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 By: Dr. Erica WollermanWell, here we are facing yet another week of social distancing and living with the challenge of parenting during a pandemic! As many other writers have also commented on, this is a time where we are all likely to have a variety of reactions but most likely we are also feeling exhausted. Exhausted with the daily changes we ae having to make and the dramatic impact staying home, often with our entire family, is having on our emotional health. The reason for this is because we are all experiencing collective trauma and anxiety from the fears we have for our world, ourselves, our families, as well as grief related to what was and what we are unsure about for the future. Most of us have not experienced a struggle like this in our world, especially one without an end date. I have to say, this is hard. It’s hard for all of us and it seems to be impacting people in such a variety of ways that I thought it might be helpful to share a bit about what I feel might help our teens and the parents of teens get through this. As I have mentioned in past blogs about the Covid-19 pandemic, we need to come to a place where we can embrace this new reality so that we can learn to cope with it. Unfortunately, our teens may struggle with this even more than we do at times. I can tell you, a cooped up and isolated teen is not a fun person to spend time with. Here are some ideas specifically to help parents with teens at home who are practicing social distancing.
I hope this is helpful for our readers right now! As always, my goal is to be a calming and helpful voice in the storm that can be parenting and my office is here to help for those who would like to talk more about parenting or who would like support for their teens. We are accepting new clients for video therapy sessions today! At Thrive, we take a positive, client centered approach to therapy that is focused on creating a genuine connection with our clients. If you would like to talk with a Thrive Therapist about yourself, your child, or teen attending therapy via video sessions, please reach out to us by phone at 858-342-1304. As always, thanks for reading and comments are always welcome regarding any issues around child or teen psychotherapy services in San Diego by Thrive Therapy Studio. To stay in the loop on the services offered and to receive updated information about Thrive, please feel free to sign up for the newsletter through the following link: http://eepurl.com/dsgLNL.
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"I don’t know about you but this is my first f****** global pandemic". -Brené Brown I was looking for a podcast this morning and stumbled on Brené Brown’s new podcast, Unlocking Us. For those of you who don’t know, I am a bit of a fan or her work. Okay, I’m totally obsessed with it! Her above statement perfectly captures what we are all dealing with and the inherent complexities of living through this time. I wrote the below blog post all about the grief process as it relates to the coronavirus pandemic. I hope you all enjoy it as it is a bit more open and vulnerable than my usual (which is great that I found a perfect Brené Brown quote to go with it considering she is my go to champion of vulnerability even when you don't want to. As I have been working with my clients, consulting with my family, friends, and colleagues, and checking in with my own emotions, I have recognized that the process of adjusting to our new normal as we try to #flattenthecurve and engage in social distancing reminds me so much of a grief process. As a therapist, I am familiar with grief and how it pops up in our lives during times that do not necessarily include death. Grief is involved in any sort of ending, new beginning, phase of life, and even happy days. For example, when you become a parent you are overjoyed at the gift of the precious baby you now have but you might also feel overwhelmed with grief for the life you used to know. As I have sat with my own emotions and explored those of others during this unprecedented time in our world, there has definitely been a process of grief and loss. I remember just a week or two ago, which feels like MONTHS ago, feeling like everything was happening so quickly and everyone seemed so anxious and I felt like it was not even happening. I now recognize my feeling that this might be an overreaction both as a product of my own misinformation and lack of understanding of the situation we were in but also as a process of denial. I honestly have been working so hard in my life on so many of my goals, that I didn’t want any of this to be real. Particularly as a business owner, this situation was enough to make anyone want to hide with a blanket over their heads. The next wave of emotions was definitely some level of resentment. I honestly resented the people around me, even my husband whose judgment I trust, for telling me life as we knew it was over and would be for a longer time than any of us are prepared to sit with. Taking my son out of daycare and moving my therapy practice online have been changes that it truly took a lot of time to process. I found that I personally needed to allow myself some space to just be sad and to grieve all of the things I feel like we are losing…. My son’s experience with his trusted and beloved daycare providers, our upcoming vacation, all of my client’s progress and consistency in sessions and in therapy, my own progress in building our business, and our freedom to do what we enjoy doing – which is generally not staying home. I also felt like I needed some time to readjust from “building and improving” my life and my business to “survival mode.” Simultaneously, I have recognized my privilege in this situation. I work in a business that can use video and telehealth for sessions and our business will continue. It will continue differently but we are able to cope with this. So many businesses and people are not and I feel that sense of injustice in our world keenly. I have also been so grateful for my family situation and feeling so well supported by my