Narrating the Lived Experience of Family Counseling in the Perceptive World of Women

Today the static concept of the family has turned into a dynamic concept in light of social and cultural changes in Iranian society. Therefore, the method of solving marital conflicts in the family has also changed from consulting the elders to focusing on  social institutions. Counseling center is one of these institutions that women refer to address marital problems. The purpose of this research is to study the women’s experience of visiting a counseling center in Isfahan using a qualitative method based on narrative analysis technique. The research population consisted of all the women with marital conflict in Isfahan who had referred to the counseling center for their conflict problem in 2021. A sample of n=17 people was selected and data was collected through in-depth interview. Data analysis was conducted using problem solving method. In this study, 5 main themes and 22 sub-themes were identified. The main themes were characters, location, problem, action and solution. According to the findings of this research, women's experience of counseling is a problem-oriented experience suggesting that they, rather than looking for pain, are trying to address their problems rationally. As such, when their problems are solved, they continue the counseling; otherwise, they change their counselor or stop it altogether. Therefore, this counseling is meant to reach a desirable solution for life, for most of the women referring to the centers, the counseling process has resulted in a solution.