Children & Adolescents

Regulation and relationship comes before skills. A child who has run out of capacity can't learn anything especially from a stranger, no matter how good the strategy is or how capable the professional is at their job. My first focus with kids is building trust. Then, we figuring out what tips them over and what brings them back. Once there's some room, we get practical: naming what's happening, building tolerance in small steps, and practicing the specific thing that's hard rather than talking around it.

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EXAMPLES OF TREATMENT MODELS I COMMONLY USE

Orenda specializes in the observation and treatment of Anxiety Disorders, ADHD, Sensory Processing Differences, Trauma, and Chronic Medical Conditions from toddlerhood to late adolescenece. Evidence Based Treatment models are used in both an individual and family capacity. Some common issues treated at this age range include:

Impulse control and emotion regulation

Interpersonal social skills development

Differences in executive functioning

Coping with parental divorce/separation

Parent child relationships

Accommodating and coping with unique sensory needs

Difficulties with self and co-regulation patterns

CBT

Cognitive Behavior Therapy

CBT helps children and teens understand how their thoughts, feelings, and actions connect. For younger children, I weave CBT into art, games, and play so the concepts feel concrete and approachable. A worry might become a character to talk back to, or coping skills might become a set of cards to practice with. With teens, the work is more collaborative and focused on the real situations they're facing.

Parents play a key role. I help families learn the same language and strategies so skills can be reinforced at home and carried into everyday life.

ACT

Acceptance and Commitment Therapy

ACT is an evidence-based approach within the cognitive-behavioral family. Instead of trying to get rid of difficult thoughts and feelings, young people learn to notice them, make room for them, and still move toward what matters to them. With younger children, this work is playful and concrete, using stories, games, drawing, and movement. With teens, it becomes more conversational and centered on their goals and identity. Parents are an important part of the process. I help caregivers learn the same skills so they can support their child's growth at home and respond to hard moments with more calm and confidence.

Creative Expression

Art and Play Based Therapeutic Interventions

Not every person can put what they're feeling into words. Play and creativity are how young people naturally make sense of their world. In my practice, art and play give kids, teens, and their families other ways to express themselves, explore big feelings, and build coping and communication skills. Through Play-Based Work I utilize open-ended toys like blocks, LEGO, and miniature figures to let children build, create, and act out themes in their own way. Through free play, kids often show what's on their minds, practice problem-solving, and work through experiences at their own pace. Board and card games are useful as well. I utilize them to help build focus, attention, patience, turn-taking, and frustration tolerance, and they make it easy to explore handling winning, losing, and waiting in a low-pressure setting. Through Creative and Art-Based Work we utilize drawing, collage, clay sculpting, and crafting as a hands-on way to explore moods, feelings, and themes. Expressive drawing prompts might invite a child to show what anxiety looks like, draw a safe place, or create a picture of how their body feels on a hard day. Working with their hands often helps kids settle their bodies and open up in ways that talking alone may not. Their creations also give us something concrete to look at and talk about together to practice those necessary skills of verbal communication.