“My daughter and I keep arguing and our relationship is deteriorating. She doesn’t want to talk to me anymore. I can’t seem to reach her.”
Adolescence is marked by a high level of change, increased independence and a desire to be more connected with friends. This is a challenging time for parents and teens as they learn a new way to communicate and keep the relationship alive and healthy. Counseling with teens and their parents is an effective tool to facilitate adjustment, decrease arguments, increase good communication and trust.
“My wife and I have decided to divorce after 10 years of marriage. We have trouble agreeing on things that involve our two children. My son seems to be more moody lately and my daughter doesn’t want to leave her mother’s side.”
Divorce is hard on kids. They have loyalty issues that complicate their ability to adjust and accommodate to all the changes that come with divorce. Individual play therapy and co-parenting counseling helps children and families work through the grief, loss, hurt and anger that is part of the adjustment to the divorce. One of the factors that help children adjust more effectively to divorce is the ability of both parents to be cooperative and cordial with one another. Co-parenting counseling to help sort out what is the best way to discipline and interact with the children is an excellent way to ensure that your child is adjusting well.
“I am in a job I don’t like and it seems that my boss isn’t listening to me. Every time I try to make a change things just seem to get worse. I come home from work after a long commute and I don’t want to say anything. I just eat my dinner and hope everyone will leave me alone.”
Stress from work and feeling disempowered in your life can lead to feelings of depression. Depending on the type of depression a person has there are a few things that can help; increase exercise, consultation with a physician about anti-depression medication, and counseling with a trained therapist. Sometimes depression is situational and can be relieved by making life changes and sometimes depression has an organic basis and medication is needed. A therapist can help you sort out what’s going on and come up with the best plan to help you feel better and get back on track
“I woke up from a really bad dream and I was sweating and crying. It was hard to breathe. I have nightmares a lot. It makes me not want to go to sleep. I wish I knew what was happening.”
Having recurring nightmares accompanied with anxiety can be an indicator of a more serious underlying issue like unresolved trauma. Whereas you can never undo trauma there are ways that you can transform the trauma into “just a memory” and not “a memory that hurts.” There are ways to help you learn to control and diminish feelings of anxiety so that you don’t feel so overpowered by your feelings. I have specialized training in trauma recovery.
“I think my partner is having an affair. How do I deal with this?”
Couples counseling can help you and your life partner examine and work through the challenges that come with trying to create a strong and healthy partnership that meets both your needs. Although counseling is not a guarantee that the relationship will remain intact I can help you examine what is working and what needs to be worked on to help you rebuild trust and make healthy choices.
Counseling with a trained therapist is a wonderful opportunity to focus on problems and create new ways of solving them or just learning to use your voice to create what you want in the world. Counseling may be brief or more long term depending on the issues that are present. If any of the things you’ve read so far have you thinking “I wonder if I should see a counselor?” please give us a call for a free half hour consultation to see if we might be able to help.
