Therapy for high school & college students
Being a teenager isn’t easy. Sometimes it feels like everyone—parents, teachers, coaches, other adults in your life—is telling you what to do. And expecting things of you. And part of you might understand that they want the best for you or want you to succeed, but sometimes it doesn’t seem like they express it well or right or take who you are and what you want into account.
And you’re also navigating friend and peer relationships, both in-person and online through social media. As you observe others around you, you might feel some competition or some jealousy or some inferiority. You might wish for or wonder what it would be like to have a peer’s life. Sometimes you feel pressure; sometimes you feel loneliness; sometimes you feel anxiety and self-consciousness; sometimes, you might feel okay. And sometimes it doesn’t feel like you can talk about your feelings without being judged.
None of this makes it easy when you’re trying to figure out who you want to be, what you want to do, and how you relate to the world–which just happens to be a total shitshow as far as you can tell. You might be feeling even more pressure knowing what you’re inheriting and going to have to fix because the adults haven’t done a good job.
Issues with which I can help teenagers:
Academic pressure, including perfectionism: Whether you’re feeling pressure to excel academically because it’s important to you or because parents or other adults communicated such an expectation, it can help to express your feelings around trying to excel in schoolwork. Coping skills and strategies can help you decide, too, what deserves your energy or when something is “good enough” (even if it’s not perfect).
Anxiety: You might feel worried or judge yourself or feel sensitive when you’re criticized. You might worry about what happens if you don’t get into the college (or grad school) of your dreams. As a result, you may think you need to practice more, re-write more, proofread more, double-check answers on homework, or rehearse conversations before they happen. Therapy can help you evaluate what’s worth your effort and how to respond when you’re nervous about something.
Identity issues: You’re trying to figure out who you are and what’s important to you. Maybe you’re navigating your gender identity or your sexuality. Or what it means to be a person of your race or ethnicity. Therapy gives you a space to explore how your identities intersect and what they mean to you.
Relationships: Maybe you’re trying to keep everyone happy all of the time. Or maybe you’re finding that your relationship with your parents is hard or maybe you lost your best friend or feel lonely. Learning how to communicate with different people in different types of relationships is a skill. Not everyone will respect boundaries you try to set or decisions you make or the reasons for which you make them. Therapy can help you identify when a relationship is healthy or unhealthy and how to address conflict respectfully.
Time pressure: Sometimes it doesn’t feel like you have enough time in your day. You go to school and have to do homework. But you have extracurricular activities, whether sports or art or other student groups and clubs. And maybe you work and have chores and have to help take care of your siblings. It can feel overwhelming!
World distress: Whether the climate crisis, the US government’s response to what’s going on in Israel and Palestine, or your prospects for the future, it’s understandable that you have concerns, frustrations, and potentially anger about the world you’re inheriting. You learn about government, but it doesn’t seem like it really works for anyone. You learn about science, but it doesn’t seem like adults take what the evidence is showing seriously. As a result, you may feel sadness or dread or injustice or hopelessness. Therapy can help address your concerns for the future and how unfair it may seem.
How can therapy help?
Depending on what’s going on for you, it can really help to have an adult who’s not your parent or teacher or coach to talk to and express how you’re feeling. You can talk about what’s going on in many areas of your life knowing that what you share stays with me (unless there’s some very specific circumstances–and we’ll talk about what those are). In therapy, you’ll have the opportunity to seek clarity with respect to your emotions and feelings. You’ll also learn skills that will help you cope and communicate better.