Should I find therapy for my 6-year old?
Please note: our blog posts are solely informational and are not meant to replace individualized therapeutic advice or healthcare.
First, having awareness of your child’s mental health needs is admirable! You likely weren’t raised in a generation where mental health was an open topic and certainly not children’s mental health. You have probably had to cultivate a lot of self-awareness around your own mental health to be in a position to identify any potential issues in your child. That’s amazing and that’s how we will collectively change the conversation around mental health as a society.
As noted in the disclaimer, our perspective in this blog is really only one perspective, so we encourage you to reach out to other professionals, and do some soul-searching about this topic before you take any steps. It’s a point worth highlighting when it comes to children’s mental health especially.
Often parents or caregivers start to develop concerns about their child’s behaviour or mental health during the school-aged years. From the age of 4-years onward is when certain patterns of behaviour, temperament, thinking or feeling can become more clear and start to feel more pervasive. Before the age of 4, almost all kids will go through the push for independence, struggle to communicate their needs and desires and invariably act in ways that make these needs obvious and hard to ignore, often in the form of tantrums. But, we expect children to outgrow the need for tantrums as they develop better emotion regulation and communication skills as they age.
Each child develops these skills at their own rate based on neural capacity and environment.
If you have concerns about your child’s behaviours or mental health the first step would be to speak with their teachers, ECEs and any other school staff that they see on a daily basis. Teachers and ECEs are experts in children’s wellbeing. They are exposed to vast numbers of children who are approximately the same age so they have a lot of data about what is a non-concerning issue and what might warrant some exploration and discussion. If they do express a similiar concern, then they are likley happy to chat with you about it and support you and your child in navigating resources for your child. They often have pre-constructed lists of resources and know what steps need to be taken and when. Honestly, teachers are heroes and do so much more within our communities than teach our kids the ABCs.
Diagnoses like Attention Deficit [Hyperactivity] Disorder (AD[H]D) and Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) can inform a child’s Individual Education Plan (IEP) which outlines what needs the child has that are not being met by the typical classroom environment and outlines which accommodations the child would benefit from in order to achieve success throughout their school years.
The idea of diagnosing a child with any of the above ‘disorders’ is very polarizing. Some parents do not want the stigma of a diagnosis and worry that it will change how teachers see and interact with their child, and other parents push for the diagnosis because it opens up resources and special accommodations for their child. This is a personal choice, but if diagnosis is on the horizon, it’s best to get the ball rolling knowing that it’s a lengthy process and might involve long periods on waitlists.
What about more common concerns like anxiety, sadness, frustration/anger, lying, withdrawing etc.?
Does it make sense to find a therapist for your child when these issues come up?
Though there is room for nuance and and addressing each situation uniquely, often there is more effective change and support for the child when the parent(s) do the work of therapy or they do it in conjunction with their child in the form of family therapy.
Below we discuss the rationale behind this perspective.
Most school-aged children (especially tweens and younger) will exhibit certain behaviours only with their parents and not with teachers, coaches, friends, friends’ families, etc. and so therefore the likelihood that a therapist will experience your child’s behaviours the way that you do is quite slim. It might very well be a waste of your time and money when these behaviours are reserved for the home and when they’re with you.
Note: this often means that you are your child’s safe person. Knowing that they can count on you for unconditional love and support, even when they’re wilding out, means that you’re doing something very right. Don’t get down on yourself too much! This is oddly good news. But, it does mean that change has to occur with you at the driver’s seat.
The usefulness of children’s therapy, meaning when a therapist works directly and solely with the child, is very dependent on the child and the situation.
Typically, younger children do not know how to articulate their internal experiences in verbal ways. They often exhibit their emotions through behaviours which means they emerge situationally. Let’s say someone teases them and they feel hurt or angry, then they might cry, yell, break something, throw things, pick on a younger sibling, or withdraw. This is the external behaviour based on an internal feeling, almost a release of that energy. And often it’s only the caregiver that sees the full lead up, explosion and calming that occurs as the emotion flares up and settles again.
Parents and caregivers are given special access to their children’s emotional experiences which means they hold a lot of power in shaping the child’s understanding of their emotions and the resulting behaviours. Often, there is some necessary learning (or unlearning) that needs to happen for the adults so that they can meet their children’s behaviours with patience, understanding and compassion.
Parents are the real teachers, nurses, therapists in their children’s lives. A therapist can talk about emotions and give examples to a child in a therapy session with varying engagement and understanding. The real learning occurs in real-time when an adult can help the child identify what’s happening, offer compassion and set a boundary around which behaviours are appropriate and which ones are not. Over and over and over again.
Emotion regulation is a learned and practiced skill, providing the space to do it safely with their loving adult is what children need most, not an ‘expert’ that lectures them.
The Exceptions
Some childhood mental health concerns do warrant working with a children’s therapist like for Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) or Eating Disorders (ED) for example. There are specialized therapeutic protocols that therapists will utilize in these instances to support the child and bring them towards healing. But often, the family does need to be involved for their own learning and to help support the child outside of therapy sessions. Most adults struggle with maintaining their progress and holding themselves accountable outside of therapy sessions and kids are no different. They need their loving community to support their healing for it to be successful over time.
The other scenario that might warrant working with a children’s therapist directly is if the child does not find it safe to speak to their adults openly and freely. Therapy can then be their safe space to share their struggles with a compassionate adult.
As their adult, this might be a more challenging scenario to identify because you’re so close to it. This is an opportunity to take a moment and assess your own capacity for challenging emotions and behaviours from your child.
Do your kids hesitate to tell you the truth?
Do you react in ways that don’t feel loving or compassionate?
Do you apologize when you don’t like your reactions/response?
FYI, no one can be calm and compassionate 100% of the time. There is room for humanness here, and it’s actually the act of repairing a rupture that your connections with your child are forged and strengthened.
Frankly, the most effective therapy for children is a caring and regulated adult that can guide them through their challenges. Ideally this is their parent or primary caregiver and often the caregiver might need their own support in this process.
This is where individual or couples therapy for parenting can come in.
This is your time and space to vent and process the challenges of parenting issues or kids’ changing ages and stages. Therapy for parenting? But you’re supposed to be able to figure this out on your own! Except that’s lies and part of the pressure of impossible parenting standards in our society. We will address the issue of this concern in a separate blog post because it needs its own space and energy. Stay tuned.
Read more about Couples Therapy or reach out for a FREE Consultation to discuss your unique situation.
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