This series of sessions showcases Dr. Minuchin’s involvement with children from a homeless family. Dr, Minuchin meets with the family with the goal to empower this family. The family treats Minuchin with a paradoxical combination of openness, suspicion, and passivity. This paradoxical posture is one that the family has learned to assume in response to the constant and uncontrolled entrance and exit of multiple helpers into their lives.
Dr. Minuchin presents segments from three cases involving families who were receiving social services provided by government agencies. In these segments we will see how the entrance of well meaning helpers into these families serves to disempower rather than empower the parents, and further disrupts the effective functioning of the family unit.
In this session, Dr. Minuchin works with a couple who has two children, both of whom are in foster care. This case demonstrates ways in which the involvement of multiple systems of care can cause disorganization in a family, if the systems themselves fail to work in sync. In this case, we meet a mother who struggles with drug addiction, which has impacted her ability to care for her children and family.