Family Therapy with Young Adults Experiencing Serious Mental Illness

 Earn 1.5 CE Contact Hours

The onset of a serious psychiatric illness such as major depression or bipolar disorder can be a profoundly destabilizing experience for young adults and their families. For young adults, the challenge lies in managing intense symptoms while navigating the developmental tasks of emerging adulthood. For parents, the struggle often includes overwhelming emotional reactions to troubling behaviors and the difficult adjustment to a sudden reversal in relational dynamics—where a once-independent child may now rely heavily on parental care.

Basic family psychoeducation, while helpful, is often insufficient for families facing these complex realities. This workshop introduces a therapeutic approach developed through Ackerman’s Young Adults with Serious Mental Illness and their Families Project. Using a case example, presenters will demonstrate strategies to help families create “climates of calm” that promote resilience, reduce reactivity, and foster a stronger sense of connection in the face of ongoing challenges.

Learning Objectives:

Participants will be able to:

• Understand the unique developmental and relational challenges faced by young adults with serious mental illness and their families.
• Identify the emotional and systemic pressures that contribute to family distress.
• Apply family therapy strategies that foster “climates of calm” and support more effective caregiving relationships.

Who Should Attend:

Mental health professionals, family therapists, social workers, and clinicians seeking to deepen their skills in working with young adults and families affected by serious psychiatric illness.

Meet the Presenters:

Lois Braverman, MSW is President Emeritus of the Ackerman Institute for the Family. Appointed in 2006, she is the Institute’s fourth president. Braverman is a highly regarded educator and clinician with over 40 years of experience in the field. Her many publications and international presentations challenge the assumptions implicit in major schools of family therapy about women’s role in the family, in the workplace, and in the psychotherapeutic setting. Her special areas of interest have been women’s friendships and marital relationships, depression and marital dynamics, motherhood and mothering, family therapy with adolescents, and issues of power in family therapy. Currently, her clinical research project is seeing families with a young adult who suffers with serious mental illness. She is founding editor of the Journal of Feminist Family Therapy and author of Women, Feminism and Family Therapy, (The Haworth Press). She was the recipient of the 1994 American Family Therapy Academy’s “Innovative Contribution to Family Therapy Award,” the 2012 University of Iowa, College of Arts and Sciences “Distinguished Alumni Award. and the 2019 American Family Therapy Academy’s “Lifetime Achievement Award.” She maintains a private practice specializing in couple and family therapy.

Mary Kim Brewster, PhD is the Director of the Serious Mental Illness and the Family Project at the Ackerman Institute for the Family. Her publications and national and international presentations address the impact of a serious mental illness on family well-being, clinical processes in systemic-relational therapy, and the effects of racial and gender marginalization, discrimination, and violence on couple and family relationships. Brewster recently co-chaired the 2023 Spring Meeting for the Society for Psychoanalysis and Psychoanalytic Psychology, Division 39 of the American Psychological Association in New York City. Her current clinical research and writing focuses on the subjective experiences of Asian Americans in psychotherapy. Brewster supervises in the Doctoral Program in Clinical Psychology at the City University of New York and has a private practice specializing in individuals, couples, and families.

← Return to Workshops