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Children Teenagers

ADHD versus Asperger’s Syndrome in Children

ADHD and Asperger’s Syndrome are two common disorders that are usually first diagnosed during childhood. They can appear very similar in their symptoms but have different causes and different treatments. Symptoms of ADHD While many children are diagnosed with ADHD in childhood, quite often Aspergers Syndrome is mistaken for ADHD at first. The APA in […]

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Marriage Counseling Relationships

Marriage Counseling: The 6 to 1 Ratio

One thing that often comes up in marriage counseling is the idea of having a successful argument where you give your spouse constructive criticism. When living together, problems will arise but how do you talk about it without your partner shutting down? In my experience providing marriage counseling to various couples, the shutting down often […]

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Children Parenting Teenagers

Discipline for Teenagers: Get Teens to Listen

This is a Love and Logic strategy I incorporate in counseling for teenagers and helping parents use discipline for teenagers. If you’re not familiar with Love and Logic, do a google search and you’ll find tons of books and videos available. Teenagers have a tendency to screw up and do things they shouldn’t or fail to do […]

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Individual Counseling Relationships

Improve Self-esteem: Doubting your Doubts

While counseling a young man with a tendency toward self-doubt, we discussed how we tend to view events that occur to us through certain filters, which in turn affects our self-esteem. If you have low self confidence, you tend to dismiss genuine compliments from others as “just trying to be nice”or trying to make us […]

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Marriage Counseling Relationships

Solution Focused Marriage Counseling

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Individual Counseling Marriage Counseling Parenting Relationships

Relationships: How Criticism Can Drive Someone Away

Below is an article written by a married woman who caught herself criticizing her husband over trivial things rather than focusing on his positive qualities. It was ruining her relationship. She realized her attitude toward him was causing him to feel unloved, unvalued, and basically treated like a child. In her case, her husband had […]

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Individual Counseling

Counseling for Life Stress: Taking Detours

When I counsel people in my Grand Rapids office, they often make progress for a time, then have a day or two when things don’t go as planned. Life stress gets in the way temporarily. For some, they view these momentary setbacks as some kind of failure, or proof that they “always” screw things up. We […]

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building self-esteem Children Individual Counseling Teenagers

Counseling for self esteem: “I tried it on and it fit”

As a counselor for teenagers and college students, I often see clients who struggle with personal identity. They need counseling for self-esteem and to develop a personal sense of identify. High school students, college students, and young adults often have trouble figuring out who they are and exactly how they should navigate their world. This […]

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Marriage Counseling Relationships

Solution Focused Counseling helps Marriages

How Solution Focused Counseling Works: When couples come to counseling to resolve marital issues, they often hope the therapist will be able to help the other person realize how wrong they have been and admit to it, then do things differently from now on. Unfortunately, it doesn’t really work that way. I’ve rarely observed someone who can […]

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Children Parenting Teenagers

Successful Parenting: Parental Screen Addiction

As a therapist who works with lots of teenagers, I often talking about successful parenting skills. I often caution parents about not letting their kids spend too much time playing video games or playing on iPhones. However, over the past couple of years, it seems just as important to remind parents about their own screen […]