As 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): 

1. Notice: the first step is to notice your emotions and/or those of your child. Just observe what emotions are coming up. Sometimes having a list of feeling words can be helpful if this is an area that is really uncomfortable for you.
2. Identify and Express: Identify the feeling that you or your child is having and express it. Example: “I am feeling sad, I think it may be because we have not spent as much time together as usual.” 
3. Be curious:If you are experiencing an emotion or your child shares an emotion with you, just be curious about it. If they say, I feel jealous rather than judging jealousy as a bad feeling or offering advice, simply ask for more information. “Oh really, jealous huh. What do you think is going on?  What does that feel like for you?”

 
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. 

We at Thrive thought it would be fun to share a joint blog from our team of therapists where we each share one of our favorite parenting tips. Since we all have different perspectives, this is a great way to get to know each of us as a therapist. Hope you like it and find our ideas helpful! 
 
Lindsey Brady, LMFT - How to support your child through tough feelings
 
In practice, I often work with children who experience difficulty with self-regulation, anger, and tantrum behaviors.  A big part of what I do is help parents to understand developmental levels and how to support their kids through the “tough stuff.”  Often, as parents, we expect our children to be respectful and behave appropriately and it’s easy to forget that kids often don’t understand or know how to manage their emotions.  It’s important to teach children that ALL feelings are okay, even the ones that seem socially unacceptable, like anger or jealousy, and that all feelings pass with time.   Encourage your kids to do something with their feelings if they need to.  Invite them to be still or to share, cry, or communicate.  If a child is unable to regulate and engages in inappropriate behaviors, parents can lovingly disengage and remind themselves that the behavior is not a reflection of their parenting or their child’s lack of respect, but more a lack of skill in dealing with the emotion or situation.  Stepping back in the moment and addressing it when everyone is calm enables the child to be in an emotional space to learn and allows the parent space to explain and correct in a calm and loving way.
 
Maria Fowlks, PsyD - Validate your child’s feelings
 
Validating your child’s emotions helps them feel heard and understood, and it lets them know their feelings matter. When you do this, you are sending the message you love and accept them regardless of how they think and feel. It is important to honor and validate the big and small things, because what may seem small to you is likely very big to them. It shows them you care and think their feelings are important. It teaches them that ALL feelings are valid.
 
Jennifer Gonzalez, LMFT - Provide your child with options
 
I am almost sure that you have heard “children like to have options” before.  I agree with this statement completely.  Children and adolescents like to feel like they are in control and hold power, and who doesn’t?
 
Well, I would like to offer you an extension of that.  Giorgio Nardone creator of Brief Strategic Therapy designed an intervention called “illusion of alternatives” which is exactly what it says; it gives the illusion that the person has an alternative.  This intervention is a real elegant way in which you offer the possibility of a option: The first option is very frightening and almost impossible for the person to complete and the second option is one that is less threatening and easier to put into practice.  
 
Translating this into child and adolescent terms: the first option should be one that is boring, tedious, and annoying to them.  The second option (the one that you really want them to choose) should be doable, easy and in many ways more appealing.  For example you may say: “Would you rather vacuum the entire house or take out the trash?” or for adolescents “Would you rather do the dishes and put them away or vacuum the living room.”
 
Angela Bianco, ASW -  Helping parents shift from being reactive to proactive in parenting
 
Taking time to reflect on your parenting and interactions with your child is crucial in learning to shift from being reactive to proactive in parenting. Unfortunately, because our lives are so busy, parents are more likely to operate from a reactive state of mind instead of working from a clear set of principles and strategies. Instead of just reacting, try asking yourself the following questions: Why did he act this way? What's the lesson? How can I best teach it?  Use these questions and your overarching parenting principles you want to use to guide your parenting as a guide for how to intervene and teach your child.
 
Erica Wollerman, PsyD – Knowing when to let your kid fail
 
As many of you who read the Thrive blog know, I am passionate in my belief that as parents, one of the best things we can do is to allow your child to fail at times. I believe strongly in the importance of teaching kids that failure is okay because it means you are trying new things and leaving your comfort zone. The other great thing about allowing your kids to fail is that you can then coach them through the failure. Teaching them how to fix things after mistakes, how to manage their feelings about the failure, and that it is okay to fall down only helps build grit and resiliency in all of us. As parents, this is a great gift you can give your children that will help them be more successful and resourceful in the future!  
 
