I listened to a podcast this morning about being needed. It described how people who don’t feel useful often get depressed. This can even lead to suicide or early death for some.  For example, when men retire and don’t have enough to do, they often lose their sense of purpose. Their health sometimes suffers as a result.  For some people, if they don’t feel they matter to someone, they wonder “would anyone even notice if I wasn’t around anymore?”.  

Where Else Does It Apply?

I had a conversation with a highschool coach about handling kids that would normally sit the bench during most games.  My opinion is it’s better to cut a player than put them on the team and not let them play in games.  I’ve seen kids lose their passion for the game when this happens faster than if they were cut.  He agreed. When he coaches, he looks at what each kid is skilled at, even if small compared to other players. This coach finds a way to bring out that skill in players and consider when he’s going to need it during a game.  He would make a point to help the player develop their particular skill and  put them in when it was needed.  This helps the player  have a sense of purpose.  And  it helps the team overall.  It also helps build team cohesion.

Need for Purpose and Parenting

All this made me wonder if parents could do the same thing with kids.  What if we make each kid aware they serve a useful purpose within the family so they feel needed.  This could  be something like certain chores, taking care of pets, babysitting, running errands, and so on.

Gary Watson provides Solution Focused Therapist in Grand Rapids Michigan and Ada, Michigan.  He counsels couples, teenagers, and adults.  He can help with anxiety, depression, stress, college and work stress, relationship problems, and more.  For more information, please visit the website at www.turnaboutcounseling.com.

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Raising a teenager can be a challenging yet rewarding experience. One of the common hurdles parents face is dealing with their teenager’s anger. Adolescence is a time of significant change and development, which can often result in intense emotions. Here are some effective strategies parents can use to help manage and understand their teenager’s anger.

1. Understand the Root Cause

Anger in teenagers often stems from various underlying issues such as stress, academic pressure, peer conflicts, or hormonal changes. It’s essential to understand that anger is a secondary emotion that usually masks deeper feelings like frustration, fear, or sadness. By identifying the root cause, parents can address the underlying issues more effectively.

2. Maintain Open Communication

Fostering an environment where open communication is encouraged can significantly help in managing a teenager’s anger. Encourage your teenager to express their feelings and listen actively without judgment. This not only helps in understanding their perspective but also builds trust. Use phrases like “I understand how you feel” or “Let’s talk about what’s bothering you” to show empathy and support.

3. Set Clear Boundaries

While it’s important to be understanding, setting clear and consistent boundaries is equally crucial. Teenagers need to know what behavior is acceptable and what is not. Establishing rules and consequences for unacceptable behavior helps in maintaining discipline and reduces the likelihood of angry outbursts. Ensure that the consequences are fair and consistent to reinforce these boundaries.

4. Model Appropriate Behavior

Teenagers often learn by observing their parents. Modeling calm and constructive ways to deal with anger can be highly effective. If parents handle their own anger in a healthy manner, it sets a positive example for their teenagers. Demonstrating techniques like taking deep breaths, counting to ten, or stepping away from a heated situation to cool down can teach teenagers how to manage their emotions better.

5. Encourage Healthy Outlets

Encouraging teenagers to engage in physical activities or hobbies can provide them with a healthy outlet for their emotions. Sports, music, art, or any other extracurricular activity can help channel their energy and reduce stress. Regular physical activity, in particular, is known to release endorphins which can improve mood and reduce feelings of anger.

6. Teach Problem-Solving Skills

Helping teenagers develop problem-solving skills can equip them to handle situations that trigger anger more effectively. Teach them to break down problems into smaller, manageable parts and brainstorm possible solutions. Encouraging them to think about the consequences of their actions and consider different perspectives can also promote better decision-making.

7. Seek Professional Help When Needed

If your teenager’s anger seems overwhelming or unmanageable, it might be beneficial to seek help from a mental health professional. Therapists or counselors can provide a safe space for teenagers to express their feelings and work through their issues. They can also offer valuable strategies and tools for managing anger and improving emotional regulation.

8. Practice Patience and Empathy

Dealing with an angry teenager requires a lot of patience and empathy. It’s important to stay calm and avoid reacting impulsively to their anger. Understand that adolescence is a tumultuous period, and your teenager might not always have the tools to express their emotions appropriately. Offering consistent support and understanding can make a significant difference in helping them navigate this challenging phase.

