Psychotherapy for Children

The early years are full of growth and excitement but also fears and difficult developmental tasks. Children need to learn how to separate from their parents, in their sleep and daily activities. They also begin to interact with others, learning how to express their feelings and ideas. At times, however, they might struggle to do so, clinging onto their parent or lashing out at their peers. Even at this young age, they might begin to feel that something is not quite right with them; that they are disappointing those around them, repeatedly having to ask certain questions or unable to do certain things. They seem worried and unhappy, low in their mood, panicky in their presentation.

Psychotherapy treatment offers safe and regular space for each child to explore their past and present experiences. Using toys and other play materials, pen and paper or their words, they begin to tell and explore their thoughts and emotions. Gaining insight into these thoughts and memories but also processing them emotionally with a trusted person can bring enormous relief to their lives, not just on the inside, but also within the family and all their relationships.

Psychotherapy for Adolescents and Young People

Leaving those early fears behind can be even more daunting when having to face the wider world, with all that is happening in its political arena. To engage with and experience all the exams, job prospects and relationship issues takes some courage and determination. The risks are great for every adolescent but so is the opportunity to forge a new identity and become who they really want to be.

At times, however, this developmental work can stutter and pause, causing a real difficulty to communicate to others what is going for the young person, their family in particular. They might be more prone to angry refusals or panic attacks that keep them isolated in their bed or house. Their minds racing with all kind of new thoughts, their bodies full of new sensations and yet they feel so stuck.

Psychotherapy treatment offers safe and regular space for adolescents and young people to revisit these powerful exchanges with peers and family members, as well as their own feelings about them. This space and therapeutic relationship built within it offers them a chance to experience and work out various new ways of responding to strong feelings and emotional exchanges, giving them a wider choice of responses for the future. Close attention is paid to how these feelings and reactions have developed over time, increasing emotional insight and imagination that way too.

Therapeutic support for Parents

All of the developmental challenges of childhood and adolescence run in parallel to parenting tasks and concerns. Putting them to sleep, getting them dressed for school, later talking to them about their intimate thoughts and wishes are just some of the parenting challenges. Every decision brings a reaction, silent or violent, every feeling finds its way to them, whether they bounce it back in anger or embrace in satisfaction. 

Similarly, many old feelings resurface for parents; memories of what their parents would say or do and how that made them feel and react. Navigating this multi-layered emotional space of past and present relationships, knowing whose feelings one is dealing with as a parent at any given time can be very exhausting, even confusing. When managed, it is extremely rewarding. When not, it can feel so burdensome that one might begin to switch off or overact and then get flooded by regret and guilty feelings.

Psychotherapy treatment offers safe and regular space not just to children and adolescents, but also their parents. When things get too difficult to manage for a child or an adolescent, it is bound to have impact on their parents, perhaps causing ruptures in their relating, further complicating things for the whole family. 

Parallel parenting support to parents of children and adolescents in treatment aims to alleviate these anxieties as well as strengthen the family relationships by attending to present difficulties and relationships but also past developmental journeys. This support offers the parents a chance to learn more about their children’s communication and difficulties but also themselves and their ways of managing the family life. All of this is worked out in the initial meeting and assessment, taking into account the nature of difficulties and wishes of those involved in treatment.