A teaching and practice framework for understanding “stuckness” and enabling movement in complex cases.
A forthcoming workshop on July 2, 2025 will introduce the 'Stuck Case' model, its method of delivery in a teaching or supervisory context, and its relevance to family therapy practice in general. The workshop will include input from our students, an "in vivo" demonstration, and a discussion exploring the possible neurobiological explanation of its effectiveness.
Participants in this workshop will witness a live demonstration of the Stuck Case process and learn about possible underlying theory and its broader applications.
The Stuck Case workshop details
Wednesday, 02 July 2025, 01:00pm - 04:30pm
In-person at the Bourierie Centre, Brunswick
Register at https://bit.ly/BC-ARTWIT-STUCK-2025
About the presenters
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Robyn Elliott is a family therapist and Mental Health Social Worker with more than 35 years of clinical experience and 25 years of teaching experience. She is the Course Lead of the Master of Clinical Family Therapy at La Trobe University/The Bouverie Centre | Sandy Jackson is a family therapist and occupational therapist with 25 years of clinical experience. She has been a lecturer and supervisor in the Master of Clinical Family Therapy for 3 years. |
What’s it all about?
The Self of the Therapist has been an area of attention since the first family therapy training programs and it has been increasingly recognised that therapist factors are significant to client outcomes. It could be summarised as all that the therapist brings from their experience, beliefs, values and personal characteristics, Over time there have been varied approaches to understanding and working well with these factors.
Since the very early 2000s, the Bouverie Centre has contributed to this area by using of the “Stuck Case” process with our trainee students. The teaching method will be described in the workshop, as a reflective process suitable for all practitioners who from time to time encounter “stuckness’ in family work.
Qualitative research into this process was conducted in 2024 by The Bouverie Centre. We engaged both trainees and teachers who had participated in the ‘stuck case’ process, centring around an analysis of reflective essays written by trainees from the previous academic year. These essays attested to the power of the process, with some students calling it “transformative”.
One trainee described the process as, “…an enriching and pivotal step in my professional development as a family therapist”
and by another as “…one of the hardest pieces of work, though also one that provided the greatest growth”.
The teacher’s contribution to the research involved participation in a focus group designed to understand better the supervisor’s processes in conducting the Stuck Case. One teacher summarised her thinking thus,
“What would they need from me in order to take that leap, that risk right now to perhaps do it or respond differently, to get through it without the devastating responses that they may have experienced in their family of origin?”
The results of this study were presented at the 2024 IFTA Conference in Toyama, Japan along with our developing thinking about the process. This approach, which does seek to bring about change, contrasts with other prevailing approaches that emphasise embracing the therapist’s vulnerabilities and flaws as a bridge to the experience of the client.
What we have learned
Over time, and with the added benefit of this study, supervisors have refined this process and reflected on how and why the process has such a marked impact. We have noticed that the common experience of emotional and sometimes physical discomfort in the trainee when our prompts are provided, and their disbelief when they receive the family role players’ feedback are predictors of greater benefit.
In addition, research conducted from the 1990s onwards about the nature of transformative change has also contributed to our thinking and enactment of the process. More than this, however, it has also influenced our thinking about what makes for more effective interventions (family) and therapy across all contexts of family work.
The Stuck Case workshop details
Wednesday, 02 July 2025, 01:00pm - 04:30pm
In-person at the Bourierie Centre, Brunswick
