents. So we try and get, ideally I’d like to see the parents first if they’ve made the referral. Um, but at least for a good handful of the sessions, they’re in there for half, if not all of it.

Then we have some even parent only sessions with the permission of the young person. Because even something as practical as if I’m teaching someone a grounding technique and [00:09:00] I’m saying something like, every time you’re flooded, I need you to get up, go to the bathroom, splash some water on your face, and the parents don’t know, and they’re having dinner and the young person’s flooded and they go to the bathroom to wash their face.

They might get yelled at. Yeah, they might be told off, why are you leaving the table? Why are you doing so even just being able to. Give context to some of the tools and strategies that we’re experimenting with can mean that the parents don’t accidentally exacerbate that distress or they know how to support, or they might actually be able to use it as a reminder.

So it really feels like there’s such a valuable piece and they want to be involved. They really do. They wanna know what’s happening with the most important person in their life. 

Bronwyn Milkins: Mm. So. I think there’s two things that I’m wondering. I think like from the perspective, early career psychologists, they might feel.

Scared to include parents, or they might want to include parents but not know how to. And then I think there’s this third thing where it’s like sometimes early career [00:10:00] psychologists, they may not be parents themselves and they think, who am I to advise this parent of what they can do? Do I think that I know better than them about their charts that don’t wanna be imposing?

And I’m just wondering if you’ve seen any of these, uh, reactions or attitudes in people you’ve supervised? 

Marie Vakakis: Look, and I think I felt all of them. I don’t have children myself. I’m not actually imposing or or directing anything. I’m actually holding space for that conversation to kind of unravel it. So at any point you start off being a novice.

So it might be that you just bring someone in for 10 minutes and then you talk about that in supervision. Then you might do a little bit of training or listen to a podcast. You know, you can upskill as you go. It’s totally fine. 

Bronwyn Milkins: So don’t have to be perfect at it out of the gate. 

Marie Vakakis: No, and I think that’s even something to overt.

I don’t know if psychologists are very good at doing this. Um, I think actually a lot of therapists aren’t, but I’m, I’m coming more from a stance of actually saying, this is what I can do and these are the [00:11:00] limitations. So even saying, look, I’m not a family therapist, but I really find it valuable to have the parents come in for the last 10 session, 10 minutes of the session.

What I’d like to talk to in this time might not be everything that’s on your bucket list, on your wishlist or whatever. This is what I can offer. So actually holding that professional stance in the room, holding that space and actually just being clear about what you can and can’t offer can still be really reassuring for people.

’cause you’re not going outside your scope 

Bronwyn Milkins: and then you’re not tying them. Look, I can’t offer anything, but you are offering value with the things that you can do. 

Marie Vakakis: Yeah, so you can say, I’ve only got 10 minutes. It’d be great if we had more sessions. If you feel, if I feel it’s needed, I might refer you on to a family therapist in these 10 minutes.

This is what I can do. I can give you a brief update of what I’m doing with your young person. We can have 10 minutes where you can tell me some of your concerns and I can mull it over and see what we do with that in the next session. Or, uh, it’s a chance for us to sort of just look at what’s [00:12:00] working really well and actually just take a moment to reflect on the progress we’ve made so far.

How does that sound, or which option sounds best so you’re not directing and you’re not really telling anything, you’re not prescribing it. You have to do this or you should do this. It’s coming in with this knowledge that they are doing the best they can, that they will be. There will be a very good reason for whatever behavior the parents are exhibiting as well.

And we’re trying to understand that 

Bronwyn Milkins: so much like working with clients, we’re having a very collaborative relationship with our parents and not one where we’re in putting ourselves in a position of authority over them. I mean, we know that doesn’t work for everyone else either. Like nobody likes being told that you should do this.

No, they don’t. No. Yeah, and like that sounds like a really. And inviting approach about letting them know what you can and can’t do, and then inviting them to talk about their concerns and some of the good things as well. I think that maybe touches on another fear that I [00:13:00] reckon early career psychologists have is that.

The parent might be adversarial, like they might think that you as the psychologist, are going to blame them for their child’s behaviors that they see as challenging, and so they’re worried that the parent might be adversarial. What would you say to that? I would 

Marie Vakakis: probably normalise that. I would actually bring the parent in and say, I’m, I’m wondering if a part of you feels that I’m gonna tell you off.