colleagues, family, and friends. Never have I cherished our new home and backyard more than I do these days with a toddler to entertain! Never have I been so grateful for all that I have in the world. I found that my path to acceptance of our situation came from allowing myself time to just feel all of these things. To feel overwhelmed, sad, and to truly grieve everything that is happening. The loss of life, people’s livelihoods, and our ability to move through our world freely. I needed to let myself just feel these things and my feelings about them. During this time, I tried not to think too rationally about how I do believe that we can figure these things out. I just let the feelings come and embraced them willingly. I let myself cry freely and think all of my biggest fears and just let my awareness sit on the fact that we don’t know how long this will last. I repeat, our futures are not known and we honestly can’t do much in terms of planning. While some may find this freeing, many of us are going to find this anxiety provoking. To go from working towards goals and planning events to just getting through the week is going to be a challenge and struggle for many. It certainly has been for me. While I truly believe in our ability to come back from this both as individuals and as a society, that is truly so scary to not know so many things about what that process might look or be like. I feel like many of us are even bargaining in this grief process. I’ve said it myself, and heard many others say things like, “I can do this for 2 weeks but no longer.” Guys, we need to sit with the truth in this situation to allow ourselves to come to a place of coping. The more we fight reality, the more we are also delaying our own acceptance and coping. The world as we knew it is changing and it is now up to us to accept this, figure out a new normal, and allow ourselves to recognize that we don’t know anything about what the future will hold. This is a wave that could crush us if we are not careful. We could get lost in the unknown and fear. I encourage you to know this and choose to dip your toes in the pool of your emotions but to then also let yourself allow some light in. Other than days when the grief wave just takes hold of me, I am going to be mindful of my thoughts and choose to believe that we will get through this and that our resilience as a people will be a powerful force in light of this pandemic. I truly believe that our struggles can bring about change and growth and am hopeful that this might not be different even now. If you or your loved ones are struggling to cope, our office is still offering telehealth (video) therapy sessions throughout California. Please don’t hesitate to reach out to us if you feel we can be supportive during this time. Our therapists have availability and can offer flexible schedules even for those who are working from home while trying to learn how to homeschool your kids. From the bottom of my heart, I hope all of our readers are hanging in there and adjusting during this time. We will continue to post resources and tips for our readers to help us all cope with the days ahead! At Thrive, we take a positive, client centered approach to therapy that is focused on creating a genuine connection with our clients. If you would like to talk with a Thrive Therapist about yourself, your child, or teen attending therapy via video sessions, please reach out to us by phone at 858-342-1304. As always, thanks for reading and comments are always welcome regarding any issues around child or teen psychotherapy services in San Diego by Thrive Therapy Studio. To stay in the loop on the services offered and to receive updated information about Thrive, please feel free to sign up for the newsletter through the following link: http://eepurl.com/dsgLNL.  By: Dr. Wollerman As many people are making dramatic changes to their lives to try to #flattenthecurve in our country while we deal with this pandemic, therapists are making changes as well. Most of us are moving towards video session and our practice is no different! Starting next week, we are going to be only offering video sessions for our clients until it is reasonable to start up in person sessions again and we feel comfortable doing so without concern of transmitting Covid19. As the leader in our practice, this was a tough decision for me for many reasons. One, I really want to support my clients and love doing so in person. Two, I really didn’t want this choice to impact people’s access to care particularly during a time where so many of us are understandably feeling stressed, anxious, and even depressed. Three, I also genuinely believe in how calming it can be to have some normalcy in our lives when the world feels like it is falling apart. Upon reflection, I realized that while I am feeling all these conflicting feelings about it, people might be feeling conflicted even about attending sessions. We all know that there has been a variety of responses to Covid19 and some people continue to feel that we are all “over-reacting.” However, there are also those who are working hard to change their lives in the interest of protecting the most vulnerable in our society. Once I got used to the idea of changing our life and the way we offer our services, the more I realized that this is valuable coping in a time when things are unstable. Perhaps the more we learn to roll with the challenges life hands us, even when they are HUGE like right now, the more we all learn how to refocus on what mattes and how we can connect and cope together through this unprecedented time in our world. So, I had my first client video sessions in the past few days and realized that this is actually such a great way to connect with my clients! We luckily had very few tech related issues and the sessions felt almost exactly the same as in our office. My clients loved it and I felt thrilled to be able to continue to provide services without feeling any conflict around if I could possibly be exposing my clients to something dangerous. For those of you on the fence about telehealth, I thought I would share some pros with you!
