review and discuss the MindTap case study – Case Studies in Psychotherapy Workbook – A Twenty Three Year Old Woman Guilty about Not Following Her Parents’ Rules.Martha

review and discuss the MindTap case study – Case Studies in Psychotherapy Workbook – A Twenty Three Year Old Woman Guilty about Not Following Her Parents’ Rules.Martha, a twenty-three-year-old woman, came for help because she claimed she was selfpunishing,

compulsive, afraid of males, had no goals in life, and was guilty about her

relationship with her parents.

SEGMENTS FROM THE FIRST SESSION

C-1: Well, for about a year and a half since I graduated from college, I’ve had the

feeling that something was the matter with me. I seem to have a tendency

toward punishing myself. I’m accident-prone. I’m forever banging myself or

falling down stairs, or something like that. And my relationship with my father is

causing me a great deal of trouble. I’ve never been able to figure out where is the

responsibility and what my relationship with my parents should be.

T-2: Do you live with them?

C-3: No, I don’t. I moved out in March.

T-4: What does your father do?

C-5: He is a newspaper editor.

T-6: And your mother is a housewife?

C-7: Yes.

T-8: Any other children?

C-9: Yes, I have two younger brothers. One is twenty; the other is sixteen. I’m twentythree.

The sixteen-year-old has polio, and the other one has an enlarged heart. We

never had much money, but we always had the feeling that love and security in

life are what count. And the first thing that disturbed me was, when I was about

sixteen years old, my father began to drink seriously. To me he had been the infallible

person. Anything he said was right. And since I moved out and before I

Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy

4 a twenty-three-yearold

woman guilty about

not following her

parents’ rules1

Albert Ellis

From Ellis, A. (1974). Growth through Reason (pp. 223-286). Hollywood: Wilshire Books. Reprinted

by

permission of the author.

1In this early case of REBT, I stress the cognitive and philosophic techniques commonly used in this therapy.

From the beginning, however, REBT has been highly behavioral, especially in its use of in vivo desensitization

or exposure with clients like Martha, who are afraid to risk failure and rejection. REBT makes use of operant

conditioning, stimulus control, relapse prevention, and many other behavioral methods. It is also very forceful,

emotive, and experiential, and uses many affective methods such as shame-attacking exercises, rational emotive

imagery, forceful coping statements, and vigorous disputing of clients’ irrational beliefs.

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• summarize the case :
  • What was the case about
  • Who did it involve
  • What happened in the case
  • What caused the distress