We hope you enjoyed our first group blog!  There will hopefully be many more to come in the future so that we can continue sharing our many different experiences and thoughts with you!
 
If you would like to talk with a Thrive Therapist about yourself, your child, or teen attending therapy with one of us, please reach out to us by phone at 858-342-1304.
 
If you would like to receive updated information about Thrive Therapy, please feel free to sign up for our newsletter through the following link: http://eepurl.com/cvGx5n. 

As a Marriage and Family Therapist who specializes in children and teens, families often come to see me wanting help with specific behaviors that are happening in the home, at school, or in the community.  Without the verbal understanding that adults have, children often resort to tantrums, crying, screaming, and yelling much to the frustration of most parents.  It is important to remember that this behavior often serves a purpose for the child.   It can communicate things that children are either unable to say or things they may not even be aware of on a conscious level.  These are the five common needs that are communicated through behavior:
 
1. The need to connect -  Listen, I get it!  Life gets busy and responsibilities get in the way.  Not to mention, dealing with negative behaviors doesn’t make it easy to slow down and connect, but this is a fundamental need that children have on a daily basis.   Find at least 30 minutes each day to dedicate to your child.  Family game nights, art activities, family outings, etc. all allow face-to-face time with each other to improve positive connections and positive relationships.  Children are more willing to comply and behave in appropriate ways once they feel connected!  And once they feel connected, they will be less likely to engage in negative behaviors.

2. The need for autonomy – This is a tough one for all parents.  Children have a need to make their own decisions, which includes making their own mistakes.  It’s hard to sit back and watch, knowing that your child may fail, but it’s vital that they be allowed to try.  This develops courage, sense of self, and creates a supportive, loving relationship between parent and child.

3. The need to differentiate – Children are naturally curious and have a need to explore different opinions, beliefs, and values.  Being free to be curious and create an identity without shame fosters loving, healthy relationships.  This is a difficult need to balance, especially when teaching right and wrong is one of our duties as a parent.  It is important to examine our own values and if there may be any motives behind wanting a child to be a certain way.  This can allow parents to release expectations and allow children the space they need to grow into healthy, independent individuals.

4. The need for emotional comfort – Children have big emotions and equally big reactions.  It is important to remember that young children are not able to regulate themselves and sometimes need extra support.  Explain to children that ALL feelings are always okay and that they don’t need to hide them or suppress them.  I like to teach children that feelings are like waves, if you don’t fight them - they pass.  If you do fight them, they can pull you under.  Extra hugs, love, and kindness help children to overcome and learn to self-soothe.   If behavior is inappropriate, it’s okay to lovingly disengage until children calm down and then provide love and support and offer suggestions for how to handle feelings differently next time.

5. The need to feel respected and valued -  When children are non-compliant and refusing to follow instructions, it is easy for parents to react with anger.  The number one way that children learn from us is through modeling.  If we model respectful and kind behavior, our children will respond and learn in the same manner.   Remaining calm through challenges is not always easy, so don’t be afraid to take a break and address things later if you need to.  
 
Next time your child is engaging in a behavior remember that they might be communicating a need and being aware of this is the first step towards helping your child to engage in more positive behaviors.
 
If you’d like to speak with someone regarding how to better understand and modify a child’s behavior, you can reach a Thrive Therapist at 858-342-1304.
 
If you would like to receive updated information about Thrive Therapy, please feel free to sign up for our newsletter through the following link: http://eepurl.com/cvGx5n.  

As always, thanks for reading and comments are always welcome. Contact us regarding any issues around child, teen psychotherapy and adult San Diego psychologist at Thrive Therapy Studio.  

I recently was reading an article written by a woman who has been diagnosed with Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) and she was reflecting on the #soOCD trend on Twitter and how reading about how others view their slight compulsions or desire for things to be a certain way as being “#soOCD.” It was a great article and summed up so eloquently something that I see quite often in my office. People often comment that they are depressed when they are actually just sad or having a bad day; say they are anorexic after skipping a meal or bulimic because they ate too much once; say they “are so ADD” because they weren’t focused for a brief moment at work; and the list goes on.
 