These are just simple things that were fun today. The most important reason to continue with telehealth is that you don’t need to cancel your personal growth just because everything else in our world is cancelled. You can still work on yourself, how you are managing the unknown of this situation, and find support. Plus, we are all not sure how long this situation will last and it is going to be important for all of us to schedule in self-care. I feel that many parents in our world who are suddenly home schooling while working, are going to feel the pressure to be in survival mode throughout this situation. I would encourage you to consider the harm and stress of that. Carving out an hour a week to find support and a time for you, is most likely going to be crucial in maintaining this situation as long as we need to. We at Thrive would be thrilled to help any Californians during this time and are no longer limited to the bounds of who can drive to our office. We are hopeful that this will help extend the people we are able to help, particularly during a time of such challenge and uncertainty in our country. We are even working on strategies of things to do with younger kids in telehealth and ways to continue our work with the whole family! From our Thrive family to your family, we hope everyone is hanging in there and we look forward to supporting you! At Thrive, we take a positive, client centered approach to therapy that is focused on creating a genuine connection with our clients. If you would like to talk with a Thrive Therapist about yourself, your child, or teen attending therapy via video sessions, please reach out to us by phone at 858-342-1304. As always, thanks for reading and comments are always welcome regarding any issues around child or teen psychotherapy services in San Diego by Thrive Therapy Studio. To stay in the loop on the services offered and to receive updated information about Thrive, please feel free to sign up for the newsletter through the following link: http://eepurl.com/dsgLNL. We will be posting ongoing information to support our families and community during the Covid19 pandemic. Please stay tuned and let us know if there are questions we can help answer!  By: Dr. Erica WollermanI thought it might be nice to take a short break from our parenting teens and the challenges of being a teen blog series to focus a bit more on the holidays in our families. The holidays are always such a busy time for families as well as a difficult one for many reasons. Some families are grieving family members who have passed or changes in their family that have affected who is present for the holidays. Others are just so overscheduled and busy with travel, gifts, events, hosting family, and All. The. Things. we are supposed to do that it is not the most enjoyable of seasons. I wanted to post a bit about how to try and enjoy the holidays, particularly if you have a teen at home. Let’s start off with a general holiday survival tip - My biggest tip for enjoying the holidays that really can apply to any family is to work on reducing your obligations and replacing them with things you actually enjoy. Often, as parents, we feel responsible for cultivating the perfect holiday with perfect traditions. For many people, this is overwhelming and creates a sense of irritation when your efforts are not recognized or even appreciated by your family members. I encourage families to focus on the things and events about the holidays that they truly enjoy and cut everything else out. It’s okay not to do everything and it’s even better to do the things you love so that it truly can be a time of connection and enjoyment as a family! My two tips for enjoying holidays with a teen are: 1. Meet them where they are at This is huge. I’ve had years of conversations with parents who tell me all the things they hope and want to do with their teen during their break. Or, what they think their teen “should” be doing. I encourage parents all the time to really put themselves in their kids’ shoes. Teens are chronically tired, stressed, and overwhelmed these days. When you feel that way, would you really want your parents putting more demands on you? Probably not. Check in with them about what they are hoping for over break and make sure to set up clear expectations about things you really need them to participate in or take care of. The more this is a dialogue, rather than a top down exercise in telling them what to do, the better it will go! 2. Expect less In general, I would say that the above tip is going to require this tip. You will most likely be hoping for more than your teen can or is willing to give. If you go into the holidays expecting gratitude, lots of family time playing board games, and definitely not a lot of “screen time” or time with friends, you are ultimately setting yourself up