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Understanding and Supporting Your Teen

Understanding and Supporting Your Teen

By Kate Motaung|2024-09-27T09:53:51+00:00August 15th, 2023|Christian Counseling For Teens, Family Counseling, Featured|

As your child grows up, he or she faces many challenges. What starts as learning rules and social norms in the early years shifts into opportunities to implement those things during the teen years. From ages 13-19, your child will navigate a variety of situations while balancing his or her responsibilities, managing relationships, and handling hormones. It may be inevitable, but it is far from simple and supporting your teen becomes all the more important. You have a role to play in this process for your teen. As you walk alongside your teen, you must focus on understanding him or her and implementing healthy, age-appropriate ways to support him or her. While this is important in practical ways like handling the pressure of school assignments or dealing with someone difficult, it is even more important when it comes to your teen’s mental health. The importance of understanding and supporting your teen. Parenting a teen is about far more than rules and school. Your teen is a complex person. Just as you want your teen to be physically well, you want your teen to have good mental health. This includes emotional, psychological, and social wellness. The teen years are especially precarious when it comes to mental health. That doesn’t mean your teen is bound to have mental health issues. Instead, it means recognizing that your teen is dealing with many social and physiological changes that impact him or her. When you are available and understanding, you can offer your teen support to help foster good mental health. Ways to support your teen's mental health. You can support your teen’s mental health during this time in a variety of ways. As you read through these ideas, consider how you can implement them and how they can benefit your teen. Start by [...]

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Does Premarital Counseling Lead to a Successful Marriage?

Does Premarital Counseling Lead to a Successful Marriage?

By Melissa Plantz|2024-09-27T09:48:53+00:00July 8th, 2023|Couples Counseling, Featured, Premarital Counseling, Relationship Issues|

More couples are seeking premarital counseling. According to Health Research Funding, couples who choose premarital counseling have a higher success rate than those who do not. You cannot guarantee that you will have a happy, joyful, loving marriage for the rest of your life as factors outside of your control are at play, but what if you could be more prepared before you say, “I do?” Premarital counseling opens doors. Premarital counseling aims to get to the foundation of the marriage relationship. You must have a firm foundation to have a rock, solid marriage. If this foundation is rooted in Jesus Christ as the cornerstone, it will make navigating the trials and obstacles in a marriage a little easier. Christian premarital counseling points you in that direction and equips you with communication skills. You learn more about each other’s backgrounds and how you would handle specific situations. It addresses problems and how to solve those while keeping your relationship strong. What to expect in premarital counseling. Most premarital counseling sessions can be divided into two to eight sessions, with an average of eight hours of counseling before the wedding. Premarital counseling should be considered before the ceremony. Sometimes the officiant will also provide premarital counseling, especially in faith-based ceremonies. The topics in premarital counseling will vary, but the most common are listed below. You should have a good grasp of what marriage means to you and your partner and the values and expectations you have of it. You should also discuss non-negotiables. For example, if infidelity and adultery are deal-breakers, say so. Make it clear that you do not want to go into a marriage or stay in one if your spouse ever chooses someone over you. The value of marriage. Marriage may mean something different to your significant [...]

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Disenfranchised Grief: What it Is and How to Cope

Disenfranchised Grief: What it Is and How to Cope

By Sandra Stein|2024-09-27T09:49:34+00:00July 6th, 2023|Featured, Grief Counseling, Individual Counseling|

Have you ever felt as though your grief was dismissed or minimized, or had people question the importance of your loss? If so, you may have experienced disenfranchised grief, a term coined by bereavement expert Kenneth Doka in 1989, to describe a loss that does not align with society’s norms and that is therefore not recognized as legitimate. Disenfranchised grief can make you feel as though you are not entitled to your grief and that no one understands. It also inhibits you from being able to openly talk about your loss or receive the support you need to help you work through your feelings and begin to heal. Examples of disenfranchised grief Unrecognized relationships. Unrecognized relationships include estranged or private relationships such as an ex-spouse or a partner you did not talk about because others would not have approved of him or her, as well as distant relationships such as a friend, co-worker, neighbor, or coach. Others feel you should not be affected by the loss and do not understand why the relationship was so important to you since you were not a spouse or a member of the immediate family. Unacknowledged losses. Unacknowledged losses are losses that are not considered significant enough to grieve over, such as the death of a pet, or a non-death loss like a divorce, loss of job, loss of mobility, loss of your home or a treasured possession, or a loved one’s dementia or incarceration. Deaths are experienced as part of a job. Deaths experienced regularly as part of a job tend to be downplayed by society. The grief of healthcare workers and other such professionals over the loss of someone who was under their care is not considered a true loss, and they are expected not to take it personally. Deaths carry [...]

