individual therapy for girls and young women
Girls and young women are faced with an onslaught of expectations of who they should be and how they should act. If they fail to measure up to those expectations or their own, the consequences can be dire for their self-confidence and self-image. Adolescents are expected to excel in every area of life; often this leads to stress, anxiety, feelings of hopelessness, loneliness and isolation. Add to those expectations the pressure of always being connected through social media and it's no wonder that almost 20% of adolescent females aged 12-17 had at least one depressive episode in 2015 (source).
individual therapy for boys and young men
It is not easy to be male in today's culture. On one hand, traditional ideals of masculinity are expected but on the other hand, we know that boys are much more sensitive and complex than typical media stereotypes. Through therapy, boys can expect to practice identifying and expressing emotions, develop coping skills to tolerate distress, and effective communication patterns.
dialectical behavioral therapy for families
Traditional DBT is taught in weekly skill training sessions with 6-12 participants of similar age and life situation. Parents often attend a DBT group designed just for parents at the same time. While this may be ideal for some, there are many circumstances that prevent families from being able to participate in the full program of simultaneous treatment.
What I offer is Dialectical Behavioral Therapy skill training in a family therapy setting. The difference is that the whole family learns the skills simultaneously and at the same pace. We use the session to process events from the past week, prepare for upcoming stressors and practice using new skills. The ‘identified client’ in family therapy is the family unit, so each family member should come ready to use self-reflection to explore their own patterns of thinking, communicating and behaving and how they may impact the family unit.