Use some parts and it makes sense. You’ve probably had a number of professionals up until now, not include you, give you medication, give you scripts, tell you this, and it makes sense that you would feel like you can’t trust me. This is what I can provide. How do we work together? Like you can actually overt that and then problem solve that with the parent.

And say, I know you are doing the best you can. You keep showing up, you keep dropping them off at our appointments. You keep paying the fees or taking time off work, like I know you are doing everything you can. 

Bronwyn Milkins: Wow, that’s such a beautiful approach. [00:14:00] Normal and really normalising that for them. Yeah, of course.

Like it’s like as soon as you say it, I’m like, oh yeah, duh. That makes heaps of sense. And I’m just wondering, like, do you find that that approach is helpful and is effective? 

Marie Vakakis: Well, everybody will have different levels of what they’re hoping to get out of, of a session, but it’s a lot harder to like, it’s not disingenuine, I’m not being secretive, I’m being honest.

Like that’s probably their fear and. I want to work with them. I’ve got them there in that moment. I can offer something that might take it on a different track. 

Bronwyn Milkins: I’m curious about parents who might not trust you as well in that maybe they’re, they’re experiencing burnout. The parent themselves, maybe they’ve lived a long time with behaviors that they see in their child, which.

I guess are associated with some stress to them and they’re thinking, look, I want help, but when I come to see the therapist, are they gonna [00:15:00] provide me with strategies or suggestions that add to my mental load rather than alleviate it like, you know, they’re at the, the end of their ropes. I, I have a feeling that this is gonna be the, discuss it with them, but I’m curious to hear what you think.

Marie Vakakis: I think that’s really tricky because there are some things that do take longer to start with and then pay off later. So if you’re thinking about, I always picture like a little kid on a high chair and it’s easy to just shovel the food in their mouth and get it over it done with, rather than see them grab a meatball, throw it on the floor, pick up the spaghetti, swing it around you, learn to use their their hands.

So it might be in talent, using an analogy with a parent and actually saying. I know that this sounds like a lot. What’s the minimum viable product? That might have the biggest gain. And for some people it might be, you know, that they get a lift to the bus stop and that two minutes in the car they just get to connect.

Maybe it’s, they need a text message or a meme throughout the day to feel like their [00:16:00] parents thinking of them. It’s actually figuring out what is a small bit that might not be so taxing. And often those bits are the ones that involve connection because we get a lot more. You know, responsiveness from a young person if they feel connected to their parent, if they feel that there’s respect there.

So it’s really hard to say without knowing the individual circumstances, but I would acknowledge that saying, this is hard. It’s really, really hard, and I don’t have a quick fix. And sometimes that, that’s the truth because it might involve, we might need, you know, you might need to think of babysitters and going to, you know, work stuff and find there’d be a million things.

So it’s actually thinking, well, what is within my scope? What’s the bit that I can change in the time that I have them here with me and maybe in the commute home? 

Bronwyn Milkins: Yeah. Again, I think that’s a really beautiful approach and it speaks to like how, how, I guess like calm and collaborative you seem to be in your approach with families, which is really fantastic.

I’m just trying to think of any other anxieties that I can think of, [00:17:00] and then I’ll ask you if there’s any that we haven’t touched on. I think one. Which might be common for early career therapists is this imposter syndrome, so that the parent is gonna work out that the therapist doesn’t know anything when the therapist actually does know things.

So one, it’s like, you know, a therapist kind of thing, not acknowledging their skills and knowledge in the area. But I think the early career therapists can be like, they’re gonna work out that I’m an idiot here and that I dunno anything about what to do with their family and with their system. And I guess I’m wondering, have you experienced this?

And if so, how did you manage it? 

Marie Vakakis: I still experience it all the time. And then depending on the person or the family, I might be really honest. Like when I first started working with, uh, trans folk for example, I had a, a person I was working with. I’m like, look, this is where my knowledge is limited. Uh, I will keep learning ’cause it’s an area that I’m going to explore.

If you outgrow what I can offer, refer you on. But I’m happy to keep learning and keep [00:18:00] doing my training and understand more about. Transitioning and the hormones and the side effects and all of this stuff. And if this works for you, we’ll keep talking. So for some, I really overt. I’m learning about this topic and does that work with you?

