ABSTRACT
At the heart of the Attunement phase is strengthening the attachment relationships within the family, and helping parents to feel confident in their ability to use the attachment-based skills necessary for creating safety and resilience within their family relationships. During this phase of treatment, parents will demonstrate the ability to implement the attachment-based parenting skills of Family SPACE and the 3 Rs of Relationship skills with special emphasis on the ability to be attuned to their children. Parents will be able to recognize their own internal emotional states so they can maintain the ability to use wise decision-making as they navigate through relationship distress with their children, and help them to repair relationship ruptures. The author discusses the role of the therapists and therapeutic tasks to accomplish during this phase of treatment. Since the Attunement phase is the final phase of treatment, the author helps therapists recognize when clients are ready to end treatment and how to help parents prepare for termination. Therapists will learn what types of play therapy and expressive arts interventions to use during this phase of treatment. Parent coaching sessions focus on increasing parental confidence using the attachment-based parenting skills taught in this family play therapy model.
