ABSTRACT
The message on my voice mail sounded like a routine intake call. “I got your name from my friend Gary. He said you had worked with his family. I need some help with mine.” He left his name and number. I returned the call between therapy sessions, expecting this man to be a client who would come in for family therapy. But when I talked to him, he told me that he and his brother worked with their father in the family business and that “things are getting pretty bad.” When I asked him what he meant, he said that his father was “losing it” all the time and lambasting him and his brother in front of the other employees. “We think it’s time for him to retire, but he won’t hear of it.” Immediately I realized that this family member was asking for help about issues related both to the family business and to family relationships.
