Outback Therapeutic Expeditions Introduces New Family Wilderness Experience: Roots & Wings Expedition
Outback Therapeutic Expeditions, a strengths-based therapeutic wilderness program for struggling teens, has introduced a new "Roots & Wings Expedition" that will unite families in crisis in a unique wilderness experience and engage them in a healing, therapeutic process facilitated by professionals.
"We are very pleased to introduce this new feature to our program and look forward to reuniting families with a powerful therapeutic wilderness experience," said Andrew Powell, MBA, Executive Director. "The Roots & Wings Expedition will help families apply skills, learn and practice new ways to resolve conflict and more effective ways to express oneself, and teach the power of empathy and validation for healthy communication."
During the expedition, families will receive the full-time attention and aid of a Master's level family therapist with years of experience on the trail and graduate-level training in family dynamics. These Roots & Wings Expedition facilitators will customize the experience based on each family's current needs.
"The Family Expedition is designed to provide a comprehensive, high-powered capstone for our students' time at Outback," explained Powell. "Having the family accompany the student for several days in the wilderness will help ensure a successful transition out of the wilderness and forward in life."
Powell continued, "The Family Expedition is the perfect opportunity for families to continue to develop, practice, and apply new skills of family communication and conflict resolution. It includes psycho-education, therapy and experiential activities, and will focus on helping families interrupt and let go of old conflicts while learning and practicing skills for successfully managing co-parenting and parent/child relationships."
Outback Therapeutic Expeditions is prepared to work with all types of family issues including adoption, conflict resolution, lost trust, substance abuse, manipulation, aggression, divorce, blended families, grief and loss, after-care planning and home contracts for sustained positive behavior.
The Roots & Wings day-to-day schedule will depend on many individual factors including current treatment plan, weather, physical fitness levels, and dynamics that come up in the moment while on the excursion. Industry-standard safety procedures, including the presence of CPR and First Aid trained personnel, will be applied, and all gear except clothing will be provided.
"We'll start the family therapy process with assignments before the Expedition," said Powell. "These assignments will guide much of the process, punctuated by a wide variety of activities such as hikes, team-building initiatives, solo-time, cooking meals together, primitive skills practice, and enjoying a fire together at night. As important as the hard therapeutic work is, having fun together as a family through the experience is also an important part of the whole Roots & Wings Expedition. When we clear out old resentments, we often find a light we haven't experienced in years. That is when we can work towards solutions and establish new and realistic expectations that before seemed out of reach."
Outback Therapeutic Expeditionshas created a solid reputation for its strengths-based approach to helping teens, blending the best of ancient cultural systems with the most effective and proven therapeutic processes. Incoming students are typically experiencing family conflict, negative peer interaction, isolation, low self-esteem, academic difficulty, or addictive drug, alcohol or computer habits. In addition, Outback's certification with the Kinship Center allows therapists to address the specific needs of teens who are adopted. Outback incorporates the highest standards of safety and therapy with one of the most powerful settings for real change: the wilderness.