for disappointment and hurt feelings. Every teen I work with looks at breaks from school as opportunities to sleep, rest, watch TV, and spend time with their friends. Even the ones who have great relationships with their parents. I repeat, even the ones who love spending time with their parents. As a parent, it is important not to interpret your teen’s disinterest in whatever it is you are suggesting as a reflection of how much they care about you or want to be with you. It is a reflection of their current place and stage in life. I hope this is helpful! I wish all of you a happy holiday season and remember, we are here to help at Thrive even during the holidays! Call or email us today if you would like more information about how we can help you and your family thrive! At Thrive, we take a positive, client centered approach to therapy that is focused on creating a genuine connection with our clients. If you would like to talk with a Thrive Therapist about yourself, your child, or teen attending therapy, please reach out to us by phone at 858-342-1304. As always, thanks for reading and comments are always welcome regarding any issues around child or teen psychotherapy services in San Diego by Thrive Therapy Studio. To stay in the loop on the services offered and to receive updated information about Thrive, please feel free to sign up for the newsletter through the following link: http://eepurl.com/dsgLNL.  By: Dr. Erica WollermanSince we work often with teens and their parents at Thrive, I wanted to spend some time sharing more about what I observe about how our current culture impacts teens (and their parents). Apparently, what I was hoping to share can’t be expressed in just one blog post so I am planning a series all about teens and parenting teens! This blog series was particularly inspired by some of my conversations recently with my teen clients about how challenging it feels to be a teen in our world. With the pressure of social media, super competitive college admissions, the focus on happiness but also achievement, and increased anxiety and fear – it is genuinely a tough time to be a teen. What I also know is that it is a tough time to be a parent of a teen. I would say that as relentless as the pressures are of adolescence, the pressure on parents is equally relentless! Unfortunately, this leads to patterns and cycles of stress just being transferred back and forth between teens and their parents. Before we talk more about the specific pressures on teens that I am noticing, I wanted to share my thoughts about what teens need most from their parents. It also might be helpful to check out my past posts about the pressures of parenting a teen and tips for parents of teens! 1. Love and Acceptance While many teens become awfully prickly and interactions with them can be challenging for parents, teens genuinely need love, acceptance, and a true sense of belonging from their parents. It’s important to remember that teens struggle with parental authority often because they are trying to figure out how to be their own person and grow away from their family to be on their own as adults. This is difficult and can be reminiscent of the toddler years. Mixed messages are common, as are outward rejections of parents while deep down wanting love, approval, kindness, and affection. It is so important that parents follow their teen’s lead but also provide them with a safe place for them to find genuine caring connections. Even if it gets you an eye roll or irritated glare, show them love and truly try to accept them for who they are becoming. Talk to them about common interests and just ask questions without lecturing or slipping into “parent mode.” Often the teens I work with just want an adult who cares and tries to see it from their side without immediately trying to fix it or tell them the “learning opportunity” in each situation. 2. Boundaries Teens will never, ever tell you but they definitely need boundaries. They need to be able to experiment with things in the world but to have parents who hold them accountable. While I am not a big fan of parents coming down too hard about grades (our academic system is stressful enough for most kids), I do think that most teens need some responsibilities at home. It’s important to learn to pitch in as a family and to learn how to manage personal and academic responsibilities. Make sure that the boundaries you set in place make sense and have some sort of natural consequences. For example, if a teen is struggling to make it home on time/before curfew, maybe they lose their driving privileges for a while. This helps them to learn that privileges involve responsibility which will help them know their limits as well as understand cause and effect in our world. Adults who did not have boundaries during childhood tend to not be the best employees