And for other people it can be sort of holding space in the session. You can hold space without having to know a lot, and then you can case conceptualise afterwards. You can hold space for the session. And if people are really pressuring you saying, look, I can see this is really important and I’m not going to do your family justice if I jump in right now with a solution because I need some more information.

So you, you know, you can model that authenticity. You can role model. Boundary setting of what you’re prepared to do, and you can role model that. I value this and I’m going to think about it a little bit in between our sessions. I’m going to chat with my supervisor or I’m going to map it all out and I’m gonna come back to you next session with a little bit more structure or with some feedback of what came to mind.

How does that sound? [00:19:00] So it’s really showing people they’re important. You are prepared to learn a little bit more and you’re not just making it up. And I still think that kind of honesty. Will get you better therapeutic rapport. 

Bronwyn Milkins: I agree. It it to me, like hearing you say that it really seems that you don’t seem to have any embarrassment or negative.

Feelings about what the limitations of your scope are, so you’re not like, oh, I’m such a failure for not knowing this thing. It’s really just medium reality where it’s at and being like, look, I’m good at these things and I can do this and I can offer this. However, this is where the scope of my knowledge lies and ends.

How does that land for you? Is that right? 

Marie Vakakis: Yeah, because a lot of the, a lot of the additional training I’ve been doing myself and PO listening to podcasts and thinking about what the user experience is like, that’s the stuff that people complain about when they go to see a therapist. They don’t care if we’re schema trained, [00:20:00] EMDR, trained Act, that that makes no sense to them often.

They wanna know that the person is being honest, they’re reliable, they know that therapeutic relationship. You know, if you look at a, is it like a common factors approach or something like that, those are the skills that matter more than any of the other modalities. So being really clear on those and talk about the talking what you’re going to do seems to be a lot easier for us.

Because we don’t have to feel like we’re stretching ourselves away out of our comfort zone, and it’s also being open, honest, and realistic with the person in front of us. 

Bronwyn Milkins: Amazing. Yes. I love that. And I find that reassuring too, that anxious part of me. So I hope listeners find that reassuring as well to hear.

I’m very validating. I’m just wondering, Marie, are there any other anxieties that you’ve had in working with parents and families that we haven’t talked about? 

Marie Vakakis: There are a few, but I, I wanted to just pick on something you said about your anxieties. I actually think that sometimes, depending on [00:21:00] the context, you can actually bring that to the session.

Of course, if the, if the person in front of you is tugging something, there’s a chance they do that to other people, and so you might be able to say, A part of me really wants to jump in and rescue you. Right? Maybe there’s something in their, in the way they’re speaking or in the way they’re acting, that’s.

Bringing people to them to rescue them. So you might say, look, a part really wants to jump in and rescue. Another part of me just wants to give you the biggest hug and tell you it’s going to be okay. And another part of me also wants to just run away because I think, wow, this must be a lot. And if we open this box, it’s gonna be a can of worms.

Oh man. Sometimes all these parts are happening at once. So you can over, you can overt that to them. Right. 

Bronwyn Milkins: I love that. It’s like, yeah. So it really is noticing your own feelings and reactions that you have with different clients and bringing that to the surface and discussing it. ’cause it might be something like you say, that [00:22:00] you’re being pulled into or that there might show up in relationships outside of the therapeutic space.

Absolutely. It’s information. Yeah. So it’s not feelings to be afraid of or feelings that you always have to neutralise straight away. It can be feelings that are useful therapeutically. They can be, 

Marie Vakakis: and it’s then it’s in your supervision to start to work out what is information in the room and what is a sensitivity for you or something that’s triggering a response that’s not really matching that situation.

And that’s in the stuff you either talk about in supervision or in your own personal therapy. So it’s on a continuum. We don’t wanna say all feelings are bad, but we don’t want all reactions to be. As well. So it’s using the, your discretion with, is this going to be helpful in the moment if this person is lacking some relational skills or some insight.

If I share these parts of me, feel these things, might that be helpful for our work together. 

Bronwyn Milkins: Hmm. [00:23:00] So cool. Maria, I think where I want to jump to next is I’m really curious about how to involve families. Like I know that’s the topic of the episode, but like, I guess, yeah, having been trained in a one-to-one framework involving another party, another person in the system like blows my mind.