9. Focus on Positive Reinforcement

Positive reinforcement can be a powerful tool in encouraging desired behaviors. Praise and acknowledge your teenager when they handle a situation calmly or manage their anger effectively. This not only boosts their self-esteem but also reinforces the idea that positive behavior is noticed and appreciated.

10. Create a Safe and Supportive Environment

Lastly, creating a safe and supportive home environment is crucial. Ensure that your teenager feels valued and understood at home. A nurturing environment can significantly reduce feelings of anger and frustration, and promote overall emotional well-being.

In conclusion, dealing with a teenager’s anger can be challenging, but with the right strategies, parents can effectively manage and support their teenager through this tumultuous phase. Understanding the root cause, maintaining open communication, setting clear boundaries, and providing healthy outlets are key components in helping teenagers navigate their emotions and develop healthier ways to express their anger.

Gary Watson is a Solution Focused Therapist in Grand Rapids Michigan and Ada, Michigan.  He provides counseling for couples, counseling for teenagers, and adults.  He can help with anxiety, depression, stress, college and work stress, relationship problems, and more.  For more information, please visit the website at www.turnaboutcounseling.com.

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I thought about it for a few minutes before responding to his dilemma.  Although it’s hard to make mistakes and feel the embarrassment of them, it’s an important life lesson to own your mistakes and learn to be better.  If you can’t admit when you make a mistake you’re just failing to take accountability for yourself.  It’s a fool who can’t admit they make mistakes or screw things up on occasion because you still know you did it and so do the people who are involved. 

So with my son, he walked me through what went wrong, how he made an error in judgement and what he thought he could do to prevent it from happening again.  We talked about how to approach his teammates who got on his case about his mistake.  For example, he could admit it didn’t go well and ask them what he should do differently.  He might get some good advice and learn something.

We also went over events that resulted in the mistake.  For example, the coach had him play defender, which he hadn’t played before.  He misread cues from the goalie since he’d never had to do that before.  These are reasons for the mistake, not excuses.  Doing this is about figuring out how the mistake happened and it can help you feel better, but it doesn’t mean you didn’t  make the mistake.  He came up with a plan to talk to the goalie at the next practice so they both know what to do in future games.  

It takes courage to admit you’re wrong but it also builds integrity and honor.  It’s impossible to go through life without making mistakes, some of them downright embarrassing.  But to earn and keep your self-respect and the respect of others, you have to deal with them.  This means sitting with that feeling of feeling like an idiot for a while, but then brushing yourself off and trying to fix it.

I provide a lot of counseling for teenagers and young men and women and this is often one of the topics we address. How to develop self respect and earn the respect of others. How to conduct yourself at work, school, and in relationships. They are relatively easy lessons to understand yet few of us put them into practice. Even many of my fellow clinicians placate their clients by telling them their life choices weren’t their fault. They tell their clients their problems are caused by society or those “other” people. They say people should just accept you the way you are and if they don’t then there’s something wrong with them. Sometimes this is true, but most times if you want to find the person responsible for your misfortune, just look in the closest mirror. But that’s not so bad because it’s a lot easier to better yourself than to fix someone else.

Gary Watson is a Solution Focused Therapist in Grand Rapids Michigan.  He provides counseling for couples, teenagers, and adults.  He can help with anxiety, depression, stress, college and work stress, relationship problems, and more.  For more information, please visit the website at www.turnaboutcounseling.com.

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Using the Love and Logic Approach

Dealing with teenage behavior problems can be a challenge, but I think it is important to not only address the poor behavior, but also teach and promote the positive behaviors.  One of the things I often teach in my counseling practice is the Love and Logic approach to parenting. 

This involves, expecting your kids to make mistakes or bad decisions, and letting them deal with reasonable consequences of their bad decisions.  This can be tough because sometimes parents have to invent negative consequences.  For example, if the poor choice is that they are doing things that make their parents worry or stress out, then the parent may have to name their own stress as the problem and let the teenager know they will have to do something about it. 

For example, “Suzie, you neglecting to study for tests and then failing them is a problem for me because it makes me worry about your future.  I think it’s probably your phone that is keeping you from studying adequately.  If you can fix the problem of me worrying about your grades that would be great, but if not, I’ll have to solve my problem.”  Then, if Suzie starts studying, problem solved.  But if she continues to fail to study, you can take her phone away.  The next part would be to say to her,  “I’ll be glad to let you use your phone again as soon as I don’t have to stress out about your grades”.