or students later in life. 3. Empathy Do you remember just how difficult and confusing it can be to be a teenager? I certainly do and hold that experience in mind when I work with my teen clients and explore situations that are difficult for them as often what teens need from us is a little empathy. Even if our lives are more stressful or difficult as adults who have a zillion more responsibilities, remember that what they are experiencing is so important to them and genuinely difficult. Part of this is because they only have limited life experience and have difficulty comprehending that their life will not be this way forever. I’ll discuss the gift of perspective more in the next section. Future blogs in this series will also describe the challenges of being a teen currently that we might not always understand as adults who grew up in a very different environment. 4. Perspective I see one of the biggest challenges of being a teen currently is that they genuinely do not know that life is so much more than high school, or what college you go to, or if you have a “thing” with the cute person at school. Teens are amazing because they experience the world very intensely and passionately but this brings the challenge that since they have not had years to adjust to being a more adult like person, like we have all had, they do not realize that their current situation is not everything. I believe a gift we can give them is just a little perspective. And not in terms of telling them how hard adulthood can be, but in terms of helping them know that our lives are always changing and that most experiences are temporary in nature and will not last forever. This is a concept that is much more available to our adult brains than theirs. 5. Space Oh boy do teens need space. They need so many forms of space – space to be themselves and experiment with who they are and want to be; space to make mistakes and totally screw up without us preventing it; space to cope on their own and exist without parent involvement sometimes; space to make their own decisions; and space to change. The more we can let our teens guide things, within certain boundaries and limits of course, the better. They just need a lot of space as they walk their path into adulthood and the more we can give them now, the better they will do on their own later in life. Plus, the less we push our values, goals, judgments, etc. on them, the more likely it is that they will reach back out to us when they are ready. I hope you enjoyed the first blog in this series all about parenting teens and the challenges of teens! Please stay tuned for more blogs to come on this topic and reach out to us at Thrive if you would like support in parenting your teen! At Thrive, we take a positive, client centered approach to therapy that is focused on creating a genuine connection with our clients. If you would like to talk with a Thrive Therapist about yourself, your child, or teen attending therapy, please reach out to us by phone at 858-342-1304. As always, thanks for reading and comments are always welcome regarding any issues around child or teen psychotherapy services in San Diego by Thrive Therapy Studio. To stay in the loop on the services offered and to receive updated information about Thrive, please feel free to sign up for the newsletter through the following link: http://eepurl.com/dsgLNL.  Dr. Erica WollermanIt’s the start of my third year of working motherhood… and well, where did the time go? No, seriously, time just flies these days as I’m sure many of you can understand also. The truth is, while I feel mostly adjusted to my new life of being a mom and a business owner, it is still such a careful balancing act of roles and resources. In talking with other parents, I know that I am not alone in feeling this way but it can still feel awfully lonely on the more overwhelming days of feeling like you are balancing everything but not doing it very well. I get a mental picture of myself in my waitressing days when I would balance way too many glasses or plates and eventually drop them. Some days I feel a sense of calm, cool control and others it just seems like things are going to drop at any minute. While I really appreciate all of the advice out there about self-care and certainly do add to it at times myself, I think it’s been helpful for me to also recognize that this time in my life is just a hustle. Luckily, for me it is a hustle of things I genuinely enjoy between my work, running a business, having my son and husband. But it is still a hustle. There was a really great post I saw on a working mother facebook group I am a part of where everyone shared the things they let go of in balancing all the things they do. I thought it might be helpful to share a little about what I try to let go of to make my hustle a little more enjoyable!