I’m like, how do I conceptualise that? How, what are the, what are my ethical obligations? Like, are they my client? Are both the clients? I don’t get it. 

Marie Vakakis: I think when you are, if you’re doing family therapy, then the system is the client. Got it. So it’s like with couples therapy, that’s very different. If you’re bringing parents into a young person’s session, the young person is your client, so you are still maintaining their confidentiality and whatever boundaries you have around that.

And I think even bringing the parents in for that initial discussion about confidentiality, it can be really helpful. So bringing them in, sitting everyone down, introducing yourself, introduce how you like to work, [00:24:00] uh, what your. Uh, expectations are of them and how you, like, you can set that up and normalise that.

You can say, you know, we have, you know, you a young person here. Look, I don’t know that I’m going to be able to understand everything in the first few sessions, so it might take up to three or four for me to really understand what’s happening after session six is when I send you back to your gp, if you’ve got a mental healthcare plan, so you can involve parents into that.

And then say, what we talk about is private between us. So I’m not going to pick up the phone and tell your parents or call your school unless I’m worried about your safety or the safety of someone else. And then parents. I’m not going to keep secrets. So if you email me a concern, I’m not going to say, well, you know, you know, so you can talk about how you hold that room and what your boundaries are about conversations in between sessions, uh, what you want, what communication is.

Okay? You might ask the young person, look, I’m gonna call your parents when there’s a billing issue or scheduling issue. Um, you know, blah, blah, [00:25:00] blah. So. It’s still actually, that could be where you start, is actually just setting your boundaries, understanding, confidentiality, and letting them know what to expect.

And that can then help the parents adjust their expectations of what you know, are they gonna get emails every day or are they expecting to be involved? Or they then start to know this is what we can expect from this person. 

Bronwyn Milkins: So it’s really setting up a frame of how you work and what. What the boundaries are.

I think that’s really great. I’m just interested to know, like you sound very practiced when you say those things, like those phrases that you say, and I’m wondering, was that like an experience thing? Did you have to practice saying that and really remember to say about like between session and communications?

Was it a thing you built over time? It’s often a thing I built over 

Marie Vakakis: time because something went wrong and I was like, oh, I have to do this now. But you know, whenever I’ve learned something, even in my couple’s therapy, and even now sometimes if there’s a [00:26:00] particular thing, I wanna make sure I still have a notepad in front of me and I’ll make sure I go through some of the questions like I’m not.

I don’t find anything wrong with that. So it might be that you sit there and be like, look, I’ve just got some admin that I wanna make sure I go through, so I cover everything. Grab out your notepad or your iPad or whatever you’ve got and say, I just wanna make sure that you understand these things so you can actually give yourself a little checklist and use that to redirect your attention and focus so that you can go through it so it feels contained and composed.

People often don’t mind unless you’re. Sitting there with the piece of paper blocking the two of you, and it’s at a desk, like you’re at a medical clinic, you know, if you’re considered of your body language, you know, they’re sitting at a comfortable distance. You’ve got your notepad sort of next to you.

Most people, they don’t mind that stuff, especially if you’re being honest and say, I just wanna make sure I don’t miss anything. And then, uh, I’ll put the notepad away or like, it, it’s still, it’s just talking about your process. Normalising that for you and the clients. 

Bronwyn Milkins: Yeah. I love that you said that because I still do that.

So I’m like three years [00:27:00] now into being a generally registered psychologist and even as a provisional psychologist, I would literally bring textbooks in and be like, I’m not too sure of this. I wanna make sure I get it right. And I would just have the book there, and I’ve never had. A client pushback, or I guess it ha it overtly affect our relationship.

In fact, it’s enhanced it by me being authentic about the limitations of my knowledge and that I’m really trying here and I wanna make sure I do the right thing by you. 

Marie Vakakis: I think that’s a really great way to do it. And it, it takes the pressure off because you can’t be an expert in any 

Bronwyn Milkins: everything. I know it’s impossible.

Yeah. And nobody expects you to either. Like, that would just be nuts. 

Marie Vakakis: Yeah. But if you’re going to try it, try it with one of the bits that feels the least. You know, challenging for you. So maybe it’s the next intake you just, you bring the, you’re like, oh, is that your parents in the waiting room? How about we bring them in?