Using Positive Behavioral Approaches

While this approach works quite well, it’s also only half the equation.  It still involves negative consequences or punishments.  However, research shows that we change out behaviors best when we feel good about the behaviors we are doing.  This means rewarding positive behavior is going to get better results than punishing bad behavior.

When trying to address teenage behavior problems, then; try to teach your teenager what behaviors you are looking for, be specific, and reward them for doing them.  You can do this in several ways.

First, you can simply compliment them when you notice them doing something positive on their own.  Try to do this as close to the behavior occurring as possible for maximum effect.

Second, you can give them a task to do and them compliment them for doing it, compliment them for being cooperative if they did it without a fuss, and/or compliment them the results of what they did (i.e. “Look how nice the living room looks after you vacuumed?)

Using Compliments

Other things you can do to avoid teenager behavior problems is to let you teenager overhear you bragging about their positive behaviors to other people.  This can let them know you must really mean it if your talking about it to others when they are not around.

Don’t be deterred if you compliment your teenager and you get a reaction such as eye rolling from them.  Just pretend you didn’t notice it because it still does the intended job.  Just make sure your compliments are genuine.  For example, you wouldn’t compliment a teenager on being able to tie their shoes or dress themselves (although for some you might want to compliment them for choosing an appropriate outfit).

Gary Watson is a Solution Focused Therapist in Grand Rapids Michigan.  He provides counseling for couples, teenagers, and adults.  He can help with anxiety, depression, stress, college and work stress, relationship problems, and more.  For more information, please visit the website at www.turnaboutcounseling.com.

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Dating and peep pressure to drink or use drugs are another factor in teen depression.  I counsel a lot of teenagers with depression. They often feel like everyone at school is using drugs or drinking.  Or, the kids they grew up with are getting into trouble and they don’t want to follow what their friends are doing but they don’t want to lose their friends either.  It’s quite a dilemma when you have to figure this one out.

Solution Focused counseling and talking to a therapist who can help you weigh your options and figure out how to deal with these kinds of stressors can help a lot.  The nice thing about solution focused counseling is that the therapist usually asks you guided questions to help you choose your own direction instead of just telling you what to do. It’s more like coaching than counseling. The therapist knows you are doing more things right than wrong, and that you’re capable of making your own decisions; you just need someone to be the sounding board for you and help give some direction to your thinking.

If you’re a parent of someone with teen depression, it can be useful to talk to them about trying counseling.  Most teens try counseling partly because their parents make them and partly because to see if I will be useful.  99% of them decide it’s more helpful than they anticipated and willingly schedule the next appointment.  I suggest parents and their teenager talk about the first session while driving home to decide whether counseling is helpful.

Gary Watson is a Solution Focused Therapist in Grand Rapids Michigan.  He provides counseling for couples, counseling for teenagers, and adults.  He provides counseling for anxiety, depression, stress, college and work stress, and relationship problems.  For more information, please visit the website at www.turnaboutcounseling.com.

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Children and teenagers with social anxiety is a common occurrence.  It often shows up in early adolescence where kids have difficulty making friends, making connections and developing a satisfactory social life.  We generally describe these kids as shy but the problem can become more pervasive and problematic for many kids. Few things are more painful for parents than seeing their children be left out and struggling to make friends.

Kids and teenagers with social anxiety often feel quite lonely, isolated, and  sometimes ostracized.  This can in turn lead to depression and hopelessness because these kids often feel alone. This can make them feel like social “losers”.  Your teenager may want to make friends but suffer in silence as they struggle to find ways to do this.

What to Do:

Kids with social anxiety have a lot to offer but have trouble developing confidence and tools to engage with others.  These kids and teenagers often have great personalities with kindness, humor, and generosity as parts of their personalities.  We often describe these kids as kind, intelligent, loyal, and caring. However, their introverted personalities make it difficult to “put the mselves out there”.  They often have intense internal conflicts as they struggle to think of things to say to initiate interactions.  Then, they judge themselves harshly for not being able to think of anything. They may worry that peers are judging them harshly for their apparent social deficits.

Fortunately, counseling works wonders in helping kids learn to work within their strengths to develop self esteem and self confidence. It can help them learn to initiate basic interactions that make them more approachable to peers.

Solution Focused Counseling Can Help

Solution Focused counseling is a good fit for teenagers with social anxiety because it helps you find small ways to start interactions. And it keeps them within their comfort zones as they “stretch” themselves enough to begin the process.  

