Helping a depressed Chinese adult with high functioning autism reconnect with his family through structural family therapy

Abstract

This clinical case example from a Chinese context describes the healing journey through structural family therapy (SFT) of a depressed Chinese father with high functioning autism (HFA). The paper both narrates the experience of a father and his family in facing the relational challenges arising from HFA and explores the contributions of SFT in helping. Identifying the father's history of loss at the individual and family levels as well as the pattern of family relationships in the family sheds light on directions for treatment. Key treatment principles of SFT and strategies to help depressed adults with HFA let go of anger and losses, both symbolic and real, and reconnect with their families are discussed. Practitioner points • Structural family therapy (SFT) can assist depressed adults with high functioning autism (HFA) in reconnecting with their spouses and children • Therapists' trust of family competence and uniqueness, and the artful use of enactment, can facilitate healing for depressed adults with HFA • Therapists' knowledge of HFA, and their humility and willingness to learn from this clientele, are critical

Family‐systems interventions for families of people with an intellectual disability or who are autistic: a systematic review

“…Lo & Ma (2022) and Ma et al . (2020b) both used structural family therapy with families of adolescents with an ID and a family consisting of a father, autistic mother and autistic daughter, respectively. These interventions were generally well described.…”

“…(2020a,b) presented very little information about the research questions or data collection, and details about the analysis methods in several studies were unclear (Ma et al . 2020a,b; Villaescusa et al . 2021).…”

“…1987; Baum 2006) and three case studies (Marshall & Ferris 2012; Ma et al . 2020a,b). Studies were conducted in the UK ( n = 4) (Baum 2006; Marshall & Ferris 2012; McKenzie et al .…”

“…2020, 2022), Hong Kong ( n = 4) (Ma et al . 2020a,b; Lo et al . 2022; Lo & Ma 2022), the Netherlands ( n = 2) (Blankestein et al .…”

“…Common factors that were perceived to be important across multiple interventions included the value of the therapeutic relationship(Villaescusa et al 2021;McKenzie et al 2022) and having space to reflect upon difficulties(Ma et al 2020b;Villaescusa et al 2021;McKenzie et al 2022). The generally high quality of most of these studies provides good evidence that family-systems interventions are perceived to be beneficial and acceptable by families of people with an ID or who are autistic.…”