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Intentional Separation of Families: Increasing Differentiation Through Wilderness Therapy

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Family Therapy with Adolescents in Residential Treatment

Part of the book series: Focused Issues in Family Therapy ((FIFT))

Abstract

Adolescents with significant externalizing or internalizing behaviors that have been ineffectively treated in traditional clinical settings are increasingly finding support via the intentional family separation that occurs in wilderness therapy programs. Although often counterintuitive to family therapists, the space provided when adolescents are separated from their parents can facilitate a decrease in the chronic anxiety within a family system , thereby enabling each family member to increase his or her differentiation level through an intensive therapeutic process. Healthy levels of differentiation are evidenced through balancing intellectual and emotional functioning (on the individual continuum), and autonomy of self and connection with others (on the relational continuum). When one has a lower level of differentiation, one is prone to emotional dysregulation or suppression, as well as emotional fusion or cutoff in relationships. Though very difficult, one can increase one’s basic level of differentiation through sustained therapeutic engagement and decreased family system anxiety . This chapter explores Bowen’s concept of differentiation of self , in a wilderness therapy context, as it relates to intentional family separation for adolescents with clinically acute symptoms and families with entrenched and unhealthy dynamics.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Open Sky Wilderness Therapy, PO Box 2201, Durango, CO, 81302, USA

    Kirsten L. Bolt & Tony Issenmann

Authors
  1. Kirsten L. Bolt
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  2. Tony Issenmann
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Correspondence to Kirsten L. Bolt .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Mount Mercy University , Cedar Rapids, Iowa, USA

    Jacob D. Christenson

  2. Mount Mercy University, Cedar Rapids, Iowa, USA

    Ashley N. Merritts

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Bolt, K.L., Issenmann, T. (2017). Intentional Separation of Families: Increasing Differentiation Through Wilderness Therapy. In: Christenson, J., Merritts, A. (eds) Family Therapy with Adolescents in Residential Treatment. Focused Issues in Family Therapy. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-51747-6_8

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