Christian Counseling For Teens

4 Fun Tips to Help Kids Enjoy Moving into a New House

2024-10-03T12:38:43+00:00August 22nd, 2024|Christian Counseling for Children, Christian Counseling For Teens, Family Counseling, Featured|

Moving into a new house, a new state, or a new country is always challenging, and even more so for children. It is easy for kids to experience social anxiety due to the loss of familiarity and security that kids associate with home. One of the best ways to combat any anxiety associated with relocation is by restoring that sense of joy, peace, stability, and familiarity that they get from the home in other ways as they make the transition. The truth is that the family itself is the greatest source of familiarity a child has, rather than the physical structure of the house. However, it is harder for children to understand this and adapt to a new town and new home. Although moving means leaving loved ones behind, it’s important to keep your kids focused on the future and how much moving into a new house can be an exciting adventure! Handy hacks to make moving into a new house fun Use technology to paint a picture of where you’re going One of the best ways to catch the interest of kids these days is by using the one word they understand the most: technology. There are now hundreds of apps and sites that can help you paint a creative picture of your new house even before you move. For example, one of the coolest apps is Google Earth, a 3D program for visualizing Earth through satellite imagery. It allows you to zoom down to a street-level view of any place in the world in real time! Imagine the fun kids can have exploring their new home as if they were in their own video game. Help each kid create their own moving-day kit The toughest part about moving into a new house for most kids is the [...]

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4 Issues Commonly Addressed in Family Counseling

2024-10-29T18:37:37+00:00January 4th, 2024|Christian Counseling for Children, Christian Counseling For Teens, Family Counseling, Featured|

The family that we are born into or adopted into affects every aspect of our lives. The nature of the home environment has a significant impact on an individual’s future trajectory. While God designed the family to be a place of unconditional love and support, where children can experience security and emotional closeness, the family unit looks a little different in a fallen world, sometimes making family counseling necessary. Even the most loving, Christ-centered families will navigate problems, and, regardless of where you find yourself on the continuum, biblical family counseling can be a valuable tool in creating a platform for feelings to be aired and discussed. 4 Issues Commonly Addressed in Family Counseling For Christian families, biblical family counseling provides a space where a trained counselor can use tried-and-tested counseling techniques with God’s Word as a foundation. There will also be an opportunity to pray and be prayed for. This is a wonderful gift that believers have as they deal with life on this side of heaven. Some common problems addressed in family counseling include: 1. Communication issues. Communication, being able to speak one’s thoughts, listen to another’s response, and respond appropriately, is an essential skill that can prevent arguments and disagreements from escalating into anger and unproductive interactions. The inability to communicate effectively is one of the primary reasons for marital division. If spouses are unable to master this skill, poor communication likely pervades throughout the family. Family counseling is an excellent place to help develop more effective ways to talk to one another. God’s Word in James 1:19 reminds us, “Let every person be quick to hear, slow to speak, slow to anger. This is the starting point for effective communication habits. 2. Financial problems. Economic hardship or a change in a family’s finances can cause [...]

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Three Common Teenage Problems

2024-10-03T12:42:50+00:00November 20th, 2023|Christian Counseling For Teens, Family Counseling, Featured, Individual Counseling|

A lot of water has passed under the bridge since most of us were teenagers. Time, technology, and culture have moved on, and while some teenage problems have not changed, many of them have. Three common teenage problems parents need to understand. A teenager’s stage of life is often characterized by the changes in their body and mind as they mature from childhood into adulthood. This brings several physical and psychological changes that the teenager needs to navigate. While teenagers want independence from their parents and families it is not realistic to expect that they can decouple themselves from the necessary support of their parents and family unit. However, even supported by parents and siblings who love them, various teenage problems are almost unavoidable. Peer pressure. Having a personal device means that the content that is sent to the teen, or that they access, is immediately accessible at any time. Take sexting for example. While research is ongoing in this field, some researchers have found that there are primarily four reasons why adolescents become involved in sexting: flirting to attract a potential partner, expressing their sexuality with their romantic partner, experimenting with sexuality and identity, as well as a reaction to pressure from either their romantic partner or friends to conform to perceived normal behavior. Many teens do not understand the possible life-long impact of sharing explicit photos of themselves. It is the responsibility of parents to equip children with the skills to make healthy choices in these common situations. School problems. Did you know that in the US one in twenty-five high school students drop out each year? Researchers find that a high school dropout has a high likelihood of earning significantly less income over their lifetime than someone who graduates from high school. This lack of earnings [...]

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5 Signs of Depression in Children

2024-10-29T18:38:07+00:00May 25th, 2023|Christian Counseling for Children, Christian Counseling For Teens, Depression, Family Counseling, Featured|

It surely is a sign of sad times that depression affects 1.9 million (3.2%) children and teenagers between the ages of 3 and 17 in the United States, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (2020). In many instances, children with depression also have another coexisting condition, for example, anxiety, Oppositional Defiant Disorder (ODD), or attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). All too often, the signs of depression in children are missed by parents, caregivers, or teachers, as they can be mistaken for normal childhood moods. Depression, however, is pervasive as a mood disorder and is not something that children can “snap out of” through distraction. Signs of depression in children Children are also not able to express their feelings easily and would typically find it very difficult to describe the kind of symptoms that depression presents. Here are five signs of depression in children to not ignore. Loss of interest in activities. Just as with adults, one of the most common signs of depression in children is a loss of interest in activities that previously brought enjoyment. Children do tend to turn their attention from one hobby to another, and this may not necessarily reflect depression. But if you notice that things that he or she always previously took pleasure in doing (reading, for example, or walking the dog) have fallen away, it could be worth paying closer attention to your child’s emotional state. Extreme reactions. Teenagers are renowned for being emotional and moody. However, one of the signs of depression in children to look out for is a constant state of fluctuating emotion over some time. You might notice that a child cries more frequently, seems to explode with anger more often than normal, or sleeps too much to deal with his or her big feelings. [...]

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Waging War Against Anorexia and Bulimia

2024-10-30T10:46:35+00:00August 3rd, 2022|Christian Counseling For Teens, Eating Disorders, Featured, Individual Counseling|

According to studies by the EDC (Eating Disorders Coalition), at least 28.8 million Americans will suffer from an eating disorder such as anorexia and bulimia in their lifetime; four out of ten individuals have either personally experienced one or know someone who has, and eating disorders have the second highest mortality rate of any mental illness. These are frightening statistics, and the numbers are likely only getting higher as our society emerges into a post-pandemic world fraught with complex problems and myriad uncertainties. An eating disorder is defined as an unhealthy way of using food to cope with psychological stress, with a few common presentations. Anorexia nervosa centers around a restriction of energy intake relative to requirements, leading to significantly low body weight in the context of age and physical health. Anorexia creates a disturbance in the way in which one’s body weight or shape is experienced, with a persistent lack of recognition of the seriousness of the individual’s low body weight. Bulimia nervosa relates to recurrent episodes of binge eating, which are characterized by both the inordinate consumption of an amount of food in a discrete period (for example, within any two-hour period), with a sense of lack of control during the episode, followed by recurrent, inappropriate compensatory behaviors to prevent weight gain, such as self-induced vomiting, misuse of laxatives, diuretics or other medications, or excessive exercise. Numerous factors can give rise to conditions like anorexia and bulimia, and these are both internal and external. While men and women and both prone to these eating disorders, they affect mostly women, and often begin in the early teenage years, as issues of self-esteem, body image, and peer pressure take root. Eating disorders can be seen in children as young as eight years old, with a child who desires a [...]

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