This book is intended primarily for the psychotherapeutic community. It contains a series of three games that can serve as clinical interventions for couples, families and groups. These serious games can be used as a set to structure the clinical experience from intake to termination, or as stand-alone, ad hoc tools that the clinician uses as needed during the therapeutic hour. The book itself place these serious games squarely in the established psychotherapeutic tradition of play therapy, while explaining how these games, and the ways in which they are used, bring something new to clinical practice. Each serious game is fully explained, with detailed instructions on how to prepare, how to run, and how to use the information that the games elicit for greater therapeutic success. Although this book is useful to psychotherapists of all approaches, it is especially useful for treating chemical dependency, applied to Brief Therapy, or any therapy where time and money are limiting issues. This is due, in large part, to the fact that these techniques uncover important information earlier and more easily than most traditional methods do. Finally, these serious games are fun to play, and help balance the often difficult moments of clinical work.
About the Author: K-athleen Grant is a licensed marriage and family therapist (LMFT) who has worked in mental health organizations and private practice. Kathleen's work has focused on trauma, addiction, and family systems. She holds a Masters in Counseling Psychology from the University of Notre Dame de Namur, a Ph.D. in political science from the University of California at Irvine, and Level 2 certification in EMDR. She currently lives in Washington, DC, in a 150 year old house on Capitol Hill, with a husband, a cat, and a dog. Laura Osborne also has worked in mental health organizations. She holds a Psy.D. and a Masters of Arts in Clinical Psychology from the Wright Institute, and is a certified hypnotherapist. Her Masters thesis was a case study of a combat-wounded veteran, and her dissertation studied controlled clinical trials of the efficacy of motivational interviewing in a dual-diagnosis population. Laura currently lives in the San Francisco Bay Area with two dogs, three chickens, and her son, and she practices urban farming and sustainability. Kathleen and Laura have written another book, soon to be published, that is designed to help therapy patients get the most out of their 50 minute sessions.