Below I describe different therapy trajectories, depending on whether you will be attending individual-therapy or group-therapy.
What does a typical individual therapy trajectory look like?
This varies according to the problem at hand, how long it has been ongoing and its scope, in addition to how often you and your therapist agree to meet. Private therapist usually accept the same clientele as state-driven day-clinics. At a day-clinic, as opposed to a residential institution, people are usually offered between ten and twenty sessions. If I offer you individual therapy, this means I think I can help you within this time frame.
An individual session lasts 50 minutes, after which the therapist uses 10 minutes on journaling, as well as reflecting on the themes touched upon during the session in light of your therapy goals.
Our working collaboration would begin by us having an introductory session where you tell me about your current struggles or what’s on your mind, after which we talk loosely about how we will work together and where the focus should be in our conversations. After this, we may fill out some standardized forms together, which will help us map and understand your problem better, pin-point it and differentiate it from similar challenges. We may touch upon central experiences in your past which may be of relevance to understand your functioning today.
From these initial conversations and tentative conclusions we make an agreement on how often we will meet each other, and how many sessions you want or may need.
During the treatment process itself, we will probably switch between talking, practices and home assignments. We may also go a bit back and forth between the talking and filling out standardized tests, to better understand the issue at hand.
To sum up, the Individual Therapy trajectory:
Introductory session - 1 session, a 50 mins
Anamestic interiew - 2-3 sessions, a 50 mins
Regular individual sessions - varies, but ca. 10-20 sessions is common, a 50 mins, weekly or bi-weekly
What does a typical group therapy trajectory look like?
Attending group therapy, starts much the same way as attending individual therapy. You start by having introductory session with you therapist where you are asked about your current struggles and whats on your mind, after which we loosely talk about how this could be worked on in a group and with the help of a group therapist and the other group members.
While individual therapy sessions last 45 minutes, our group therapy sessions last 2 hours in total. The group sessions begin with 5-10 minutes spent on messages and checking-in with the different participants. After this participants spend 30 minutes on their own art-production, before the group reasssembles. Then follows 30 minutes of conversation where the group fouces in on the works produce, before an additional 30 minutes is spent on more free-flowing conversation. The last 5-10 minutes is used in cleaning up, preparing the room and the art materials for the following session.
After the group session, the therapists journals and reflect on the themes touched upon by the group, in light of the different patient’s therapy goals.
Groups meet once a week, and runs all through the year, with a short break in the summer and winterholidays.Each groups consists of 5-8 patients, and 1-2 group therapists. An attendance of 85% is requires to continue attending a group.
For the initial groups being arranged Spring 2021, there may be small variations in the way we organize the groups, until the pandemic measurements allow for optimal group saturation.
To sum up, the Group Therapy trajectory: Introductory session - 1 session, a 50 mins Anamestic interiew - 2-3 sessions, a 50 mins Regular group therapy sessions - varies, but ca. 6-12 months is common, a 120 mins, weekly
