Cognitive-behavioral therapy for teens can effectively treat anxiety disorders and other adolescent mental health disorders. CBT for teens can also improve their day-to-day lives by correcting bad habits, reframing negative thoughts, and improving self-control. If your teen is suffering from anxiety, depression, extreme stress, or bipolar disorder, learn how our cognitive-behavioral therapy program can help today by reaching out to our compassionate Imagine Fort Collins team online or calling us at 888.291.2309.
What Is A Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy Program?
Through functional analysis and life skills training, our cognitive-behavioral therapy for teens will teach young people how to identify the negative thoughts and actions at the root of their anxiety. Like most therapies, a cognitive-behavioral therapy program focuses on counseling designed to help teens overcome their issues at home, school, work, and social situations. CBT for teens can address anything from anxious behavior to an emerging dependency on dangerous substances should self-medicating be an issue you are concerned about with your teenager.
A cognitive-behavioral therapy program is effective because it is based on the theory that your teen’s negative thoughts, behaviors, actions, and mental health disorders are not caused by outside influences, situations, or environments. Instead, CBT for teens believes and works to address a teen’s harmful thoughts impacting their anxiety. Therefore, cognitive-behavioral therapy for teens attempts to positively influence how teens think about themselves and alter their thoughts, actions, situations, and circumstances. With the help of skilled, compassionate cognitive-behavioral therapists, teens will start to change how their feel and behave.
During a cognitive-behavioral therapy program, your teen will learn to:
- Recognize dangerous social situations
- Avoid triggering events
- Steer clear of risky scenarios and influences
- Improve their self-control
- Correct bad habits
- Manage their negative feelings and thoughts
CBT for teens is typically a short-term, skills-focused treatment program aimed at altering a teenager’s emotional responses by changing thoughts and behaviors.
3 Ways Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy for Teens Helps Their Anxiety
Cognitive-behavioral therapy for teens is one of the most effective psychosocial approaches to treating anxiety disorders in adolescents. This is because a wealth of evidence and support shows how effective a cognitive-behavioral therapy program can be for adjusting anxiety behaviors.
Identify A Teen’s Negative Thoughts
During CBT for teens, your teen and their therapist will work to uncover the negative thoughts that swirl around their teenage mind and disrupt their life at home, school, work, and with friends. A Cognitive-behavioral therapy program will address everything from feeling awkward in public to a teen’s belief that people think they are ugly. The therapist will develop trust with your teen and ask questions about their feelings. Over time, your teen will discover the roots of their anxiety and be taught ways to overcome them.
Challenge Your Teen’s Negative Thoughts
When living with anxiety, a teen’s negative thoughts can overtake the more rational ones leaving them feeling crippled by fear, shame, and embarrassment. During CBT for teens, their therapist will question their thoughts, examine the evidence for them and analyze the belief behind each one. Soon, your teen will learn that their harmful thoughts and feelings have been influenced by a negative point of view not based on factual evidence.
Replace The Negative With The Realistic
Finally, one of the great benefits of a cognitive-behavioral therapy program for teens is replacing negative thoughts with realistic ones. CBT for teens instills new, healthier thoughts that pass the reality test. For example, cognitive-behavioral therapy for teens may discuss how your teen might come to own their feelings of awkwardness while accepting that others do not feel the same way by pointing to real-life evidence of being invited to events, parties, and other social situations.
Learn More at Imagine Fort Collins
If your teen is suffering from anxiety, contact Imagine Fort Collins today using our secure online form or call us at 888.291.2309 to learn how cognitive-behavioral therapy for teens can help them overcome their anxiety disorder.