Coping Skills: Still Not the Whole Answer
Why write about the wrong way to use coping skills? I get so many phone calls and emails from parents asking me to teach their kids coping skills. In the past few weeks, the misuse of coping skills has come up repeatedly, and it’s inspired me to write about coping skills…and their limitations. I’ve written…
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How Does Online Therapy Work?
When I first heard of online therapy, my first thought was “What? Why? That sounds terrible.” But, here I am 2 years into providing online counseling to teens and young adults in different areas of Tennessee (yes, I started voluntarily, a year before the pandemic started). It can bring up so many questions for people,…
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Why Online Therapy Can be a Great Fit for Teens
Pandemic 2020 (and now 2021). What a year, right? Not much has been normal. And even the normal things haven’t been all the way normal. Masks, social distancing, events cancelled, school cancelled, and on and on. Then, there’s been the social isolation. No matter how you’ve been treating the pandemic, you’re probably missing friends, family,…
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Does Anxiety Treatment Work?
Does Counseling Work? There are some questions that I get asked a lot. This is one of the questions that I get asked the most. If it didn’t work, I promise I wouldn’t be wasting my time doing it. I’d probably work on making a career out of playing with my kids and rescuing dogs.…
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COVID-19: 6 Tips To Help Your Teen to Make it Through the Coronavirus Lockdown
The COVID-19 pandemic is real. And really stressful. The Coronavirus pandemic and the subsequent lockdown seemed to happen really fast. This leads me to wonder, what’s this like for your teenager? Are they freaking out? Completely ignoring things? Depressed that they can’t see their friends? Turning their room to a hibernation cave? A year ago,…
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Into the Unknown: High School Graduation Stress
This is the day your kid has been waiting for. School’s out forever (at least the K-12 thing is done). They may have been talking about this time for the past 13 years. It’s the next step, and the rest of their life is about to begin. But sometimes there is graduation stress. How Scary…
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When Coping Skills Don’t Cut It
I hear a lot from parents that they want their kids to come to counseling to learn some coping skills. It’s great when parents are aware enough to notice that kind of thing, because it all too easily slips under the radar a lot of the time. But is it enough? Why the answer isn’t…
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Spring Semester Blues and How Parents Can Help
I wrote awhile back on how to beat the winter blues. I completely left something out, though. It’s something I noticed from both working in and attending school: The “Spring” semester sucks! After all, the majority of the semester is actually Winter. Why is the Spring (Winter) Semester So Bad? I’ll tell you why. In…
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Bullying Series – Part 5 of 5: Prevent, Stop, and Cope with Teen Bullying
How to Deal with Bullying After working with teens and young adults for years, including in schools, I’ve learned a thing or two about dealing with active bullying and helping people recover from the effects of bullying. Following my contribution to a News 2 WKRN mental health special on teen bullying, I wanted to put out…
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Bullying Series – Part 4 of 5: Signs and Long-Term Effects of Bullying
Part 4: Signs and Effects of Bullying I was happy to provide info about bullying for a News 2 WKRN special on teen mental health recently. The interview was about 30 minutes long, but the segment only lasted about 4 minutes. We talked about bullying signs and effects as part of that. So in an…
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