I’ll just have them in for five minutes. I’ll do my little spiel and then they can leave. And you might just start with that. Uh, you might start with, maybe you want to start off with recapping [00:28:00] positive. So if you’re actually getting some really great gains with the young person, maybe you bring the family in and saying, I just wanna take some time to actually.

Reflect on how far you’ve come, how consistent you’ve been. Maybe you do some strengths work and you bring out strength cards and you make it fun and say, okay, I want you to pick out free strengths for your young person, and tell me an example of how they’ve shown each one. I really wanted to end this, you know?

Episode of care or this period of work or our six session, you know, you can have these little mini signposts to mark chunks of work. So you can start off with positive stuff if you don’t have to go with the most complex, um, family to start with. 

Bronwyn Milkins: No, that makes a lot of sense. So I’m interested, I think in.

Two things. I’m curious with the setting boundaries about out of session contact from parents. I’m wondering, I’ve seen this a bit on social media, like people asking questions about this, but you’ve told the parent of the boundary and then. The young person has a fight with their [00:29:00] bestie. They’re not telling the parent about it.

Parent wants to know. They know that you, they’ve talked about it with you in session. They send you an email being like, I wanna know the goss. How do you reinforce that boundary, or what do you do there? 

Marie Vakakis: It really depends and every, everyone I work with in supervision has a slightly different way. So we really, we can’t.

Stop them giving us information. If they’re in the waiting room, they could be yelling through the door, but don’t forget to tell her about this. Yeah. You know, so we can’t, we can’t, we can’t, um, ignore that. But we can choose how to respond. So you might have an automatic email reply saying, if you’re emailing between sessions, this is what I can and can’t do.

So you might choose to not even open that email. Okay. You might, you might choose to, depending on the family to, you might open that email and say, this is something I need the parents to come in for. Or maybe if you’ve made it really clear that I’m not going to hide information and the parent sends that, then maybe it’s a way for the parent they’re trying to get you to help them have that conversation.

So it could be that you bring them in and saying, okay, [00:30:00] so I got this email from Mum. Mum, do you wanna tell me what was in the email? Okay. What made that hard to talk about? That could still be information, but so genius. But it’s, it’s really tricky and, and I do it a lot where, you know, especially the more critical some pa parents feel that their young person is, is exhibiting really kind of scary, uh, things like maybe they’re self-harming, that it really activates the system and it can cause a lot of anxiety and it’s really trying to tell parents.

I can do a parent session, you can come in at the end, you can come in at the start, but this is getting in the way of the work that I’m doing or this is not what I can help with right now. So it can be really, it can be really tricky and there are cases where I still take to supervision and I unpack it and we, you know, reformulate together.

But in general it’s, it’s trying to have that kind of transparency. 

Bronwyn Milkins: Yeah, no, that sounds like great suggestions. As I was listening to you speaking, I’ve pushed out the other thing that I wanted to talk about, which I’ll come back to later. This is very A [00:31:00] DH, D of me. I am just like, okay, hold that and then forget that and then come back to this thing.

Um, so as you were speaking, I was thinking this sounds like a lot. I’m wondering whether there is an increased mental load or stress associated with working with both parents and the young person as opposed to just one-to-one, and if there is how you take care of yourself with that increased stress. It, it 

Marie Vakakis: definitely does, and I think that sometimes I, I try not to have more than two appointments back to back and I will try, I probably need to tweak it so that after a parent, like a family session, I have a bit of a break because the case formulation, it feels a lot bigger.

Bronwyn Milkins: Yeah. 

Marie Vakakis: Uh, and it feels a lot, um, a lot of parts that I’m trying to kind of put together. And it’s also the times where you get the biggest rewards the most quickly. So it does have these kind of, so is high risk, high reward. [00:32:00] Um, but I try to leave like maybe I would recommend someone starting out have that, like, have that gap, like make it a 90 minute block in your diary.

Have the on a 50 minute session, and then have your kind of. Downtime. 

Bronwyn Milkins: That’s a good idea. So you can kind 

Marie Vakakis: of put those pieces in and I think people, you get into a bit of a flow over time of what fits your diary. Especially me, I’m lucky in private practice, I can kind of move my things around and, and, and schedule things accordingly.

