Parting Gifts: Termination Rituals In Group Therapy

Abstract

A patient's termination from group therapy is a powerful experience for the departing patient, the therapist, and all group members. Unless the feelings evoked are channeled into constructive expression, they may undermine this potentially valuable phase of both the departing patient's group treatment and the life of the group as a whole. A termination ritual, styled by a particular patient according to his or her own need, therapy goals, and personality may help the patient achieve a more clearly defined sense of self. The authors suggest that the group therapist's careful attunement to and thorough exploration of the significance of any termination ritual or gift will help to extract maximum therapeutic benefit for the departing member and the group as a whole.

Co-Creating Meaningful Structures within Long-Term Psychotherapy Group Culture

“…The following three long-term outpatient psychotherapy group vignettes illustrate moments of co-creative meaning making potential. In addition to focusing on how group members utilize symbols or structures for interpersonal and collective growth (Shapiro & Ginzberg, 2002), these examples focus on how group experience is the product of this symbolic activity, and how it interacts with relational, social, and cultural contexts to evolve further meaningful structures. I borrow an interpersonal, developmental, and existential focus from Budman and Gurman (1988) to portray the examples, which are not intended to convey Co-creating Meaningful Structures 14 empirical findings, but offer to connect theory to practice, and practice to social, cultural, and global contexts where psychotherapy groups exist.…”

“…Integrating member stages and ages into group culture building demonstrates most clearly how group members and leader not only co-create meaningful structures, but also cocreate with meaningful structures as they become outdated. The following group example depicts the evolution of a meaning filled "group ritual" (Shapiro & Ginzberg, 2002) as it facilitates, expresses, and stabilizes a variety of developmental events:…”

“…I suggest that both leader and members co-create 'meaning attributions' through intersubjective hermeneutical interaction between structure and experience and this process safely supports leadership flexibility, and guards against leadership intentions disconnected from group member experiences, group culture, or the social, cultural, and global contexts where psychotherapy groups exist. All types of interpersonal group structure enters the hermeneutical spiral of immediate experience, expression, and understanding including status, authority, attraction, communication, normative, and role structures (VandenBos, 2007) that express through such group interactions as narrative, ritual, role-play, process commentary, questioning, reflection, and interpretation (Dies, 1983;Shapiro & Ginzberg, 2002). The ensuing interplay with group experience is intersubjective in that the structures experienced are products of presuppositions resultant of interactions between individual subjectivities and socio-cultural contexts, which further evolve through socially interacting individuals embedded in personal and collective contexts.…”

Impact of personality on termination of short‐term group psychotherapy in depressed elderly outpatients

“…To our knowledge, there are only two studies exploring the clinical determinants of both inappropriate and appropriate terminations in individual or group psychotherapies (Shapiro and Ginzberg, 2002;Todd et al, 2003). Personality traits may decisively influence the quality of the termination process in psychotherapeutic settings.…”

Factors associated with acceptance and decline of client gift giving.

“…At the other end of the continuum are theorists (e.g., Hundert, 1998) who proffer that acceptance of a client gift is appropriate when the gift is an expression of gratitude and is presented at termination, during the holiday season, or when the client has conquered significant therapeutic challenges. Shapiro and Ginzberg (2002) speculated that some clients, particularly those who are low functioning (i.e., emotionally fragile) may be less equipped to handle their psychotherapist's rejection of the gift.…”