adolescent therapy
Beyond Surviving: How Therapy Helps Montgomery College Students Move from ‘Fine’ to Flourishing
Have you or someone you care about ever felt isolated from fellow students while in college? Has making new connections proven harder than you expected? Does everyone seem just too busy to get together? You’re not alone. Although you might see students chatting between classes or during lunch, beneath this busy exterior, many are silently…
How Dr. Megan Burleson Helps People With ADHD Navigate College, Work, and Life More Successfully
Life as a teen, college student, or young professional can feel overwhelming, especially when you’re living with ADHD. Juggling assignments, jobs, friendships, and personal goals requires strong executive functioning skills—things like planning, organization, time management, and emotional regulation. When ADHD makes those skills harder to access, it can feel like you’re constantly climbing uphill while…
How My Therapist Mom Helped Me Understand Mental Health
My friends think it’s amazing that my mom is a therapist. They assume she can fix everything with a quick conversation or a couple of probing questions. To our generation, mental health is extremely important. Everyone is looking for advice on how to feel better, get over a breakup faster, or navigate friendships when something…
Early Brain Damage in Contact Sports: What New Study Reveals About Risk to Young Athletes
In 2018, we wrote an advice column addressing a parent’s concerns about long-term brain damage that can result from contact sports. Now, with new research from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and Boston University, it’s time to revisit this critical topic. A new study published this month reveals that even young contact-sport athletes show…
Why Limiting Smartphones and AI in Middle School Is Worth the Fight
As parents, we all know how quickly childhood changes, especially during the middle school years. Although learning to navigate a bigger school and multiple teachers grabs our attention, under the surface, quietly, the refinement of social skills, the development of identity, and the management of emotions take center stage for them. New research shows that…
The Gen Z Stare Is Real. It’s a Problem. And It’s Largely Our Fault.
Have you all been following TikTok’s so-called “Gen Z stare?” We need to see this as something more than a passing internet fad. We need to take it seriously. The vacant, slightly contemptuous, silent stare when spoken to isn’t just rude, it’s a sign of a serious, larger issue. Researchers are seeing similar behaviors: decreased…
What Freya India Gets Right—and Wrong—About Girls’ Mental Health
The Digital Age’s Impact on Girls’ Mental Health By Dr. Elizabeth Carr, Founder, Kentlands Psychotherapy Freya India, pop culture influencer, has quickly become one of the most compelling and insightful cultural critics writing about the mental health crisis among young women and girls. Her voice is urgent, passionate, and clearly attuned to the social and…
Five Things Your Teen Daughter Wants You to Know
“Mom…I am listening (as my eyes are darting back and forth between my text messages, the watermelon game, and social media).” I feel like this interaction happens between my mom and me almost daily. Can you relate? Teen girls are in a beautiful, complicated phase of life. We’re growing into who we are and,…
Advice Column: Bonding with my quirky kid
Q: My child is kind of quirky, artistic, and wonderfully unique, but lately, we’ve been butting heads or drifting apart. I want to be supportive, but sometimes, I just don’t get them. How can I improve our relationship? A: You’re not alone—many parents of creative, outside-the-box kids face this challenge. Children who are “quirky”, artsy,…
Advice Column: Stimulants and Growth Concerns
Question: Our son, a student-athlete, was diagnosed with ADHD. We’ve worked hard to help him develop coping strategies, but we’re now at a point where we’re considering medication. Our biggest concern is the potential impact of stimulant medication on his growth. He’s in a critical stage of development, and we don’t want to do anything…
It's not an easy time to be a kid. Perhaps it never is, but now it's especially true. Let us help you understand and support your child's needs.
Is your teen struggling with school, in their relationships with friends, with you? Do they seem irritable, withdrawn, unmotivated, sad? Our therapist know how to help.
Are you looking to make some aspect of your otherwise good relationship better? Maybe you’ve tried all the strategies that make sense to you.