PLAYING FOR THEIR LIVES Helping Troubled Children Through Play Therapy Dorothy G. Singer Copyright © 1993 Dorothy G. Singer e-Book Copyright © 2014 International Psychotherapy Institute All Rights Reserved This e-book contains material protected under International and Federal Copyright Laws and Treaties. This e-book is intended for personal use only. Any unauthorized reprint or use of this material is prohibited. No part of this book may be used in any commercial manner without express permission of the author. Scholarly use of quotations must have proper attribution to the published work. This work may not be deconstructed, reverse engineered or reproduced in any other format. Created in the United States of America For information regarding this book, contact the publisher: International Psychotherapy Institute E-Books 301-215-7377 6612 Kennedy Drive Chevy Chase, MD 20815-6504 www.freepsychotherapybooks.org [email protected] TO JERRY WITH RESPECT, APPRECIATION, AND LOVE Table of Contents PREFACE ................................................................................................................................... 6 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ........................................................................................................ 13 ONE — LOIS, THE PRINCESS IN THE TOWER The Effect of A PArent’s DeAth on A Child .............................................................................. 14 TWO — PERRY, THE VOLCANO MAKER The Child of ChemicAl-Abusing PArents ............................................................................... 65 THREE — TOM’S SCARY WORLD A CAse of SexuAl Abuse ............................................................................................................ 110 FOUR — MARTY, THE LITTLE CYCLONE Attention Deficit And HyperActiVity .................................................................................... 154 FIVE — BARBARA, WEDNESDAYS CHILD DiVorce And Its Effects ............................................................................................................. 200 SIX — VICTORIA, THE BED WETTER Sibling Rivalry and Learning to Love ................................................................................. 239 EPILOGUE ............................................................................................................................ 287 SUGGESTED READINGS ................................................................................................... 290 PREFACE Children, even in the best of homes, must struggle with all the tasks of childhood: there are so many things to learn about the large, confusing world of grown-ups. The children who have come to see me for help over the years have been those who not only had to deal with the normal growth processes involved in cognitive, social, and emotional development but also had pressures imposed on them by forces they could not control: parental illness; family financial stresses; the emotional disturbances of adults; adults’ inadequate parenting skills; and neglect that was psychological and sometimes even physical. In this book, I wanted to share with readers my attempts to help troubled children to find some solace and to gain some competencies and inner strengths. I suffered with them as they faced unbearable problems. Sometimes, I felt as angry as they did about their circumstances, but I could not let this anger to immobilize me. Instead, I had to use it as a motivation to think more diligently about how I could help alleviate these children’s distress. In this book, I hoped to show how, through the work of play therapy, the process of healing can take place and what are the limitations of therapy with children, who are truly pawns in the hands of their adult caregivers. I hope, too, that the reader will recognize my silent screams when a parent thwarted a child’s progress and will also share in the sweetness of the mending process and the beginnings of individuality and autonomy. Many parents ask, “What is play therapy?” “How is it different from Just playing?” “How can children become better by playing?” Jean Piaget, the noted Swiss psychologist, believed that play could heal through its compensating and cathartic characteristics. For example, through play, a preschooler can compensate for the loss of a pet by “curing” the animal and restoring it to life. The child plays this game many times in trying to understand the meaning of death. Each time she reenacts the event, her anxiety lessens and the pet becomes increasingly a memory in a broader context subject to the child’s own control. A child may feel better after expressing anger at a doll and even spanking it or sending it off to bed with no supper; in this way, the child may be able to handle anger that he or she cannot express openly to a sibling or even to a parent. Piaget believed that through the use of symbols, children could “liquidate a disagreeable situation by reliving it in make-believe.” Thus, forbidden actions may be carried out in make-believe games and fears may be neutralized by doing “in play what one would not dare do in reality.” Over the years, children have labeled my playroom a “safe room,” “the smiling room,” the “happy-sad room,” and even “Pee Wee’s Playhouse.” In the playroom, a child’s “sacred space,” I have tried to offer troubled children an opportunity to heal; to become more integrated, more self-actualizing, and more positive in their self-images; and to play with joyful abandon. To do this, I listen carefully to the children’s fears, complaints, and sorrows and to their shouts of triumph, their expressions of excitement about new accomplishments and their emerging proclamations of love of themselves, their siblings, and their parents. I respond empathically and reflect, when appropriate, on the children’s behavior and emotions as they converse with me or play, paint, draw, and build. I offer limits, structure, and information when necessary, to help children learn how to control negative behavior that has been damaging to themselves and to others. I try to help them learn new approaches so they can adapt to home and school demands more constructively. In general, I draw on a variety of therapeutic methods, depending on the age, the intelligence, the capacity for insight, and the responsiveness of the child. The playroom is carefully planned to house a variety of materials, but not all are on display because I don’t want the children distracted by too much stimulation. My methods include: • Traditional play techniques, using the dollhouse, dress-up clothes, puppets, water play, arts-and-crafts materials, board games, and music • Modeling behavior through role playing, in which the child and I take turns becoming, for example, a sibling, a parent, or a teacher so that the child can learn more appropriate responses to conflict • Imagery techniques without the use of props that encourage the child to picture people, events, moods, conflicts, and resolutions • Behavior modification, which reinforces a child’s positive behavior with external symbols, such as a star or a sticker, and which ultimately leads to self-reward and intrinsic satisfaction. The key elements that distinguish play therapy from “playing around” are the therapist’s interpretations of symbolic play in words the child is ready to accept and understand; the offering of new ways to control and handle fears, anxieties, and negative emotions; and the teaching and modeling of adaptive skills that will enable a child to cope with an ego-threatening home or school situation and to increase his or her capacity for daily problem solving. Through symbolic play, children cast their conflicts, fears, unresolved wishes, and concern about their parents or siblings into miniaturized form in order to confront their own anger, distress, sadness, shame, guilt, and humiliation. The skilled therapist is, in effect, a substitute for the absent, inadequate, or troubled parent. This key figure, however, must be careful not to usurp the role of parent and, instead, to help the child identify those features in a complex, confusing world that need special attention. The therapist provides approval of a child’s play efforts to assimilate material that is disturbing, teaches imaginative skills to help solve problems, makes maJor life issues more concrete, and uncovers significant people and conflicts in the child’s life. New ideas and scripts or plans are developed to help reduce anxiety, ambiguity, confusion, fear, and terrors. For example, a four-year-old I worked with had a fear of airplanes and airports in addition to other fears. He was unable to sleep after a flight with his parents and had regressed in his behavior. He had been bewildered by the enormity of the buildings, the hustle and bustle of the crowds through the corridors, and the roar of the airplanes’ engines as they took off and landed. His play consisted of a continuous reenactment of the airport scene, in which he used miniature airplanes, plastic people, and blocks to create his airport. By playing this game repeatedly, he was able to master his confusion and anxiety about his frightening experience. Through play, a child becomes more flexible, more empathic, and more capable of sharing, taking turns, and delaying gratification of needs; the child also learns to express feelings in words, increasing her or his vocabulary in the process: think of all the new words a child needs to play “knights,” or the words that may enrich a game of “space”! As it is essential that the child’s parents