Filial Therapy is a form of family therapy. It harnesses the power of play therapy to help families forge closer, more cohesive relationships.  The term ‘Filial’ comes from the Latin filios or filias, technically meaning son or daughter but loosely translated means parent-child.

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Practitioners train and supervise parents or caregivers as they conduct special non-directive play sessions with their own children.  Play is the primary avenue for gaining greater understanding of children.  Through play, children express their feelings, master new skills, learn problem- solving skills, develop coping skills and understand their worlds.   The therapist helps parents to understand their children’s motivations, feelings, intentions and behaviours in context through noticing and discussing play themes that arise in the play sessions.  

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As the parents’ skills and confidence in conducting and understanding play sessions develops, the therapist helps them shift the play sessions to their home environment.  Home play sessions are monitored and supported by the therapist and parents are helped to generalise what they have learnt to daily life and parenting situations.

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Parents are the most significant people in their child’s life and are likely to have a greater impact on their children than any therapist could. Parents are completely capable of learning the skills necessary to conduct child led play sessions with their children and when parents learn these more effective ways of interacting with their children and helping their children, the positive results are likely to be more profound and longer lasting.  Parents are seen and involved as true partners in  the therapeutic process.

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