For nearly any disorder, stress, or issue that your teenager faces, the first line of intervention should be made by parents at home. Compassion and understanding comprise the most beneficial approach you can take to helping your teen. However, sometimes mustering up compassion and understanding is difficult because teenagers’ issues can reverberate in us and cause great anxiety, anguish, and anger.
Parents who are usually well-tempered adults can lose their tempers quite easily when dealing with adolescent moods, behaviors, and provocative discussions. Reflecting before blowing up – understanding that there are always reasons for your teens’ misbehavior or mood variation that may not readily be apparent – is sometimes difficult but is always the most rewarding tactic you can employ in helping your teenager.
Parental help is not always enough. It is important to follow your instincts. When you believe help is necessary, you need to act. Figuring out who to turn to once you realize that your teenager needs help can be overwhelming. Consulting your teenager’s doctor, teachers, school counselors, religious counselors, local mental-health associations, hospitals or outpatient services are reliable ways to find a trained mental-health professional to help.
The first step in getting help for your teenager usually involves a mental-health evaluation. Mental-health evaluations can be carried out by nearly all mental-health professionals. These include adolescent psychiatrists who specialize in the problems of teenagers, psychologists, social workers, mental health counselors and psychiatric nurses.
Adolescent psychiatrists are the most broadly trained of mental-health professionals; they have gone to medical school and pursued advanced training in adult and child/adolescent psychiatry during residency programs. The adolescent psychiatrist can prescribe medication and do psychotherapy.
The psychologist has received an advanced doctoral degree in psychology and often has done an internship prior to getting a license. Psychologists are trained not only in doing therapy but also in doing various types of testing, which helps in the evaluation of many aspects of a teen’s life.
Social workers who are licensed have also attended graduate school to receive their Master’s Degree in social work. Like psychologists and psychiatrists, they are also psychotherapists but have more training in dealing with family issues, cultural issues, and system theory.
Mental health counselors are also licensed mental health professionals who are also broadly trained in most areas of mental health and do psychotherapy and school counseling.
Psychiatric nurses, especially those with a Master’s Degree in Psychiatry, are often trained similarly to a psychiatrist but not as extensively. The nurse will often have a strong background in medical sciences but also an expertise in psychiatric diagnosis, like the psychiatrist. Psychiatric nurses also do psychotherapy.
As you can see all five of the major professions provide psychotherapy, while psychiatrists and specially trained psychiatric nurses can also prescribe psychotropic medication. Any of the aforementioned mental-health professionals can go on for advanced psychotherapy and/or psychoanalytic training. Without such training, many therapies get bogged down in more superficial approaches that don’t take into consideration unconscious psychological issues, family influences, and a host of inner conflicts that cause anxiety and symptoms in our teenagers. It should be emphasized that work with teenagers requires training in the area of adolescent problems specifically, and while many in the field of mental health are adequately trained it is mostly in work with adults. Make sure that the mental-health professional you choose has specific training and experience working with teenagers.
DISCLAIMER
Information contained in this blog is intended for educational purposes only. It is not intended as medical or psychiatric advice for individual conditions or treatment and does not substitute for a medical or psychiatric examination. A psychiatrist must make a determination about any treatment or prescription. Dr. Paul does not assume any responsibility or risk for the use of any information contained within this blog.
