ABSTRACT
The first time I met Gabriel, we barely spoke to each other. He sat in the room and listened to his parents rattle off his list of sins and transgressions (almost literally in those terms). He barely said a word. With Ricky, his parents came in first without him, and he came in by himself for the second session. And with Marlon, he came in by himself for the first appointment, and I never met his aunt who had referred him. Therapy started for each of them in three different ways: attending with parents, attending alone after the parents had met privately first, or attending alone with no parent meeting. All three are legitimate ways to start, but require slightly different approaches.
