Therapy Services

Anxiety. Self-Harm. Suicide. Trauma.

Parenting your adolescent has nearly broken you.

You’re exhausted and everything you’re doing (or not doing) doesn’t feel like enough. 

You feel completely alone and isolated because your most difficult days parenting your teen don’t even come close to the experiences of other "normal" or "average" families.

I MEAN, HOW CAN THEY?	

You’re on edge, barely hanging on by a thread and trying to save your teen because you never know when the self-harming will happen again or worse, “what if” they take it too far this time.

The fear of the “what if” is unbearable, and it keeps you up at night wondering what to do next.  

You don’t have to wait until your teen seriously hurts themselves or makes an impulsive choice that leads to a fatal act of self-aggression. 

Therapy can help your teen deal with their really big emotions and learn new, healthy ways to cope.

Knowing that your teen is self-harming, in itself, is difficult enough, especially since self-harming is very secretive and oftentimes, experienced behind closed doors and rarely communicated about. 

More often than not, parents have no idea that their teen is self-harming until they observe a scratch or a burn, and something in them tugs to say, hey something’s not right. In my experience, parents often notice the big emotions first, or the complete 180 change in their teen’s behavior. 

Some adolescents experience intense sadness or crying spells. Others experience complete withdrawal and isolation. Some teens report feeling stuck, lethargic, or flat. Others report agitation, rage, and aggressiveness. Some teens show increased anxiety, rigidity, or a need to control everything in their environment.

Self-harming is about managing deeply distressing emotions with strategic, and healthier approaches, to help you and your teen confront the self-harming behaviors with stronger awareness through education and taking step-by-step actions to plan for the immediate, and long-term goal of reducing, and eliminating self-harm.

What is self-harm?

Self-harm refers to purposeful, often ritualistic behaviors that cause harm or injury to one’s own body, and self-injurious behaviors are generally not attempts to complete suicide.

Common Self-Harming Behaviors

Cutting

Biting

Burning

Scratching

Hitting or punching oneself

Piercing or stabbing the skin

Risky or poor decision making

***Risky decision making suggests choices that would place one at risk of further distress, emotional harm or injury.

Common Signs and Symptoms of Self-Harming:

Fresh cuts and bruising

Scarring on the skin

Wearing pants or long sleeves to cover up the self-injuries

Unpredictable behaviors and impulsivity

Reporting accidental behaviors when asked about the self-harming

Difficulties with interpersonal relationships

Having a poor self-concept or feeling worthless

Reports of helplessness and hopelessness

Let’s Work Together!

This journey may be one of the most challenging journeys you, your teen, and your family may ever face, which is why I’m here to help. My role is to support teens and parents to confidently walk into each vulnerable situation together, assess the risks, and problem-solve together in the here-and-now first, and then prepare for the “what if” scenarios.

We can’t prepare for what we don’t know or understand.

My first goal is to complete an assessment to thoroughly assess your teen’s self-harming behaviors and level of risk, and provide you and your teen with an immediate safety plan. From here, I will work in a variety of ways including individual sessions with your teen, one-on-one sessions with you, the parent, and family sessions.

My approach to therapy will combine different modalities including Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (DBT), Seeking Safety (SS), and Yoga for Mood Management to help teens increase their resources and reduce stressors.

Let’s work together to help your teen cope with distress in healthier ways.

Click here to schedule an Onboarding Session!

Other Therapy Services Offered

 Anxiety. Suicide. Trauma.