Creating Solutions Psychology

Teen Counselling and Therapy in Edmonton

Teen counselling provides a supportive space to improve communication, understand feelings, and build new skills.

When your teen is struggling and you need support

Is your teen experience anxiety, irritability, mood swings or emotional distress? Does it feel like they are overwhelmed with school, friends, or changes in their life?

Teen therapy provides a safe, supportive space to help them express feelings, develop coping skills, and build confidence.

Common issues addressed in teen therapy include:

  • anxiety,

  • depression,

  • ADHD,

  • trauma and loss,

  • bullying and peer pressure,

  • social and learning difficulties, and

  • family or life transitions.

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Five young adults walking and talking on the sidewalk in an urban area with brick buildings and leafless trees.

How Counselling and Therapy can make a difference for your Teen

Counselling can make a significant difference in a child’s emotional, social, and psychological development.

Emotional Expression and Regulation: teens often struggle to express their emotions verbally. Activity-based therapy provides a safe way to communicate and process difficult things.

Building Coping Skills: teens learn effective coping strategies for stress, trauma, or other behaviour challenges that fit their lives and developing self.

Healing From Trauma and Loss: children who have experienced trauma, grief, or abuse may find it additionally difficult to verbalize their thoughts, feelings, and experiences. Activities support processing in a non-threatening way; enhancing their resilience and healing.

Boosting Self-Esteem & Confidence: in therapy teens gain a sense of control over their emotions and experiences. This empowerment helps build confidence, independence, and a stronger sense of self-worth.

Improving Behaviour & Academic Performance: many behavioural issues come from underlying emotional distress. Therapy supports teens to better understand their emotions and triggers and with greater regulation, including focus, tends to improve. Specific academic strategies are also explored to set teens up for success in junior and senior high.

Managing Change and Difficult Situations: there are many circumstances in a teen’s life that are outside of their direct control, often leading to distress and resistance. Therapy can support kids to learn to focus on what they can control, enhancing their sense of mastery.

Common techniques used in teen therapy

  • Confidentiality and an Emotionally Safe Space: Therapy provides a private, judgement-free environment where individuals can openly express their thoughts and feelings without fear.

    Therapeutic Relationship and Guidance: Therapists offer compassionate listening, validation, and professional guidance to help clients navigate challenges, improve self-awareness, and find solutions right for them.

    Personalized Strategies and Techniques: Therapy is tailored to each person’s needs. Evidence-based approaches are used to help clients work through difficulties and create the life they are working towards.

  • CBT focuses on identifying and changing unhelpful thought patterns that lead to emotional distress. It is goal oriented and empowers individuals to develop healthier ways of thinking and coping.

    Key CBT Techniques

    • Identifying Negative Thought Patterns: Helping clients recognize negative or distorted thoughts to replace them with more healthy ones.

    • Reframing Thoughts and Perspectives: By challenging negative beliefs, CBT encourages more balanced and realistic ways of thinking, improving overall emotional well-being.

    • Coping Skills: Specific skills are developed to support problem solving, relaxation, and healthy responses to stressors.

    • Building Emotional Resilience: By practicing new coping and perspectives, individuals gain long-term skills to manage future challenges more effectively

  • Somatic therapy helps individuals heal by connecting the mind with the body. Rather than focusing solely on thoughts and emotions, somatic therapy techniques incorporates body awareness, movement, and other methods to address emotional pain that might be stored in the body.

    Key Somatic Therapy Techniques for Children

    • Enhances the Mind-Body Connection: techniques like breathwork, grounding exercises, and gentle movement supports clients to reconnect with their bodies and feel more present.

    • Improves Emotional Regulation: By learning to recognize physical sensations that are linked to emotions, individuals can gain better control over stress, anxiety, and feelings of overwhelm.

    • Releases Stored Trauma and Tension: Stress and trauma can be become trapped in the body. This can lead to chronic pain, tension, or distress. Somatic therapy helps release these stored experiences through guided awareness and movement.

    • Self-Awareness and Healing: Individuals can gain deeper insights into their emotions and develop healthier coping mechanisms.

  • Exposure therapies like Prolonged Exposure and Systematic Desensitization are designed to help people process and reduce the distress caused by trauma-related memories, thoughts, and experiences. It has been found to be effective for those experiencing post traumatic stress and other anxiety.

    Key Exposure Therapy Techniques

    • Reduces Fear and Avoidance: many individuals who experience a traumatic event avoid reminders of their trauma, which can reinforce fear. Exposure therapies help clients to face these fears gradually, reducing the emotional intensity over time.

    • Helps Process Traumatic Memories: people recount and process their traumatic experience in a safe environment, helping to desensitize them to the connected distressing emotions and thoughts.

    • Encourage Real-World Engagement: As they heal, clients are gradually reintroduced to activities, places or situations they have been avoiding. This supports individuals to regain a sense of control.

  • Solution Focused Therapy is a short-term, goal oriented approach that focused on practical solutions to challenges rather than past problems. It empowers clients by emphasizing their strengths, resources, and positive change.

    Key Solution Focused Therapy Techniques

    • Positive Mindset: SFT shifts the focus from problems to solutions, helping people see possibilities for change rather than staying stuck in difficulties.

    • Focus on Strengths and Resources: Clients are guided to recognize their existing skills, past successes, and naturally occurring supports to build their confidence.

    • Sets Clear and Achievable Goals: SFT focuses on simple and effective techniques that can be applied immediately to create meaningful progress.

    • Boosts Self-Efficacy and Independence: The client’s existing successes and frameworks are used to support them to make positive change and move forward with confidence and clarity.

Who Provides Teen Counselling?

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How Teen Therapy At Creating Solutions Works

  • Creating Solutions requires the informed consent of all guardians to proceed with therapy services involving a minor, unless indicated otherwise by legal documents. If you have documents related to decision making for a child please provide those at the time of intake.

  • Parent involvement in therapy sessions is based on a variety of factors including the child’s age, comfort level in therapy sessions, and therapeutic goals. Your child’s therapist will be able to talk directly with you about what is best to meet the needs of your child.

  • Parents are able to access information about how therapy is progressing through the therapist in a variety of ways. These might include parent update sessions, emails, and discussion at either the beginning or the end of each therapy session. Each therapist works with the guardians/parents to develop a method of communication that fosters trust with the child and ensures the adults in the child’s life are working together.

Setting Up Therapy for your Teen

If you are ready to get your child started contact us to complete the intake and schedule an initial session.

If you are not sure what you may need to get started let us know you want to book a phone consultation with one of our child therapists to ask questions and get clear direction.

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