Services
Play Therapy
“Toys are children’s words and play is their language.”
- Gary Landreth
Play therapy is an expressive, relational therapy that gives children ways of communicating, learning, and healing through regulating their nervous system from the bottom-up. Children’s brains are not yet fully developed. In fact, the human brain does not fully develop until roughly age 25. The brain develops from the bottom-up; from the brain stem as the first to develop to the limbic system in the mid-brain, to the prefrontal cortex as the last to develop. Children take in information and communicate more effectively when their brain stem and mid-brain are calm and engaged.
That’s where play therapy, sand tray therapy, and art therapy come in.
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These expressive therapies regulate and engage these lower parts of the brain where talk therapies and cognitive therapies fall short. Cognitive therapies focus on the prefrontal cortex functions which are underdeveloped in a child’s brain. I am gifted in using expressive therapies to build safety in the therapeutic relationship with your child and help them learn new ways of being and doing through play. Some goals in play therapy include building self-esteem (connecting to self), developing agency and internal locus of control, building safe relationships, learning new, safe behaviors, and healing traumatic or attachment wounds. Parents will be very involved. Parents are the most influential adults in a child’s life. I will hold regular parent-only sessions during a child’s treatment in play therapy to help parents learn ways to support their child’s healing and growth in therapy and beyond.
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Often, I will also hold family or dyadic (parent-child) sessions to strengthen the connection between children and parents to reinforce emotional safety in primary relationships. I am trained and experienced in offering child-centered play therapy, Theraplay, sand tray therapy, and art therapies to children of all ages. Play therapy has been researched to be effective in treating trauma, depression, anxiety, behavioral struggles, attachment issues, and many others in children as young as 2 years old.
Trauma comes in many forms. It can be situational, relational, personal, complex and even ancestral. At its core, trauma compromises a human’s sense of safety and connection in their own body. In order to survive, this person’s nervous system develops defensive strategies to prevent further harm. These defenses are no longer needed when the threat has passed.
However, if the stress cycle is not completed, these defenses get “stuck” in the body and brain. They can then get “triggered” by the person’s body-based memories of the threat. In treatment, I use the attachment and polyvagal theories along with expressive and cognitive therapies to soothe the nervous system, complete the stress cycle, and return to safety.
Trauma
“Trauma is not what happens to you.
It’s what happens inside you as a result of what happened to you.”
- Gabor Mate
Parent Coaching
“Behind every behavior, there is a feeling. Behind every feeling, there is a need. Meet the need and you will treat the cause rather than the symptom.”
- Unknown
“Children will do well if they can."
- Ross Green
Parenting is hard. I get it. Our children get overwhelmed, and we get overwhelmed. And when our children get overwhelmed, all manner of challenging behaviors can break loose. These behaviors can look defiant or disrespectful and can get out of control. Our job as parents is not to control our children’s behaviors but to create an environment of connected, peaceful guidance where children can be their best selves.
That’s not easy, and that’s where I can support you.
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According to a massive body of attachment research, children want to do well and please their caregivers. Children with challenging behaviors are seeking emotional regulation and connection. They are not having fun and neither are we. Children get emotionally overwhelmed more easily than adults because of their underdeveloped brains. They only learn to regulate their emotions in connection with emotionally safe adults. This is called co-regulation. Connection soothes emotional overwhelm and brings with it, co-regulation. I can help you parent for connection with your children. I work from the bottom-up in your relationships to help you achieve more peace and balance in your parenting and in your family.