If you are interested in reading more about my parenting journey – feel free to check out my blogs before having my son and after! I have put the titles for you to easily reference below. At Thrive, we take a positive, client centered approach to therapy that is focused on creating a genuine connection with our clients. If you would like to talk with a Thrive Therapist about yourself, your child, or teen attending therapy, please reach out to us by phone at 858-342-1304. As always, thanks for reading and comments are always welcome regarding any issues around child or teen psychotherapy services in San Diego by Thrive Therapy Studio. To stay in the loop on the services offered and to receive updated information about Thrive, please feel free to sign up for the newsletter through the following link: http://eepurl.com/dsgLNL.  Some readers might be wondering what autism even is so I thought it might help to share a bit about it before continuing with the blog. In layperson’s terms, autism is term that describes a broad range of conditions that typically involve challenges in social relationships, verbal skills, nonverbal communication, general development, and can include repetitive behaviors or approaching the world in a more rigid, structured way. Because the term “autism” encompasses a wide spectrum of individuals who often experience the world in many different ways, it is difficult to generalize what an autism diagnosis will mean for your family or child. It is best to seek understanding for how your child may or may not experience the world, rather than to project ideas of what this might mean for them onto them. Also keep in mind that many common portrayals of individuals with autism in our media (example of Rain Man) are entirely inaccurate and do not describe everyone. By: Dr. Erica WollermanSince one of my specialties is working with parents of kids with autism and working with individuals on the autism spectrum in general, a question I get asked a lot is about what to do when your child is either screened as being at risk for having autism or newly diagnosed with autism. Particularly because young children are often getting screened for autism starting at their well child visits with their pediatricians around a year of age or younger, this has become much more common for parents to wonder about and experience. In my experience, this can be such an overwhelming process for parents and one that unfortunately, not every pediatrician is skilled at handling well with them. Often, parents are given a long list of resources without much direction as to what would be most helpful for their child or they are steered towards Applied Behavioral Analysis (ABA) immediately. While ABA can be helpful for some children, it is becoming much more commonly referenced as a therapy to treat almost any childhood challenge. I find this a bit alarming because ABA therapy is very behavioral in nature and at times can miss the more emotional component of what is going on for children. So, what do I recommend to parents with either a newly diagnosed child on the spectrum or a newly screened “at risk” toddler? Step One: Take a deep breath. This sounds silly but I find that parents in this situation are so overwhelmed and overcome with a feeling of urgency to get your child into the “right” treatment or intervention that is going to “fix” them. The thing is, it is okay and preferable to take some time with this experience. Your child is not different today than they were yesterday and while early intervention is very helpful, it is okay if you set it up next week or next month, rather than right this second. It is okay to make sure you are wrapping your head around what is happening first so that you can be a calm place to set up the services you feel comfortable with. In other words, take a deep breath and let yourself sit with this information before you do anything else. A calm, peaceful parent is going to be the most helpful as you go through the next parts of this process. I’d also like to note that there are a lot of myths out there about what it means to have autism and that the reality is not what you may see on TV, movies, or the internet. It is a BIG spectrum with a lot of variability so just because your child might fall somewhere on it, does not mean they will be a certain way or not be a certain way. For example, parents tend to worry that their child will not show them affection if they have autism and this is just not the case for all kids. Some kids are affectionate, some are not and this applies similarly to people on the spectrum too. While having a child with autism can be challenging at times, it is also pretty amazing at times – just like parenting any child. I am of the belief that we all have our struggles, and our children will too, and it is all about figuring out what our children need to thrive. Some of my favorite clients and people have autism and I truly love being able to know them and the way they experience the world. I could go on and on but my point here is simply, try not to panic or overreact to this news. Step Two: Do a little research. By this, I mean that it would be helpful to consider what your child is experiencing and if you fully agree with their diagnosis or at risk status. Have you been having concerns yourself perhaps that their development is not where you think it should be or matching other kids you know or see? When you read more about children with autism, does it match your experience? Do you feel you might want a second opinion? Maybe read a few books or blogs from other parents or experts in the field to help you gage what you are seeing and feeling. Keep in mind that some