Group Design Part 3: Managing Problem Situations in Group Counseling Sessions

Group Design Part 3
Managing Problem Situations in Group Counseling Sessions
Dorris Williams
August 22, 2016
Initial and Screening stages
Before our group counseling session started, I and my co-leader choose eight individuals with varied experiences, age, and socioeconomic status. I did this in a strategic manner that would result in a more efficient learning experience than conflict and regression. Also, these individuals that were present in my counseling session have their ideas, beliefs, and other sensitive information taken into consideration in order to achieve the same purpose. The members of my group, their demographics, and presenting problems are as follows:
1 Martha – 19 years old; African-American freelance writer; ongoing cocaine abuse, persistent relationship problems
2 Jacob – 24 years old; Canadian hockey-player; relapse prevention, career problems
3 Mendeleev - 29 years old; musician from Manhattan; relapse prevention
4 Jessica – 32 years old, seamstress; relapse prevention, ongoing marriage problem
5 Juan – 38 years old; bar waiter from Chile; ongoing alcohol abuse, work problems
6 Mike – 42 years old; truck driver, father of five kids, and a devoted protestant; relapse prevention
7 Belle – 51 years old; grandmother of two, widowed; relapse prevention for alcohol abuse
8 Jericho – 59 years old; retired football coach from Europe; ongoing substance abuse, family problems
By creating a diverse group with a very varied cultural background, age, and experience we’re expecting a better and wider input of ideas and opinions from the group, but we also expected that there might be some minor difficulties with the member’s behavior and participation. And as expected some minor issues appeared while we do our sessions such as reluctance, shyness, and quietness of some individuals. There are also some problems with the attendance especially at first. However, in order to facilitate better-working dynamics, we’ve talked about a more convenient schedule were all of us can dedicate our time to the activities. Due to this, attendance issues were handled efficiently and the group is now working better while gradually building trust and camaraderie with everyone. For the first session we got to know each other better by doing a few ice breakers, the first one, everyone had to introduce themselves and tell two truths and one lie. The rest of the class had to guess what the lie was without knowing the person. It was judge on personality, looks, age, and how that person carried themself. It went very well, we had fun. The second, game was, I had a beach ball that I pat parts of the world on it and we threw the ball to one another everyone had a turn who ever got the ball and where there finger landed they had to say something about that country, place, or thing. That was a brain stormier to see what kind of imagination the group had. There were some pretty good answers, such as some people wanted to go out the country to Germany, Spain, and France. We also had fun with that; it broke the ice for a lot...