But being aware of your own energy and what, which sessions are taxing, which aren’t, when I see couples, we make that first session like a, a time and a half. So a 75 minute session, and then I have that bigger break at the end because. That’s, uh, that’s required for me to digest everything. 

Bronwyn Milkins: Yeah. Thank you for sharing that.

I think it really normalises the idea that. It’s often quite hard for us to go between, you know, back to back sessions, particularly when we’ve had Yeah. More mentally taxing work. 

Marie Vakakis: Yeah. [00:33:00] Yeah. And I think, I think one, one thing, and these people will probably be like, absolutely not, I’m not doing this. Um.

What I’m about to suggest, I would, if you’re going to give this a go, I would ask for permission to record the session, set up a template, or set up a consent form and tell your clients I’m doing some advanced training in working with families. You know, is it okay if I record? Uh, only me and my supervisor will watch that.

So what was most helpful about my family therapy course was. We do the therapy. Well, our team is watching us, so we have a room with a double-sided mirror. Our whole little practice reflective practice group sit behind the double-sided mirror and watches us run a family therapy session. That’s 

Bronwyn Milkins: terrifying.

Marie Vakakis: Yeah, and we do. We do this for two years. And so I’ve watched, you know, a dozen other people do family therapy and I’ve had that many people watch me. And what you learn from that is so much more helpful. So there’s nothing to stop you doing that with a supervisor, recording, even watching it back yourself, seeing what you missed.

[00:34:00] Maybe someone sh shuffled in their chair and then going through, why did I say that? What could I have done? And you can even share those reflections with that family or with that person. So. I actually, it’s very funny. I, I’m always nervous to ask for recordings and very few people say, no, and it doesn’t ruin the therapeutic relationship.

I’ll mention it to them. I send them the consent form and saying again, just if you ignore it completely, I’m not gonna remind you. I’m not gonna ask you about it again, and. That’s, it’s such a good way to learn. 

Bronwyn Milkins: No, I completely agree, and I know we’ll freak out a lot of listeners, but I did an episode earlier just on recording sessions and talked about the value of doing it because I’ve been recording a lot of my sessions for my SCHEMOTHERAPY accreditation, and I have to say that it just provides a huge boost in learning.

When you review a video, like one instance comes to mind where it’s like I was writing down a note. Client has a reaction and they change their facial expression and body language. I miss that and come back to the client with, I guess, a [00:35:00] happy tone of voice when really I needed to match a different emotional expression that was taking place.

And I wouldn’t have known that unless I had seen the video. So you can pick up on a lot of stuff that you miss and it just, it’s such valuable feedback. I echo what you’ve experienced, Marie. I’ve never had, I’ve actually never had a client decline to record a session. I’ve had a few who are like, tell me more about it.

And then I’ve actually had the opposite response of like, tell me when you’re recording next and I’ll be happy to come in anytime. I’m very happy to support your learning. And I’m like, okay, great. So, you know, I’ve had the opposite response as well, and yeah, it’s, it’s so much. Um. Better I find for supervision, because when you’re in supervision, you’re talking about new skills that you’re learning.

You’re really remembering what you’ve done from your perspective, and then relaying that from to the supervisor and the supervisors applying what they think has happened. But with a video, you just get everything in real time. So there’s no interpretation, you know? No like middle person. Yeah. And it’s, it’s, 

Marie Vakakis: it’s confronting.

It can be [00:36:00] confronting it, confronting. It’s such a, it’s such a good learning experience and I, I’ve never had a supervisor made me feel like they’re judging me. They often Yeah, same, quite, have a lot of, um, respect and humility for, you know, for sharing that vulnerable space. Um, and I’ve never judged a fellow colleague who’s done that as well because everybody has a level of skill that’s gotten to, to this place and actually.

I have a lot more admiration for someone who’s like, I’m really stuck. Can you watch this with me? Than someone who’s saying I’m really stuck, and they’re continuing doing the things the same way. 

Bronwyn Milkins: 100%. I agree. Yeah. And really important. I’ve never had a supervisor judge me for my videos either. Um, it’s always been quite supportive and the feedback has been really valuable and it, it, it can be confronting, but I guess sitting with that discomfort and that knowledge that, yeah, we’re not perfect, but we’re learning and that’s okay to learn.

