Surround Us During Life's Ups and Downs

Sweeten Life Systems is an organization that I describe as "Asset Based" rather than "Sickness Based". It is too bad that our western world is obsessed by focusing on sickness, illness, pain, trauma and worrying about the things that cause problems. I am not sure way that is true but it is true, especially for people such as I who was trained to be a Therapist.

I was trained in The Sickness Model of Counseling Rather than the "Asset Based Model". Here is my description of the Sickness Model.

It separates the Disease from the Person

The Person from his/her Family

The Family from their Support System

The Support System from the Medical System

What does this mean for me as a Patient or the Parent of a Patient? It means that the Medical, Psychological and Insurance System will ignore you and disrespect you. You will be treated as a non entity who knows nothing and has no influence on the Disease.

Let's think of that definition for a while. You take your troubled child to the Doctor, the Psychologist, the Nurse or the Hospital and the Experts probe him, test him, look him over and try to come up with a Diagnosis. Some sort of diagnosis is settled on and it is sent to your a few weeks later. In the diagnosis you are told to go now to your Family Doctor and get a Prescription to treat your child.

This sounds ludicrous and silly as well as a form of malpractice. It is. But that is the Disease Model of Medicine. Even if the Doctors and their allies want to do differently, and many do, the current payment system mitigates against them being personally involved with you as a Parent. A Doctor is allocated exactly six minutes for each Patient and that is not enough time for a Caring Doctor to listen to a parent.

Thankfully, I have a different philosophy of Counseling and have trained thousands of Peer and Professional Helpers to treat the entire person, the entire family and their entire life choices. At Life Way Counseling Centers and in all our classes and Lay Caring we include every member that is significant to the Seeker.

In our current focus on Parents with kids who have Special Needs we are training Peer and Professional Helpers how to include the whole family in the caring and support process. Attend the November 6 Gathering and learn how to respect people not just their dis-ease.