O poder de recuperação em uma família co-dependente do álcool

Abstract

ABSTRACT

The present study aims at knowing and understanding the family system, its functional patterns and the strength of the family to overcome alcohol co-dependence. In order to reach such a goal the work draws from systemic thought, which establishes a correlation between the issue of drug use by the individual and the relational patterns of social and family systems.

The study agrees with Stanton (1990), who considers the family approach the most appropriate one for intervention in the prognosis of patients with a history of drug abuse. The investigation of family structure, the power manifestations that organize it, and the possibility of changing that power by relating it to the reproduction or not of the drug-addiction cycle were all deemed important.

With a basis on the systems approach, within Stanton s conceptual framework on drug addiction, as well as Bateson s theory of alcoholism and socioanthropological contributions, an in-depth study was carried out on transgenerational relational patterns of a drug co-dependent family. The strategy used was structural systemic therapy and its techniques, such as resonance, narratives, reframing, externalizing conversation, and drawings.

It was thus possible to achieve an in-depth knowledge and understanding of the strength of a repetitive transgenerational drug-addiction cycle and the power of resilient family interaction patterns as one of the possibilities to free family members from a relationship of co-dependence in order to move towards individuation.

The research has contributed to the enhancement of knowledge of the relational context of the drug-addiction cycle and, at the same time, it has made possible to know the strength of a family to rescue its resilient patterns and overcome alcohol co-dependence.