If you’d like to learn more about how solution focused counseling can help your child, contact me for a free consult.  

Gary Watson is a Solution Focused Therapist in Grand Rapids Michigan.  He provides counseling for couples, counseling for teenagers, and adults.  He provides counseling for anxiety, depression, stress, college and work stress, and relationship problems.  For more information, please visit the website at www.turnaboutcounseling.com.

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Is My Teenager Depressed?

Some of the common behavior changes parents tend to see is withdrawal from the family—often keeping to themselves instead of spending time with family.    They can lose interest in activities they used to enjoy.  They may stop spending time with their usual friends.  Your teenager may also spend too much time sleeping or show changes in appetite.   Depressed teenagers often show signs of secrecy, keeping more things from parents or showing signs of evasion.    An obvious sign of depression is cutting.  If you notice small cuts on your teenagers arms, legs, or torso, or notice blood on bedsheets and pillow cases, it could be a sign of teenage cutting.

There are lots of things that can cause depression for teenagers. It can be a loss of a family member, loss of a friendship or boyfriend or girlfriend, changes in family such as divorce, worry about parents due to things such as job loss and potential homelessness.  Many teenagers worry about their grades and their future career options.  These are just a few things that can cause depression in teens.

What To Do

If your teenager seems depressed, never take it lightly and don’t assume that they will just snap out of it.  Doing this could end in disaster.  If you think your teen is depressed, seek counseling as soon as possible.  Even if your teenager is angry with you about counseling, explain to them that you’d rather have them alive and angry than dead.  I’ve had this conversation with several teens over the years.  

Many teens who come to counseling are not overly happy to be there.  However, they are often appreciative that their parents care enough about them to get them into counseling even if they don’t want to do counseling.  Oftentimes, my teenage clients only have one goal—to not have to come to counseling anymore.  That’s a perfectly fine goal to work with for counseling because the counselor can them help them do the things their parents need to see happen in order to be comfortable ending counseling.  In the process of meeting this goal, they usually end up finding other goals they do want to work on.  Usually once they start counseling, they become more comfortable talking to the counselor and are no longer reluctant to do counseling.  

Counseling for Teenagers

Quite often, one of the first things parents need to see from depressed teenagers is for them to come out of their bedrooms and participate with the family more often, or talk more about their day with parents.  There can be some negotiations with parents about giving them some amount of privacy during these conversations such as parents not asking too many questions.  Teens are often more agreeable to talking to parents about their days when they feel safe they won’t be “interrogated” by parents with 20 or 30 questions when they give some personal information.  This is a good start.

If you are asking yourself whether your teenager is depressed”?, feel free to contact me to start counseling or just ask questions.  

Gary Watson is a Solution Focused Therapist in Grand Rapids Michigan.  He provides counseling for couples, counseling for teenagers, and adults.  He provides counseling for anxiety, depression, stress, college and work stress, and relationship problems.  For more information, please visit the website at www.turnaboutcounseling.com.

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Counseling for Anxiety is one of the main things that therapists provide. So the good news is that if you have anxiety, you’re in good company. There are many different strategies that help with anxiety. Below, I will discuss one of the strategies.

Anxiety as a Mental Construct

Anxiety often comes about because of our thought processes. These negative thoughts then send signals to that part of our brain in charge of fight or flight. This in turn can lead to physical symptoms of anxiety such as chills, hot flashes, shaking, etc. Our brain picks up on an uncertainty or fear which can cause or increase the feelings of panic.

I work with a lot of clients who struggle with anxiety in my Grand Rapids, MI office. I work from a solution focused therapy approach which means rather than focus on what is causing the anxiety, I help you determine how you want to react to anxiety-provoking situations in the future.

How to Reduce Anxiety:

You can’t be relaxed and anxious at the same time. We focus then on how to build up your confidence by starting with small changes. When you’re confident, you’re relaxed. I’ll have you think about and describe what you will look like when you are confident (rather than anxious). I’ll ask you to describe how you will stand, sit, walk, etc. Once you have this in mind, I’ll suggest you pick some opportune times to practice this. It may be just when you walk into a classroom or your work place.

Next we might talk about what other things you’ll be doing when you are a confident person. Perhaps you have anxiety when you walk into a grocery store. We’ll have you visualize what the smallest sign of confidence will be when you walk into the store. For some, this might be nodding a greeting to the store greeter. For others, it could be how they go up to the grocery carts and select one.

