Working with your son and identifying and treating his mental health concerns is just a small part of the process. Substance abuse or experimenting with drugs is often a by-product of mental health concerns, causing additional emotional stressors. As we treat these concerns, we focus on your son’s strengths, environment, brain chemistry, and individual abilities to create a unique plan to build mental resilience and internal change.
Each student meets with his Clinical therapist throughout each week. Individualized attention is paramount to building a relationship of trust. Each therapist works with only a handful of students, so time spent with your son is maximized.
Group therapy can be difficult for adolescents and young adults. It’s hard to be vulnerable and express emotions and private thoughts with a group. That being said, group therapy is an effective tool that helps nurture understanding, compassion, empathy, and empowerment. In group therapy, we will discuss such topics as trauma, anxiety, social skills, resiliency, habits, and communication.
At Live Strong House, we love adventure and play. “All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy.” Play is an essential part of mental health and a great way to challenge your son to step outside his comfort zone. We have two recreation days a week that are dedicated to all kinds of adventures, such as snowboarding, skiing, hiking, mountain biking, wakeboarding, rock climbing, and most anything your son would like to do.
Each day, Live Strong House students meet as a group to evaluate their progress. These supervised student-led groups foster accountability, leadership, problem-solving, thinking outside oneself, understanding, and empathy. At community group meetings, your son will set goals, make plans, practice reporting on his efforts, and receive more training.
In order to find ourselves, we must lose ourselves, or at least lose our self-centered perspective. Service in the community is part of our weekly routine. We design our structured service projects to deepen empathy and develop our students’ ability to think outside themselves. These service projects challenge our students to develop compassion and a greater understanding of what’s really important in life.
Medication can sometimes be an essential part of therapy. We are very aware of the risks and stigma associated with psychotropic medication. We use medications with prudence and experience. Our prescribing nurse practitioner has years of experience and will be sensitive and judicious when it comes to finding the right medication for your son, if needed.