Yeah, absolutely. Mm-hmm. One thing I wanted to ask was, and this comes out of the, this is a complete 360, I wanted to know what’s the best thing about [00:37:00] working with young people and their parents? 

Marie Vakakis: I think for me it’s, it feels like early intervention and prevention. So if I can get the, them communicating in a way that’s different to what maybe brought them there, they might grow up to have a better relationship, maybe be better partners and then better parents themselves.

So it’s, it’s that relational shift is, is so rewarding to see when it goes well. 

Bronwyn Milkins: That’s really beautiful. Um, I really love that. So like if I’m a one-to-one therapist, why should I consider involving parents and perhaps seeking further training in training in this area? Like what have you seen as the rewards?

Marie Vakakis: Well, you’re only with that person for maybe 50 minutes once a week or once a fortnight, and they’re with their family or with the outside world all that other time. And so you have a really good opportunity there to sh to shine a light on some of the things that the family might be able to benefit from.

So it really is [00:38:00] setting them up for a different experience by bringing that family in. 

Bronwyn Milkins: That’s awesome. Okay. I wanna know where you did your family training, and then I wanna ask something else. It just, there’s so much to ask you on this topic. Yeah, go for it. Yeah. So where did you do your training? 

Marie Vakakis: So I did it at the re center, which is, I’ve heard that Latrobe Uni.

Um, there is, there are other options if people wanna just get a taster. I know the, the book that we used, um, there was a therapist in the US called Diane Gayheart, and she has some really great, easy, digestible books. And she also has a YouTube lecture series. So if you go into. Type in her name, Diane Gay Hart in YouTube.

She’s actually recorded a lot of her lectures, so Wow. Isn’t 

Bronwyn Milkins: that fantastic? 

Marie Vakakis: Yeah. You’ll be able to get some really simple kind of things around Case Conceptualisation or Bowen Family System, so you’ll be able to get a bit of a taster to see if it’s a sort of stuff you like. 

Bronwyn Milkins: I what a great suggestion.

Yeah. As early career psychs, we love free stuff. Um, and it’s like so good to get that [00:39:00] taster because like I assume with the Buffie Center, was it, um, that Yeah, it, it costs, you know, like a few thousand dollars. It’s a full master’s, I think. Yeah. Mm, yeah. 

Marie Vakakis: Added a zero onto 

Bronwyn Milkins: it. Yeah. Yeah, totally. And did you enjoy your experience in family therapy training there?

Marie Vakakis: I did. I wouldn’t, I wouldn’t, I can’t unsee it now. So now that I know how to work with families, it’s, I, I do that work even with individuals and having that reflective practice group is. So valuable because you learn how to be in the space. 

Bronwyn Milkins: Well, the way you talk about it is the way that I think about learning a language.

’cause I, when I think about learning languages, I think not only that you are learning the specific words, but you’re learning to see a culture and like a world view from like a different perspective. And when you talk about families, it just reminds me of that. And I wonder whether like you can, that resonates with you.

Marie Vakakis: Yeah, absolutely. It really does. It’s learning it in conversation rather than just through a textbook. 

Bronwyn Milkins: Yeah. That’s so cool. The other question I [00:40:00] had was, okay, so as as psychologists and I, and I’m sure this is same for the social workers as well, the key thing that we’re taught about adolescents is that the key psychosocial stages, individuation, so they wanna.

Get away from their parents, discover who they are, value the social group over their parents. And I wonder how that shows up in therapy. Like how do you honor the maturation stage of wanting to individuate with it’s, it might be causing difficulty with a parent if they think that the parents out to get them enrolled in their lives.

Like, uh, that’s probably, is that a hard question? 

Marie Vakakis: No, it makes, that makes a lot of sense. I usually say that rupture start to happen from that kind of primary school to high school transition, and then it gets a little bit harder. One of the things I do is I work a lot with parents in that moment saying or normalising their feelings of rejection, because that’s often what they’re feeling.

They had this [00:41:00] really cute little kid in primary school who maybe wanted to hold hands and give them a cuddle and had their lunchbox patched. To now someone who they almost don’t know anything about. So trying to understand where the parents, how they feel, maybe even labeling that rejection or feeling excluded or that they’re not a part of it, and then helping them understand how do they respond when they feel that way.