Starting Small to Overcome Panic Attacks

We don’t try to stop your anxiety all at once. In fact, we don’t worry about stopping it at all. Instead we might have you focus on just noticing when your anxiety is less on some occasions. We might focus some effort on having you predict how much your anxiety will decrease over time. This can also help you focus more on the idea of it decreasing rather than worrying that your anxiety will increase.

For example, if you have to do public speaking in a class or for work, I may ask you to consider how you will notice that you were just a little bit less nervous the next time you have to speak. You may notice that you started off being nervous, but calmed down and found your regular speaking voice a little bit sooner. Focusing on these small but noticeable changes will help you keep going in the right direction.

Counseling for Anxiety can be relatively painless. It just takes some attention to the way you want to be instead. If you live in the Grand Rapids, MI area and would like to try Solution Focused Counseling, then give me a call. I’ll be glad to help.

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Does This Sound Like You?

If you are one of these high school students, you may often have anxiety and then start judging yourself harshly for being anxious and not being able to control it. After all, you usually manage to control many aspects of your life and stay on top of things. You may notice having trouble falling asleep because your mind races when you first go to bed. Maybe you wake up with anxious thoughts in the middle of the night and not be able to fall back to sleep.

You may worry because you don’t know what you want to study in college or where you want to go to college. You may not want to go to college but want to have a good career and not know how to make that happen.

If this sounds like you, then you’re in good company. Many high school students worry about not knowing what they want to do with the rest of their lives after high school. Sometimes, you worry because you want to do something meaningful, you just don’t know what that means for you yet.

What to Do About It

There is time to figure it out. Many people change their minds during college and switch majors when they find something they like better. Many people get their degrees in college and end up changing careers to something totally different after being on the job for a figure years. An example is teaching. Many teachers get their Bachelors degree in teaching and get tired of dealing with the stress of teaching after a few years. They end up changing careers or getting trained in something else.

Of course, not worrying about it may not be an option either because telling yourself not to worry is as effective as telling yourself not to think about purple cows. As soon as you try not to think about something, that’s all you think about. So, the trick is to allow your mind to think these thoughts without judging yourself for thinking them or not being able to stop thinking about them. Just accept the thoughts as “that thing I do when I don’t know the answers” and remind yourself that you don’t have to have the answers right now.

Other Strategies

It may help to think about this in terms of “clarity”. You’re trying to gain clarity about your future. You can put your level of clarity on a scale from 1 to 10. If 10 stands for complete clarity about what you need to do and 1 stands for having no idea at all, where are you now? When you can say you’ve gone one number higher, what are some of the things you might know then that you don’t know now? This can be a useful trick to help gain some clarity about your future plans.

Gary Watson is a Solution Focused Therapist in Grand Rapids Michigan.  He provides counseling for couples, counseling for teenagers, and adults.  He provides counseling for anxiety, depression, stress, college and work stress, and relationship problems.  For more information, please visit the website at www.turnaboutcounseling.com.

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I just heard this saying the other day for the first time and it made me think about my own habits. The saying suggests to me that we all have a level of conscientiousness about how we approach things, from our jobs to relationships to keeping up our homes to parenting our kids. If someone were to watch how we do one thing, it would give them a pretty good idea of how we do most things.

My two brothers tend to be slow and methodical about most things. They even walk slow compared to me. When I watch them do physical things such as maintenance on a car, they move slowly and methodically as if every movement is planned. They’re careful and think things through before they do it or while they’re doing it. As a result, they don’t make many mistakes.

I can see similar patterns in how I do things. I won’t go into detail, but let’s just say I can see patterns. Sometimes I move too quickly and then have to retrace my steps because I forgot something. I sometimes end up doing something over because I rushed. It’s an ADHD thing, okay?

This saying also reminds me of the saying, “If the job is worth doing, it’s worth doing right”. The saying about how you do anything is how you do everything seems to add to the meaning of this one. Taking time and effort to do any job the right way, builds self-esteem and you become better at many other things because you are teaching yourself to be more conscientious. In turn, this leads to higher self-esteem, stronger self-concept, and more reason to take pride in who we are.

Now if you’ll excuse me, it’s time to go make my bed.

Gary Watson is a Solution Focused Therapist in Grand Rapids Michigan.  He provides counseling for couples, counseling for teenagers, and adults.  He provides counseling for anxiety, depression, stress, college and work stress, and relationship problems.  For more information, please visit the website at www.turnaboutcounseling.com.

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