Sadly, we all use such dramatic language to describe things in our lives and since one of my main beliefs about being a person is that the language we use MATTERS, this matters too. When we describe our slight hunger as being just starving or our slight nervousness as a panic attack, we are trivializing the experience of people who really are starving or experiencing panic attacks. We are also hyping up our own experience and magnifying our emotions needlessly. We are using very serious words to describe situations that don’t match up in severity. What this leads me to think about then is, what happens when we are actually depressed?  How will we describe that in a way that is genuine, authentic, and matches the experience when we have already used our arsenal of big, serious words? 
 
You might be wondering why this matters to me so much and it has a lot to do with my experience working with people in managing their emotions. With kids, we talk about needing to “name it to tame it.” What this means is that we need to find a word to describe accurately our feeling or experience so we can then understand, process, and move on with learning from the experience. Without being able to do that accurately, I believe that we might be more at risk for difficulties managing our emotions.
 
I would encourage all of us to strive to follow one of the tenets of the Four Agreements and to be “impeccable with our word.” By seeking to describe our experience as accurately as possible, we are going to not only understand our own emotions better but we also will avoid being insensitive and minimizing of others’ experiences.
 
If you would like to talk with a Thrive Therapist about yourself, your child, or teen attending therapy with one of us, please reach out to us either via email at ewollerman.psyd@gmail.com or phone at 858-342-1304.
 
If you would like to receive updated information about Thrive Therapy, please feel free to sign up for our newsletter through the following link: http://eepurl.com/cvGx5n.

As always, thanks for reading  and comments are always welcome regarding any issues around child, teen psychotherapy and adult psychotherapy services at Thrive Therapy Studio. Contact us for San Diego psychologist services.  

At our office, we frequently work with children and teens whose families are going through a divorce. While we do not engage in any sort of custody recommendations and tend to stay out of court at our office, there are many other ways that therapy and services at Thrive could be helpful.
 
1.  Providing your child/teen with a neutral place to talk:
During a divorce, kids go through so many different emotions and experiences that can be really hard for them to talk to their parents about. As close as they might be to their parents, some feelings they are having will lead them to feel as though they are betraying one parent or the other. With a therapist, we can help them talk about and sort through those feelings in a  safe space where they know no one else will hear about. This is actually a big part of the reason why we do not engage in custody recommendations… if parents and kids know that we are going to be sharing our opinions with anyone outside of the child’s sessions, it prevents the kids from sharing openly and feeling safe.
 
2.  Giving your child/teen time to talk things through:
Often, during a divorce or separation, parents can become overwhelmed with their own experience and emotions. While this is totally understandable, at times the kids will feel lost and alone. Coming to therapy and having a therapist that they trust who spends about an hour a week just focusing on them and their experience and listening to what they want to talk about, can be enormously helpful in helping the child or teen process their experience and emotions around the divorce.  
 
3.  Providing the possibility of co-parenting sessions:
At Thrive, we are big believers in involving the whole family in treatment when we believe it will be helpful to the child or teen. In situations of divorce or separation, your child or teen’s therapist can be enormously helpful in supporting parents through the process with co-parenting sessions. Sometimes these sessions will need to be with a separate therapist than your child or teen’s, but co-parenting sessions are always helpful. Research has shown that it is not divorce itself that is harmful to children and teens’ emotionally, but the conflict that at times persists for quite some time after the separation or divorce. Co-parenting sessions can help parents learn how to work together as separate parents to benefit their child/teen and ideally, reduce overall conflict following a separation or divorce.
 
These are just three of the ways that therapy can be helpful when going through a divorce or separation. At Thrive, we know that parents are all doing their best to get through tough situations that arise in their families. We are here to support the whole family and love working with children, teens, and adults particularly during times of crisis like a separation or divorce.
 
If you would like to talk with a Thrive Therapist about yourself, your child, or teen attending therapy with one of us, please reach out to us either via email at ewollerman.psyd@gmail.com or phone at 858-342-1304.
 
If you would like to receive updated information about Thrive Therapy, please feel free to sign up for our newsletter through the following link: http://eepurl.com/cvGx5n. 

As always, thanks for reading  and comments are always welcome regarding any issues around finding a therapist for teens and Family Therapy San Diego at Thrive Therapy Studio.  

​Recently, I was discussing emotions with a friend not in the mental health space and realized that the topic of “numbing or avoiding emotions” comes up frequently both at work as well as in my personal life. So, I thought I would share some of my thoughts about the risks of avoiding or numbing emotions!
 