children are going to get a positive screen and then not end up meeting the criteria for being on the spectrum when they are older. I always say that this is why I am so conservative in diagnosing children and teens because sometimes their symptoms are more developmental than pathological, though they may at times be problematic. Step Three: Seek Consultation I would also encourage you to seek consultation with a therapist or psychologist who specializes in working with children on the spectrum or even to seek out a more formal full developmental assessment. Ideally, this person can help you chart a course of treatment individualized to your family and child’s situation. Often, parents are given so many ideas of what to do (Speech, OT, ABA, individual therapy, group therapy, etc.) that it can be overwhelming. Ideally, you can find someone who can help you determine what your child would benefit most from and start with that method of therapy. Therapists, psychologists, speech, and OT providers can be helpful to consult with to help you determine the best path forward. If you feel your child’s diagnosis is accurate, this is where you want to start collecting treatment options to see what would be a good fit for your family. It might help to join some Facebook groups with other parents in the same situation so that you can check in with what other parents are doing and what their experiences have been with different therapies and providers. I have found that treatment options really vary depending on your child’s presentation and needs so remember that none of this is one size fits all! A great resource in San Diego can be San Diego Regional Center also so this might be a good time to reach out to them. I hope these ideas are helpful to you! If you have questions or are a parent of a newly diagnosed child with autism or even an “at risk” child, feel free to reach out to us to see if we can support you at our office. We love working with parents in parent consultation sessions or even individual therapy to help support you throughout this process. Raising a child who is developing differently can be very challenging at times and we are happy to help however we can! At Thrive, we take a positive, client centered approach to therapy that is focused on creating a genuine connection with our clients. If you would like to talk with a Thrive Therapist about yourself, your child, or teen attending therapy, please reach out to us by phone at 858-342-1304. As always, thanks for reading and comments are always welcome regarding any issues around child or teen psychotherapy services in San Diego by Thrive Therapy Studio. To stay in the loop on the services offered and to receive updated information about Thrive, please feel free to sign up for the newsletter through the following link: http://eepurl.com/cvGx5n.  By: Dr. Erica WollermanAs a therapist who specializes in working with kids, teens, parents, and families, I have noticed a growing and very concerning trend in my work. So many of the kids, teens, and even young adults that I work with are struggling with anxiety, crippling perfectionism, and so much self doubt that they struggle to do things they desperately want to be doing. At the root of so much of this are feelings of incompetence and a huge fear of failure. I have been contemplating this challenge and recent parenting trends and have noticed that this happens more in the families I work with where parents seem to be struggling to let their kids deal with things on their own. Unfortunately, these parents get kind of a bad rap as “helicopter” parents when in fact, they are parents who are simply struggling to know when it is appropriate to let their kid/teen/young adult fail or struggle through something. And the root of this struggle is usually so much love for their little one (who may not be so little anymore) as well as overwhelming fear about what might happen for their kid/teen/young adult if they do not participate so heavily in their lives. This fear is one most parents know well. What if they don’t get into a good college? What if they make choices that screw up their whole life? What if they do something I can’t help them undo? What if they can’t get a good job? And the list just goes on and on. As a result (I believe), we are overdoing it in the parenting department. We are rescuing our kids way too much and then we come to find that our kids seem to need to be rescued. Weird huh. When you look at what happens and what a person will think if they are being rescued from situations, it starts to make sense. When we rescue a person from a situation that they are either capable of handling on their own or almost capable of handling on their own, the message we are giving them is not one of their own ability but one of their need for us to handle things for them. We teach them that they need us and that they can’t do these things on their own. We teach them to ask for help before they need it, before problem solving on their own, and to at all costs avoid struggling with something. Instead, we need to give our kids the following kinds of messages by verbalizing them as well as by our actions in letting them handle most problems on their own:
