Untangling the Relational System: Action Methods for Families

About this event

Untangling the Relational System: Action Methods for Families

Presented by Adrienne Loker, LCSW, SEP

EMDRIA Certified Therapist and Approved Consultant

Friday, November 6, 2026, 9:00-5:00 pm

This training has been approved by the NASW Virginia Chapter for 7.0 CEUs, approval code NASW-VA 26NOV06SDR.

Individuals exist within larger relational systems, and sometimes what looks like an individual problem makes more sense when we can see the relationships around it. Thoughtful family involvement can deepen individual treatment when clinicians have a clear framework for determining when and how to bring family members into the therapeutic process.

This training introduces action methods that can be used in both individual and family settings to assess relational dynamics, implicit rules, family strengths, and patterns of connection and disconnection. Participants will learn how to determine when and how family involvement may support individual treatment, as well as how to use structured experiential methods to bring otherwise difficult-to-observe relational patterns into view. Multiple assessment tools will be introduced and practiced, with attention to translating what is observed into clinically useful information and intervention.

The training is highly experiential, with substantial time devoted to practicing these methods so that participants leave with concrete skills they can begin incorporating into their clinical work.

Upon completion of this training, participants will be able to:

• Identify implicit biases and assumptions that clinicians may bring into family therapy and consider how these may influence clinical assessment, engagement, and intervention.

• Assess when and how family involvement can support individual treatment while maintaining focus on the client’s therapeutic goals.

• Describe how foundational family therapy theories conceptualize family relationships and systems, and consider their implications for contemporary social work practice.

• Describe the theory of change underlying action methods and its application to relational and family systems.

• Demonstrate the ability to plan and facilitate two sociometric exercises with families and identify the clinical implications of clients’ responses and choices.

• Demonstrate the ability to assess strengths within a family system and apply this information to support therapeutic change.

• Demonstrate the use of the Social Atom as a clinical assessment tool for exploring relationships, support systems, and patterns of connection and disconnection.

Seeking Depth Institute — Foundation Series for Trauma Therapists

The Seeking Depth Institute offers four foundation trainings for clinicians working with developmental, complex, and relational trauma. One training is offered each quarter, and each training is designed to be taken twice : the first experience introduces the framework and skills; the second gives you the opportunity to deepen your understanding, refine your clinical application, and see the material from a new level of complexity.

The four trainings are:

• Tracking the Unspoken: Somatic Psychotherapy

• Reprocessing the Wounded Child: Somatically-Centered EMDR

• Integrating the Fragmented Self: Self-Triangulation Theory

• Untangling the Relational System: Action Methods for Families .

Each training stands on its own, while the full series creates a deeper understanding of how trauma lives in the body, shapes the developing self, and is expressed within relationships.

About Adrienne Loker, LCSW, SEP

Adrienne Loker is a developmental and complex trauma specialist and the founder of Seeking Depth. She holds a Master’s Degree in Social Work from Virginia Commonwealth University and is an EMDRIA Certified Therapist and Approved Consultant and a Somatic Experiencing™ Practitioner . Since 2017, she has pursued advanced training in Psychodrama, Sociometry, and Group Psychotherapy . Her clinical work brings these disciplines together with a particular focus on the therapeutic relationship, the reenactments that emerge within it, and the ways trauma is communicated through the body and relational experience. The Institute grows directly out of this ongoing clinical practice and study, giving participants access to frameworks and methods developed through years of specialized training, supervision, and work with complex trauma.