So one of the analogies I use with, with people is, is we call it you’re moving from manager to consultant. So they need parents in this manager role to organise things and, and get them places and have play dates, and then somewhere along the line they get fired. And parents can handle this in a number of ways.

They can fight for un unfair dismissal. They can spend years in litigation trying to keep their job. Uh, they can say, well, stuff you, I didn’t need this anyway. Good riddance. Uh, or they can be like, well fine and get all passive aggress. So they can handle it in a number of different ways. But what we want to see is [00:42:00] an acceptance of, uh, that role is no longer required, and how can I get hired back as a consultant?

This role between us has changed My position description is new and they need, they really still need their parents. There. It looks different and so normalising that for parents can help go a long way. 

Bronwyn Milkins: Wow. I love that. Did you come up with that? 

Marie Vakakis: No, I You did. Okay. 

Bronwyn Milkins: So good. It’s so good. But like, I love the way that you’ve explained that it’s, uh, it just, um, I think puts it all together and really does normalise the parents’ feelings in that.

And, you know, it can be shocking to be fired and then move into a, a new role, like, and pick up your stuff from the desk and then have to move down the hallway and, yeah. Yeah. 

Marie Vakakis: And one thing like. I think some people make this mistake, and I definitely did. Like I even have a extra training in just like a graduate diploma in youth and adolescent mental health, and there was nothing in there about working with families, which is Wow, that’s incredible.

Startling. Yeah. But [00:43:00] thinking about, I try and consume some content that is targeted to parents, so I’m not always just looking at things for young people. So I’ll be listening to podcasts like Parental as Anything. I’ll be listening to, um, ask Lisa, which is Lisa Demi’s podcast, and her books are excellent.

So actually hearing parents’ stories, parents’ concerns, parents’ worries can really help because that I can bring that in and saying, I wonder if you heard this from your young person and it made you scared about X, Y, Z. Like really normalising the parents’ experiences in that as well, because they can’t.

They can’t, you know, the young person can’t be what they can’t see, and so sometimes we have to help the parent understand what they’re feeling and how to articulate it so it can go back into the system to help our young person. 

Bronwyn Milkins: Absolutely. Hmm. Marie, you’ve given me a lot to think about. It’s been so wonderful to listen to you.

Thank you so much for coming on the podcast. I’m wondering if there’s anything that we’ve [00:44:00] missed that may be like any, any wisdom that you want to impart to listeners just about working with parents and families. I think 

Marie Vakakis: give, give it a go. 

Bronwyn Milkins: Yeah. It’s, 

Marie Vakakis: it almost, it almost feels, um, wrong not to have some involvement with family, especially for your working with younger people.

Um, and I guess the, you know, a lot of the data out there, the mental health commission, you know, every, everything is saying parents want to be involved and that’s the best course of treatment. So we actually really do need to find a way to bring them in, to bring families in, to bring connection in, um, because that is the best way.

Bronwyn Milkins: Yeah. No. Wonderful. And Marie, if listeners wanna learn more about you or get in touch, where can they find you so they 

Marie Vakakis: can? Um, my prac, my practice is called the therapy hub, so that’s therapy hub.com au and my. A kind of supervision and consulting and training is at Marie Va Kaka. So I’ll put a link to that in the show notes.

So I’ll be, uh, [00:45:00] over the, over next year I’ll be releasing, um, some training that helps actually talk about some of this stuff. So how to do the first three session kind of structure. Wow, cool. How to bring families in the room. So it’s some things that we use internally to train our team. And I’ll be recording that and having that sort of on demand, um, there as well.

And my parenting program connected teens will be up there as well. So I’m on LinkedIn and all the different social media channels as well. 

Bronwyn Milkins: Great. No, I think that’s amazing and yes, we’ll pop those links in the show notes. Thank you again, Marie, for coming on. It really like, opens my mindset and I feel like yeah, you have such a.

A calm and, uh, lovely approach to involving parents and just, it just makes it seem like the obvious thing to do that. Yeah. Like you said, like it just, you just can’t unsee it. Um, so yes, it’s, it’s been really wonderful to listen to you and thank you again for coming on the podcast. No worries. It’s been fun.

Great. Well, thank you listeners for listening. Have a good one and catch you next time. [00:46:00] Bye.