Tampa Bay Area counseling for children and teens
Therapy for Anxiety
Does this sound like your child or teen?
appearing restless, hyperactive, or unsettled
difficulty focusing or staying on task
irritable and grouchy over minor things
emotional distress
tired and fatigued
worried about getting enough sleep or oversleeping
obsessing over grades, performance, and achievement
conflict with friends that never seems to resolve
seeking constant reassurance
difficulty making choices, even simple ones
As a parent, you just want to see them thrive
Therapy can help….
Life is always throwing curve balls, especially in the pre-teen and teenage years. Despite reading all the books and doing your best, as a parent, you don’t always know what to do. Anxiety can make the whole family feel out of control.
It’s time for a new approach. Instead of focusing on eliminating anxiety and worry, we will focus on learning skills and tools to manage and tolerate it. The best defense for anxiety is having a good offense. We will look for the triggers and causes, identify key patterns, and find new ways to break the patterns and handle things differently than before.
In Therapy We Will…..
Therapy can help your teen identify the specific triggers and causes of their anxiety. Improving self-awareness is a key influence of change. Therapy will start to demystify the ways that our brains and bodies respond to stress by uncovering the science behind the how the nervous system works.
Find the triggers and the root cause
Therapy will help you and your child reveal patterns of their behavior, while also looking for family patterns that contribute to worry, anxiety, and emotional distress. Sometimes parents don’t realize how they may be accommodating their child’s worry and anxiety. Learning about patterns and discovering how they operate helps children and families to adapt and change.
Uncover patterns
You and your child or teen will leave will skills and tools that they can apply to deal with stress, worry, and anxiety. Strategies like relaxation techniques, mindfulness, and problem-solving skills will help to build an emotional tool kit. Your child or teen will develop skills to increase their confidence in knowing what to do when worry and anxiety show up.
Build skills and tools
Change the way you think
Cognitive restructuring is a fancy way of saying “change the way you think.” An important part of therapy is to help re-frame unhelpful thoughts and thinking patterns to learn new ways of thinking about situations or observing and experiencing emotions.
An important part of managing anxiety is learning how to tolerate it when it shows up. This means experimenting and practicing skills during situations that may cause you to feel anxious or stressed. For children or teens who are fearful or avoiding things (like social situations), exposure work is an important part of the therapy process.
Practice Exposure
