Counselling Techniques

 

Bev Dyck’s counselling is client-centered and goal oriented. She love people and enjoys the counselling processes. She has been involved with the Saskatoon Adlerian Society since 1996 (until its closure and then with NASAP) and uses Adlerian concepts in her counselling. Adlerian Psychology embraces the following principles:

1. People need to belong and contribute because they are social beings.
2. All aspects of peoples’ lives are entwined because they are whole beings.
3. The tasks of work, friendship and intimacy are lifelong.
4. All people deserve dignity and respect.
5. There is a purpose to all behaviour.
6. When encouragement is given (which focuses on strengths), positive changes take place.
7. The experiences children have early in their lives is meaningful to them and causes a framework upon which they act for the rest of their lives.
8. Social responsibility and personal freedom co-exist.

Bev Dyck shares concepts and handouts to enable clients to learn health principles of relating.

In her counselling she gives tools to parents and teachers to help them understand children’s disturbing goals of behaviour and how to help shift the children into useful ways of behavior.

She also uses brief and solution focused counselling.

Bev is trained both as a secular counsellor (primarily using Adlerian Psychology) and as a Christian Counsellor.

Bev has been trained in the use of EMI – Eye Movement Integration which is very useful in overcoming trauma.

Some Examples of how Bev tends to respond to Counselling Aspects:

Depression:

Bev will do a Depression Screening with each client to determine the state of well-being of the client and to establish a baseline for the client. This will alert her to some aspects that the client does not know to bring forward. This also gives a measurable way to determine whether a client is progressing or declining.

Bev will explore as to the onset of the Depression symptoms and what was happening at that time. When there are counselling issues, she will draw attention to these and explore those areas. Bev will attempt to empower the client to understand him/herself and to notice when something is not working for them and to respectfully learn to meet that need.

Eating Disorders:

Bev will look for the circumstances at the onset of this disorder. She will see the eating disorder as the client’s solution to a situation with which the client is uncomfortable or feels out of control. As the client has felt out of control, the client has then found an alternate way to be powerful or affirmed.

Eating Disorders are not about food, but about uncomfortable emotions. As the client learns to process their emotions the eating disorder usually loses its power.

Children & Families:

Bev loves to explore family dynamics. She draws attention to what is going well and notices what is not working, and looks for ways to help the family to function in healthier ways. Usually the most sensitive child will be the barometer and react with misbehaviour and become the scapegoat of the family unit. As each person is encouraged by having their needs met in healthy ways, misbehaviour often declines.

Bev looks for ways to help the family to work better as a unit, where each one feels respected and loved. Bev teaches techniques that help families to operate with mutual respect.

Bev will often meet with the parents first, and then with the child, or teen and the parents. Sometimes she finds it helpful to have all the family members attend to work with the whole family.

Blending Families:

Bev has often worked with Blended Families and knows aspects that can help the couple and the family operate more easily. She draws attention to where misunderstandings are originating and encourages the couple (and family members) to aspects that will ease the situation and help the family to become a positive unit where mutual respect can thrive.

Anxiety:

The Depression Screening will be helpful for Bev to be able to have some idea of whether the client is struggling with a combination of Depression/Anxiety. Bev will explore with the client using recent events and looking for clues as to what is causing anxiety for the client. She will come alongside the client, helping them to recognize and understand their self-talk and to learn how to interact with themselves in helpful ways. She will equip the client with ways to calm themselves and to process earlier episodes that are contributing to the anxiety.

Marital:

Bev seeks to help each of the partners to become healthier people and to take responsibility for their own well-being. She sees each person as having a part in the difficulties that the couple is experiencing. She encourages each one to find ways to de-esculate issues, to invite what each really is wanting, to be true to themselves and to look for respectful ways to reach toward the other. Bev teaches each one to find healthy ways to have boundaries with what the person does not want or like, and to learn to get better and better at inviting what it is that they do want.

Pre-Marital:

Bev has helped couples with Pre-marital counselling. She helps couples to see what will be issues for them, from observation of their family of origin. She will look for healthy assertiveness of both partners. She will help them to have problem-solving skills for when the problems will come. She will help them learn to talk with each other so that it is easier for them to hear each other.

Addictions:

Bev looks with the client at what it actually is that the client is getting from the addicting agent. She will also help clients to see what the addiction has cost them, both in money and in emotional impact. She will help clients to explore how to meet their real needs in healthy ways. She will help them find accountability and to begin to rebuild their life.

Stress:

Bev helps clients to realize that stress is inevitable. She helps people to learn to recognize when they are experiencing optimal stress and how to learn to balance stress and keep it manageable. She will also help clients to learn to have their own De-stressing Kit to use regularly to help themselves shed the stresses of daily living.

Anger:

Bev welcomes working with learning to process anger in healthy ways. She sees anger as a second degree emotion and helps people to recognize the emotions that they are feeling at an initial stage and to learn to take care of themselves in productive ways. She helps people to recognize unhealthy ways of mis-handling anger, and to recognize when they need to work with themselves to process through the uncomfortable emotions and do truly helpful things. In doing so, people are able to become far more creative, assertive and passionate.

Careers:

Bev has developed a simple Personality Profile which she uses to help people find meaningful career options for themselves. She helps them recognize areas of strengths which a person finds themselves naturally gravitating towards and excelling, and also recognizing areas of weakness that the person finds draining and unnatural. With these aspects she helps people move towards career options that help them operate in their areas of passion so that they can find their work sustainable and lifegiving.

Trauma:

Bev has been trained in the use of EMI – Eye Movement Integration. This is a technique that is a neurological treatment that unburdens the nerves of traumatic events. The brain has been unable to process the event and therefore that event remains too fresh and alive for the person and begins to interfere with their present life and often interferes with their ability to rest and sleep. Bev works with using eye movement to bring closure to that event and to help the person to be able to live freely.