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You're right about the "quick fix" part
One of the points I failed to make in the original essay was that the family-dysfunction model of rehab provides just such a quick fix. Those eager to use this model - those, in other words, who believe it is the only correct way of describing the predicament of people like Pelzer, who grew up in alcoholic homes - seemed to me to want everyone to adhere to that model. The problem is that the ACOA or family-dysfunction model of rehabilitation is so vague that about 97% of the population can relate to it. That's where people like Virginia Satir get the idea that such a large percentage of the population is dysfunctional or comes from dysfunctional homes (take your pick): they don't understand that they're being too vague, or that their "diagnostic critera" are too broad to be usable in a clinical setting like drug rehab. They really feel that these criteria are clinically valid, usable, and applicable to those whom they wish to force into the mold of "ACOA client of the year."
I realize I'm drifting a bit here. I guess I'm also saying that the family-dysfunction model of rehab is also stereotyped; Pelzer would be forced by those using this model to become just what they say he should become, and put through a "quick fix" form of therapy to get him there. That would be a shame, because these people aren't willing to acknowledge that perhaps these people didn't need therapy in the first place.
And isn't that a form of emotional abuse? I think it is, which is why I posed the question.
posted by
kidnykid
on November 26, 2003 at 8:41 AM
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Yep. Just so.
I grew up in what I know now to be ghastly conditions, and thinking that it was perfectly normal -- that parents beat their children up in various ways and that was that. My therapist, god bless her, is very good, and I am slowly learning about how to cope (I've been ticked on several axii in the DSMIV). I just wish the media would stop protraying it as a quick fix when it comes to living with therapy and medication. Anyhow, thanks for your essay.
posted by
telynor
on November 26, 2003 at 1:55 AM
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