Bowen Family Therapy: A Personal Genogram Analysis

Introduction to Bowen Family Therapy

Bowen Family Therapy is a systems-based treatment approach. Rather than treating the individual as a completely separate person, Bowen places the person in the context of his or her family. By examining at least three generations of an index person's family, the therapist can develop a strong understanding of the factors that formed and continue to influence the patient or client. The systems-based intervention for treating an issue also helps the individual grasp the underlying factors affecting his or her life and change either his or her individual approach or the entire group dynamic in order to address the problem.

Family Genogram Overview

My family is relatively unremarkable as genograms go. My father's biological parents were Caucasian, Italian, Roman Catholic, working class, lived in New York State, and had one child—my father. My paternal grandfather was a foreman in an aluminum plant, and my paternal grandmother was a housewife. My mother's biological parents were Caucasian, Italian, Roman Catholic, working class, lived in Indiana, and had two children: my mother and my Aunt Elizabeth. My maternal grandfather was a shoemaker, and my maternal grandmother was a factory worker at a shoe plant. My Aunt Elizabeth never married and had no children.

My parents were married only to each other and had four biological children: Julie, Paul, Katherine, and Francis. My father was the traffic and shipping supervisor for the same aluminum plant, and my mother was a housewife. There were no divorces, affairs (that I know of), illegitimate children (that I know of), or mental illnesses (that I know of), and no major physical illnesses until my paternal grandfather's fatal pneumonia, my paternal grandmother's terminal colon cancer, my maternal grandfather's fatal congestive heart failure, my maternal grandmother's terminal cirrhosis of the bile ducts, my father's fatal heart attack, and my mother's terminal colon cancer. There have been no major illnesses among my brothers, sister, or me. Diversity, in the classic sense, is a non-issue in my family.