Adolescent Therapy & Parental Therapy
I work with adolescents and families in a focused and supportive way so that the adolescent journey is less “storm and stress” and more “energy and direction”. I work with adolescents from 11 - 30yrs old. Adolescent therapy is offered in three parts:
1: Initial Assessment with Adolescent and Parent(s)
2: Parent Assessment Session
3: Individual Adolescent Session
1: Initial Family Therapy Appointment
This initial appointment is a 60 min session.
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Your first adolescent appointment will be an initial family assessment appointment. This is offered to parent(s)/ and your adolescent. Meeting you as a family together gives me the opportunity to hear from you the adults about your teenagers strengths. Important family history is gathered from you and the reason for needing support at this time.
What emerges from this initial assessment appointment is a rich story about personality traits, experiences and the wonders of skills and competencies within the family. The appointment is designed to be explorative and curious in understanding your parenting style and aspects of family life.
This beginning assessment appointment provides an anchor from which we can work so that we can be solution focused and not problem saturated from the outset.
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Prior to your session i will send you on an information sheet so that you can understand the format of the session prior to your appointment. You can provide me with all the necessary information about your adolescents behavioural and learning style.
Therapy can sometimes be daunting and not everyone may agree it is a good idea. Everyone gets the opportunity in this session to meet with me and understand how therapy works.
If adolescent therapy feels right, we can arrange for an adolescent to move to the next stage which is one to one sessions. Further family sessions may be arranged during therapy in consultation with adolescents and adults.
The purpose of the parent session is to give you the parent(s) the opportunity to outline your reasons for therapy and the support you feel your adolescent needs. Adolescent therapy is synonoymous and connected to the parent role. Parents often seek out guidance to know how they can better understand their adolescent and support or manage challenging behaviours.
Focusing on practical tools as well as interventions that can help to focus on everyone's needs is key to parental consultation. We will consider your parenting and how best to optimise your realtionship with yoru adolescent. Focusing in this way supports us to work within teh family style, value system and your own goals for adolescent and family support currently. Within this consultation work we focus on managing expectations, re shaping teh relationship, managing boundaries and staying connected even when its tough going. This work is confidentail and separate to your adolescents work
2: Parent(s) Session
3: Adolescent Therapy
One to one 50 min session
Your adolescents one to one therapy begins at stage three. Adolescent Therapy also known as teenage therapy is a specialized area of psychotherapy tailored to meet the needs of teenagers. At AdolEssence the focus is helping young people cope with a wide range of emotional behavioural and mental health issues that may arise during adolescence.
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Adolescents are amazing human beings. Parents and caregivers are eager to be supportive in this period of development. These two facts do not always work together. Finding your identity as a teenager can feel risky and exhausting. Supporting an adolescent can feel frustrating and unrewarding. Adolescent Therapy with adolescents and their families is designed to give greater understanding about this important life stage. Together we support the adolescent in navigating their future adult life.
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Adolescence is a time of growth and change. The brain, body and emotions are undergoing significant changes and challenges. The adolescents social and academic world is continually expanding as they begin to learn more about the world themselves and others.
With these changes comes a demand on the mind to work everything out. This can place a pressure on both adolescents and their families to figure it out or get it right.
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Adolescence can benefit from therapy when this figuring out becomes difficult or challenging. Symptoms of anxiety, depression or other mental health issues can emerge if they are struggling with stress related to school, relationships or family issues. The figuring it out can become painful and exhausting.
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Adolescent Therapy is a space to figure it out. Often adolescents need the opportunity to look at themselves in a supportive environment so that they can see the real essence of who they are and who they want to be. Many developmental challenges arise in adolescence which impact behaviour, mood, learning style and overall development. These challenges benefit from support psycho education and understanding. The specific type of therapy that is offered for an adolescent will depend on their individual need and circumstances. I will work with adolescents and their families to determine the best form of support that is needed. The therapy offered will focus on specific skills and interventions to support negative thoughts patterns and behaviours. It will also involve working with parents to understand and support the developing adolescents and the parenting style.
