1st Edition

Couples of Mixed HIV Status Clinical Issues and Interventions

By R. Dennis Shelby, Nancy L Beckerman Copyright 2005
    190 Pages
    by Routledge

    190 Pages
    by Routledge

    Examine the unique emotional challenges and issues that face couples of mixed HIV status today!

    Previous books on this subject—mostly written in the days when HIV/AIDS was considered a fatal rather than a chronic disease—focused on end-of-life issues. However, Couples of Mixed HIV Status: Clinical Issues and Interventions addresses the unique emotional challenges facing today’s couples of mixed HIV status and provides a conceptual framework for assessment and intervention. The book offers examples of how to apply emotionally focused couple therapy to help them work through issues including disclosure, the fear of HIV transmission, shifts in emotional intimacy, family planning, betrayal, mistrust, and uncertainty. This unique work, its knowledge base, and the interventions you'll find inside, are applicable to any practitioner who provides couple and family therapy—as well as any practitioner who counsels around issues of chronic illness.

    Couples of Mixed HIV Status provides therapists with a range of theoretical approaches to help mixed HIV status couples deal with their issues and concerns. It includes applications of couple therapy approaches that have proved to be particularly effective as well as case studies that demonstrate how different relationship variables may affect therapy. The book presents the findings of a research study involving 44 mixed HIV status couples in the Northeast and is generously illustrated with tables that make complex research results easy to access and understand.

    Topics covered in Couples of Mixed HIV Status include:

    • various approaches to couples therapy
    • the historical context of HIV/AIDS
    • HIV transmission
    • family planning and HIV/AIDS
    • emotionally focused couple therapy
    • disclosure issues
    • attachment theory
    • and much more!
    Couples of Mixed HIV Status: Clinical Issues and Interventions is a valuable resource for therapists and other mental health counselors working with today’s couples of mixed HIV status as well as for students of counseling and health related services. Readers who may be in a mixed HIV status relationship or those who are friends and family members of couples living with HIV will also find this book helpful.

    • Prologue
    • Rationale
    • Plan of the Book
    • Chapter 1. Introduction
    • Key Emotional Issues
    • Introduction to Research Study
    • How This Book Is Organized
    • Chapter 2. Literature Review
    • Historical Context of HIV/AIDS and Couples
    • Empirical Research on Serodiscordant Couples
    • Summary
    • Chapter 3. Theoretical Framework
    • Common Theoretical Frameworks in Couple Therapy
    • Medical Family Therapy
    • EFCT and Couples Affected by HIV/AIDS
    • Integrative Couple Therapy with Couples Affected by HIV/AIDS
    • Summary
    • Chapter 4. Methodology
    • Empirical Study
    • Qualitative Research
    • Chapter 5. Introduction to the Findings
    • Empirical Findings
    • Qualitative Data
    • Chapter 6. Fear of HIV Transmission
    • Overview
    • Quantitative Findings
    • Qualitative Findings
    • Summary
    • Chapter 7. Shifts in Emotional Intimacy
    • Overview
    • Quantitative Findings
    • Qualitative Findings
    • Summary
    • Chapter 8. Impact of Uncertainty
    • Overview
    • Quantitative Findings
    • Qualitative Findings
    • Summary
    • Chapter 9. Disclosure Issues
    • Overview
    • Quantitative Findings
    • Qualitative Findings
    • Summary
    • Chapter 10. Issues of Mistrust and Betrayal
    • Overview
    • Quantitative Findings
    • Qualitative Findings
    • Summary
    • Chapter 11. HIV and Family Planning
    • Overview
    • Quantitative Findings
    • Qualitative Findings
    • Summary
    • Epilogue
    • References
    • Index

    Biography

    R Dennis Shelby