I could go on and on but I won’t. The point is that we definitely need to help when it is needed. But we are so often confused about when it is needed that we are rescuing way too often, which is not helping our kids/teens/young adults develop into the independent and capable people that we know they are meant to be. I encourage you to trust yourself as a parent and trust your “little one,” however old they may be, that they can figure things out and will benefit from a little struggle and failure along the way. Just like most of us did on our way to becoming independent adults. At Thrive, we take a positive, client centered approach to therapy that is focused on creating a genuine connection with our clients. If you would like to talk with a Thrive Therapist about yourself, your child, or teen attending therapy, please reach out to us by phone at 858-342-1304. As always, thanks for reading and comments are always welcome regarding any issues around child or teen psychotherapy services in San Diego by Thrive Therapy Studio. To stay in the loop on the services offered and to receive updated information about Thrive, please feel free to sign up for the newsletter through the following link: http://eepurl.com/cvGx5n.  By: Dr. Erica WollermanAs a therapist who specializes in parenting and working with kids and teens, emotions and how we handle them is a big topic in my office. One of the common focuses of my work is about helping people understand themselves better, including understanding their emotions. As a therapist, it often may feel obvious to me that this is really important work but I realize that many parents I work with may not realize just how important our relationship with our own emotions is. So, I thought I would share more about why I am so intent on validating emotions, even the ones that seem illogical or frustrating to others. My understanding of people and the world centers on the belief that most people really crave understanding. Understanding both of themselves but also from their loved ones. We all want to know that we are both good enough but also that we are not “crazy” or experiencing something others have not or do not. “Is this normal?” and “I’m not crazy, am I?” are common questions when it comes to how we relate emotionally to the world. Interestingly, our culture seems to work against us in terms of how we relate to our emotions… we get the message that some emotions are “good” and some are “bad,” which means they should essentially be avoided, hidden, or just not talked about. We tend to internalize these ideas and come up with a lot of strategies to avoid our more unpleasant emotions. We might make a lot of jokes, just avoid emotional conversations, find something else to channel our feelings into, or just pretend nothing is bothering us. Unfortunately, while these strategies may seem to work in the short term, they usually stop working when our emotional cup becomes too full usually because of some challenging life event. Divorce, a big move, loss of a loved one, birth of a child, losing or changing jobs, etc. can all be big triggers for experiencing a lot of previously avoided emotion. This is why therapy can be very uncomfortable for people. In therapy, we often ask people to not just identify their feelings, but to share them and learn how to both express and experience them. This is tough for most people, especially the most practiced avoiders! However, the more we can look at our emotions as helpful cues to our environment, rather than judge them as good or bad, the better we are going to be able to respond and cope with unpleasant situations and feelings. The first step in learning how to manage our emotions is simply to accept we have them. As a therapist, this is why it is so important to me that I validate another person’s experience and emotions. I might say something like: “Yes, it makes sense to feel the way you are feeling. I might feel that way too.” This helps us remember that our emotions are a very human part of us and we all have them. They are not some strange, foreign part of us to be scared of, they are a part of us to learn to embrace. And as a parent consultant, this is why it is important to me that we, as parents, learn to validate our child’s experience. By validating their experience and saying, I see you and your feelings and they are not only okay with me, but understandable, we communicate to them that they are seen and heard and not alone. Validation and understanding of emotions can help prevent a situation from escalating, help our kids learn how to experience their emotions rather than engage in unhealthy distraction and coping behaviors, and can help them have a healthy relationship with others. Here are some ways to help you work more emotional understanding into either your relationship with yourself or your child(ren):
Notice that these questions are just geared to help you notice, express, and communicate about feelings. Often, when feelings are “heard,” they dissipate more quickly than if they are resisted, suppressed, or avoided. When we avoid them, they usually get louder to be heard. So, just by listening more intently to ourselves and our children and using curious observation and questions, we can often defuse difficult emotional situations. At Thrive, we take a positive, client centered approach to therapy that is focused on creating a genuine connection with our clients. If you would like to talk with a Thrive Therapist about yourself, your child, or teen attending therapy, please reach out to us by phone at 858-342-1304. As always, thanks for reading and comments are always welcome regarding any issues around child or teen psychotherapy services in San Diego by Thrive Therapy Studio. To stay in the loop on the services offered and to receive updated information about Thrive, please feel free to sign up for the newsletter through the following link: http://eepurl.com/cvGx5n.  The Dark Side of Parenting Anxiously |
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Thrive Therapy Studio Therapists Offer Child, Teen, Adult, Marriage and Family Psychotherapy Counseling Services in San Diego, California.
