When you are choosing a therapist for your child or teen, it can feel overwhelming. You may also be given the option of a student intern from the organization you connect with. Many families may shy away from this option, for the reason that they are unsure if a student has the skills and abilities to best support their child. However, there are many benefits of working with a student intern as your therapist! 

Let’s talk about brain development!  Brain development is such an important part of understanding and making sense of behaviours, thoughts and feelings.  When thinking about how a brain develops, it can be helpful to think about it the same way a house is built. 

What are Body Breaks? For children with ADHD, or simply with a lot of energy, it can be difficult to maintain focus on a task for long periods of time. Body breaks can help release feelings of frustration and stress, increase focus and stay on task, and they can help a child learn how to self regulate. 

Anxiety is a term that is often used in everyday conversation to describe our children, ourselves, or others around us. Anxiety is an emotion coupled with feelings of uneasiness, worry, and intrusive thoughts which may occur as a response to a present or perceived threat. When individuals feel anxious, they may experience physical symptoms such as an increased heart rate, sweating, increase in temperature, uneasy stomach, or restlessness.

In “post pandemic” times, it makes sense why some folks are eager to book in-person sessions when beginning their therapeutic journey. However, for many individuals, virtual therapy can be incredibly beneficial… especially for teens! Here are 5 reasons why Virtual Therapy can be beneficial for teens.

Masking (sometimes referred to as camouflaging) is the tendency to suppress certain behaviors that might be related to neurodivergence. The term is most often used in the context of ADHD or Autistic individuals. If you are interested in learning more about neurodivergence, feel free to check out my other blog post: What is Neurodiversity #TipsToBloom.

Happy Pride Month! Pride month is the perfect time to reflect on our use of inclusive language in all aspects of our lives including parenting. Whether you know if your child identifies as 2SLGBTQIA+ or not, there are a few things you can do to make them feel more comfortable with sharing their identity, and supporting their peers as well. This includes language that includes various gender identities, diverse families, and romantic partners.

The term neurodiversity describes the natural cognitive differences between individuals, including brain function and behavioral traits. Just like racial, gender, and cultural diversity, variations in neurotypes are natural and valuable forms of human diversity! 

November 20th is National Child Day in Canada and World Children’s Day across the globe. This date commemorates when the UN General Assembly adopted the Declaration of the Rights of the Child in 1959 and when they adopted the Convention on the Rights of the Child in 1989.