As a psychologist, the topic of numbing or avoiding emotions comes up frequently in my sessions and discussions with clients. It is my belief that part of this is our culture that currently suggests that any emotion that is not typically thought to be "positive" is somehow "negative" or "bad." Clients come in with many thoughts about how to manage emotions and often seem to vacillate between avoidance and wallowing in the emotion. Neither of these is very helpful for long-term mental health. Emotions are cues to the environment and so important to learn to sit with and process through them so that you can receive the lesson the emotion is there to teach. For example, if you are feeling depressed it is very worthwhile to think about what is going on and why you might be feeling down and depressed. This query and search for meaning can help you figure out what the depression is trying to tell you and what life changes might help you feel more content with your life again. 
 
Unfortunately, when someone tries to avoid or numb their feelings, it often leads to increases of that very same emotion in the future. Kind of like when you have a soda bottle and just keep shaking it. Eventually, it will explode!  Emotions are very similar and unfortunately, numbing them is only a short-term solution. Additionally, when we numb our unpleasant emotions, we also numb our more enjoyable emotions. They are flip sides of the same coin and it is through the experience of sorrow that our capacity for joy grows. 
 
Here are some tips on ways to sit with unpleasant emotions:

1. Remember that they are temporary.
2. Seek out the lesson that emotion might be trying to teach you by exploring the emotion further.
3. Try to figure out the exact emotion you are feeling. Often, unpleasant emotions are experienced as overwhelming and it can be confusing to know what is really triggering your pain. Sitting with the emotion, exploring the emotion, and arising at a reason or at least the accurate description of the emotion leads to understanding and a release.
4. Let yourself experience the emotion with the understanding that it will not hurt you and that though it is painful, emotions are all a part of being alive. Sometimes it is helpful to think of the emotion as a wave that comes and goes.
5. Talk to someone you can be vulnerable with. Particularly a close friend, family member, or maybe a therapist who can sit with you and express understanding without trying to solve the problem or “fix” the emotion.

I hope this discussion helped illuminate some truths about the balance that is so needed in our world around emotions!  Please let me know what you think in the comments section!

​By: Dr. Erica Wollerman
I recently went with a group of therapist friends to see the movie, Inside Out, which is, as many other child therapists have already noted, a child therapist’s dream movie. This is for a few reasons but primarily because it is based on the emotions or “voices” in our heads and the movie did a pretty wonderful job of demonstrating what each emotion is all about and what it looks like without the other emotions combined with it. Fear seemed to represent anxiety and sadness was certainly a great representation of depression. Anger was quite over the top anger that I often see with some of the kids I work with who have difficulties managing their big angry feelings. 

The coolest thing about this movie is that it takes emotions and makes them an interesting and okay thing for kids to talk about, which can be unusual in our current culture that focuses a lot on happiness and avoidance of most other emotions. Some of the kids that have come into my office since seeing the movie have been more open to share about their feelings, using the movie as their platform for the conversation. As I stated before, this is a child therapist’s dream!  

Another element of the movie that I really appreciated is that you get to watch an evolution of the characters, where they grow to understand that each emotion is important and that their person, Riley, will cope and live her best life if they are all working together, rather than just focusing only on Joy (which was how the movie began). I fundamentally believe that all of our emotions are important and useful tools in our lives and that issues arise when they get out of balance and we rely on one emotion and neglect the others. As such, this message was something I really appreciated.

Here are some questions and discussion starters that I have been using with kids in my office to help them open up about their feelings while also feeling like they are talking just about the movie: 

• What was your favorite part of the movie?
• Which emotion do you think was most important?
• How do you think things work when a person only feels one feeling at a time?
• Was there anything about the movie that reminded you of the way you feel?
• What emotion do you think is “in charge” of you a lot of the time (or it could be more than one)?

I can’t say enough how impressed I was with the movie and how easy it was to relate to it without having an over the top, educational or therapist vibe!  I would highly recommend that any parent who is interested in talking to their child more about their emotions go see the movie with their child and then discuss it afterwards. 

As always, thanks for reading  and comments are always welcome regarding any issues around child or teen psychotherapy in San Diego.
.  
 

