Universitas Indonesia Conferences, International Conference on Intervention and Applied Psychology (ICIAP) 2018

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Multiple strategy of relaxation techniques to deal with stuck point in reducing Generalized Anxiety Disorder (GAD) symptoms: A case study of Indonesian Housewife
Faiz Agung Baskoro, Lathifah Hanum

Last modified: 2018-08-07

Abstract


Like any other anxiety disorder, reducing the intensity and the emersion of Generalized Anxiety Disorder (GAD) symptoms of the client is somewhat necessary before dealing with the primary resource of the disorder. It is more challenging to encourage the client to gain insight from the therapy session when they still overwhelmed by their anxiety symptoms. However, it is undeniably circumstances that the client experienced some stuck point where they felt that the intervention was too difficult to implement or irrelevant to their current problem. This condition usually leads to unproductive or maladaptive behavior of the client such as procrastination and absenteeism that interfere with the progress of therapy sessions. Such a typical situation frequently happened toward Indonesian clients in public medical service, specifically Indonesian housewife client in community health center. There was a common misconception of the client that any treatment should lead to instant remedy, and implemented efficiently in their current routine. Moreover, their involvement in therapy usually based on their enthusiasm, comfort, ease feeling, and perceive a change in their behavior every session. One of the reasonable solutions to this problem is to encourage the client to use multiple strategies that shared the main principles of intervention, in this case, using a various relaxation technique to reduce anxiety symptoms. Having alternative resources, the clients could choose the method that fits best in their particular routine without diminishing its impact on the client’s symptoms. This research aimed to present the dynamic process of GAD symptoms intervention toward an Indonesian housewife using two types of relaxation techniques, progressive relaxation, and deep breathing-orientation. Using the case study method, just one participant was involved in this research. The subjective experience of the clients and its behaviors related to anxiety was described and analyzed in chronological order based on days within therapy sessions. The data was collected in 3 months’ therapy session with interview and observation as primary instruments. The result showed that the client felt more enthusiastic and helped with the alternative solution provided. She could choose the most comfortable technique that felt more compatible with her current routines, such as deep breathing-orientation in the tight schedule and progressive relaxation in the opposite situation. She also felt more enthusiastic when she could share and teach her peers about the implemented relaxation techniques in her routine because of its simplicity and easiness. There was also consistently reduce of the symptoms in the baseline and after intervention either using progressive relaxation or deep breathing-orientation based on client daily self-monitoring and researcher observation in the face-to-face sessions. These results support the efficacy of multiple strategies to overcome the stuck point of the intervention of GAD symptom specifically in Indonesian housewife client. It also provides a single clue that leads to the evidence of multiple relaxation strategy effectiveness in reducing anxiety symptom in GAD clients. Furthermore, there was a slight contribution to provide the practical framework for research and intervention dealing with Indonesian client who is experiencing GAD and stuck point during the intervention. This particular result could stimulate the discussion about the concept of GAD intervention in a cross-cultural context.

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