Is it anxiety and depression or just being a teen?

The adolescent years can be a tumultuous time. Our kids are changing to adults before our eyes and it can be hard to figure out how we can best support them. While some ups and downs are inevitable, it is important to get help when teens might be experiencing anxiety, depression, or other mental health conditions.

The following are some signs that your teen might benefit from working with a counselor.

Has your teen

• Dropped in academic performance

• Has a hard time “getting moving” in the morning

• Expressed dread about their day to day life

• Become overwhelmed and “frozen” by every day tasks

• Experienced a lot of interpersonal conflict

• Been consistently irritable, not just occasionally annoyed by things

• Stated suicidal thoughts or desires to self-harm

• Experienced major changes, losses, or traumas

• Expressed interest in working with a counselor

If any of these are true for your teen, then therapy can help. Forward Together Counseling has experienced adolescent therapists who can help support your teen to overcome anxiety and depression, better manage stress, and heal from grief and trauma.

Therapy can help your teen.

Adolescent counseling at Forward Together uses some of the most effective approaches available including cognitive behavioral therapy, dialectical behavioral therapy, family counseling, and parent coaching.

As middle and high school adolescents are growing more independent, we uniquely tailor our approach to counseling to their stage of life. With tweens and teens, we typically combine individual sessions, family sessions, and caregiver sessions to meet the needs of the child.

Caregivers and family members are the most important people in a teenager’s life, and we consider them integral to treatment. At Forward Together Counseling, we meet for a parent session at least once a month—more frequently the younger the child. We also incorporate parent-teen session and family sessions as appropriate. We believe that strengthening family relationships helps not only teens to recover from anxiety and depression, but helps caregivers feel less stress and more joy in parenting their teen.

Depending on the goals, we may focus sessions on how to build stronger, healthy relationships, how to manage increasing workloads in school, how to better tune in to our bodies and emotions, or a variety of other areas.

Clients who work with our skilled teen therapists see their adolescents begin to thrive again—engaging in activities that bring them joy, enjoying family time, and improving their academic performance.

Your teen can bounce back from anxiety and depression.