 By: Dr. Erica Wollerman
As many of you may know, I was recently interviewed by ABC News to comment on the trend that occurred in response to Zayn leaving the group, One Direction. Fans were cutting themselves and demonstrating their wounds publicly utilizing the hashtag, #Cut4Zayn on social media. Some posts even suggested to others to do the same because then Zayn would come back to the group. (If you did not catch the story and very small role I played, check it out here). Since so much of my interview was cut out from the story, I thought it would be nice to cover this topic in a blog post! 

The more that I reflected on this particular scenario and the overall topic of self-harm, the more I felt strongly that instead of posting about more typical topics around cutting (how to stop people from doing it, what to do if your teen is cutting, etc) I wanted to have a discussion of WHY this might be happening so frequently and in such a dramatic, public way. Please keep in mind that this is mainly my opinion, which is based on what I see in my office and in our culture but not on specific, measured, scientific facts necessarily. 

This topic also ties in with some of my fundamental beliefs about why people are feeling so stressed, anxious, unhappy, and disconnected because I think many people are cutting for exactly those reasons. While I might come off as entirely elderly during this post, I’m kind of okay with that! As I have gotten older, particularly given the work I do, I have gained such an appreciation for simpler times (which I would categorize my childhood in as I grew up prior to the internet in the 80s). 

Here we go!  The following is a summary about some factors I see as influencing Americans mental health and leading us to feel generally unhappy, disconnected, anxious, and stressed and which also could lead people into self-harming. 

The Happiness Obsession: This is my way of saying that we are all SO focused on being happy all the time that I believe people are losing their ability to understand, accept, and tolerate discomfort and the less pleasant emotions. I covered this topic in another blog post as well (feel free to read that here) but in essence, I think that particularly younger individuals have an expectation of being happy and excited all the time. This is so entirely unrealistic that it is the definition of an unreachable goal but so many people may not realize this, which creates feelings of isolation and anger that THEY are not happy, since everyone else must be. After all, that’s what TV shows (well, happiness or complete and total DRAMA but that’s another topic). This also reduces our capacity to regulate ourselves through less pleasant emotions and situations, which can lead to cutting behavior. 

General disconnection through mass media overload: I should preface this section by saying that I generally have a love-hate relationship with the media. While I love some great/terrible reality TV, I am also highly concerned about the impact TV, movies, the Internet, social media have on us as human beings. I believe that our expectations are so driven by what we see on the Internet that they are entirely skewed. I even find myself falling into this trap and thinking, well they have time for that (on my favorite show), why don’t I?  While I mediate this thought by reminding myself that I live in reality and not a made-up world on TV, I can imagine how hard that is to do for someone who is younger, less mature, and likely to be less educated about how the media impacts our perceptions. 

There is also the factor of how much time we spend connecting with other people in inauthentic ways, such as through social media or even texting. I find it concerning that so many of the teens I work with do not communicate with their friends verbally apart from occasionally at school. Most things are communicated through some sort of electronic source, which I believe reduces our ability to connect in an authentic way where we feel connected and heard by the other person. Plus, anything in writing could be misinterpreted, saved, and even used against someone and as such, many people are less likely to be truly vulnerable in writing. I believe that connection and vulnerability are so important in developing emotional resilience as well as shame resilience and without face-to-face communication, we are all lacking these skills to some extent. 

Expectation of Perfection: Failure has somehow become such a dirty word in our culture. The sad thing to me is that so much of our learning comes from our failures and being open enough to try something different but we are all so consumed with being perfect and doing things “right” that we are often afraid to try something new. In many ways I do think our culture has forgotten that it is hard work, failure, and perseverance that drives success, not doing everything right all the time. I see parents often trying to help their children avoid any sense of failure, which unfortunately only leads to them never developing the resiliency to deal with failure and recover from it. This is particularly concerning to me because I do think this is a huge risk factor for self-injury as well. A shame spiral so quickly develops when we feel ashamed for our mistakes and can spin all the way down to being completely worthless, ashamed, and terrible which could certainly lead someone to feel like harming themselves in one way or another. 

All of these factors lead to reduced emotional resiliency and regulation skills, which are key factors in developing healthy relationships and coping skills. My next blog will discuss ways to help facilitate resiliency in kids and teens. Stay tuned!

I hope you enjoyed reading this post!  Let me know what you think in the comments section or feel free to send me an email.

Please contact me regarding any issues around child or psychotherapy for teens in San Diego CA.