TPC Journal-Vol 9- Issue 1

The Professional Counselor | Volume 9, Issue 1 57 experienced a reproductive loss, normalizing and validating both acknowledged and unacknowledged reactions to the loss, as well as making space for the client to create a hopeful narrative about the future. Therapeutic exploration of the meaning of the loss, both to the individual client and within broader relational and cultural contexts, is encouraged in order to facilitate client understanding and growth (Diamond & Diamond, 2017; Markin & Zilcha-Mano, 2018; Wenzel, 2017), supporting the utility of the ecological model as a conceptual frame. Ecological conceptualization pairs easily with a wide variety of theoretical approaches to clinical work. It can be used to facilitate a more deeply person-centered encounter, to provide context for adaptive and maladaptive relational strategies at play both in and out of the therapy room, to facilitate existential exploration, and to co-create goals and strategies tied to specific variables. Counselors can infuse ecological conceptualizations and observations into the therapeutic encounter, providing rich opportunities for reflections of meaning, re-framing, and narrative restructuring. Following a detailed case example describing a client who has recently experienced a miscarriage, the next sections progress through each level of the ecological model (Bronfenbrenner, 1994). After explicating the level, we identify clinically relevant variables from both the literature and the case example and offer clinical implications for counselors working within an ecological framework. An eco-map summarizing ecological variables from the case example can be found in Figure 2. Figure 2. Eco-map of Michelle. Case Study: Michelle Michelle is a 27-year-old woman who lives in a mid-sized East Coast city. She resides with her boyfriend of 3 years, Jon, and is employed as a server at a high-end restaurant. She is currently