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Relationship Advice for Men: Practical Tips to Implement

Relationship Advice for Men: Practical Tips to Implement

By Kate Motaung|2024-09-27T09:54:43+00:00June 7th, 2023|Couples Counseling, Featured, Marriage Counseling, Relationship Issues|

We can all use extra help from time to time in our relationships. Here are a few pieces of relationship advice for men. If you need more help, don’t hesitate to speak with a Christian counselor about your unique relationship challenges. Relationship Advice for Men Communication is key. The first bit of relationship advice for men revolves around communication. Effective communication is an important aspect of any relationship. Here are a few tips for improving communication as a man. Practice active listening. This means fully focusing on what your partner is saying and trying to understand their perspective. Avoid interrupting or getting defensive. Instead, try to ask clarifying questions. Be honest and open with your thoughts and feelings. Don’t bottle up your emotions or hide things from your partner. Instead, try to be upfront about what you’re thinking and feeling. Use “I” statements. Instead of blaming or accusing your partner, try to express how their actions have affected you. For example, “I feel hurt when you don’t listen to me” is more effective than “You never listen to me.” Watch your nonverbal communication. Your body language and tone of voice can convey a lot of information. Make sure that they align with what you’re trying to say. Take breaks when needed. If you’re feeling overwhelmed or things are getting heated, it can be helpful to step away and give yourself some time to cool off before continuing the conversation. Remember, effective communication is a two-way street. It’s important not only to express your own thoughts and feelings but also to listen to and understand your partner’s perspective. Show your appreciation for your girlfriend or wife. A second piece of relationship advice for men is to show appreciation. There are many ways that a man can show appreciation for his [...]

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Establishing Healthy Boundaries in Friendships

Establishing Healthy Boundaries in Friendships

By Kate Motaung|2024-09-27T09:55:12+00:00May 5th, 2023|Featured, Individual Counseling, Relationship Issues|

The people you call friends are those you’ve built rapport with; you get each other, and you’ve gone through enough things together to build trust. Implied in all this is that a solid friendship takes time to build, and it’s not always a smooth road getting there. Friends, like other people, have fights, and hopefully, they resolve those conflicts well. One positive outcome of well-resolved conflict is that you know one another as well as how to love each other better. Boundaries are another way for friends to love one another, and they are just as important in friendships as in other relationships. Defining boundaries. A boundary is a psychological and emotional demarcation of where one person ends, and another begins. God created us uniquely in His image, and we are born with our personalities, strengths, areas for growth, proclivities, and sensitivities. Though we may share many similarities, we are individuals. This is all the more important between friends because you can have so much in common that you can seem like you’re the same person. Even though you may have many points of common interest, you and your friends are still individuals. Healthy boundaries define and protect that individuality so that you can express yourself and exist without being consumed by someone else. If there’s a friend with a dominant personality, a combination of that dominance and peer pressure can wind up molding the group of friends into an extension of the dominant personality. Healthy boundaries prevent that from happening. Why good boundaries make better friendships. It may be tempting to think of boundaries as a barrier of sorts, the kind that hinders vulnerability and deep fellowship. On the contrary, healthy boundaries can facilitate more meaningful interactions between friends. It allows the friends to be themselves and make [...]

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The Inside Job: Healing Trauma and Family Relationships

The Inside Job: Healing Trauma and Family Relationships

By Kate Motaung|2024-09-27T09:54:11+00:00April 28th, 2023|Family Counseling, Featured, Individual Counseling, Relationship Issues, Trauma|

Scripture’s earliest images reveal the spectrum of challenges that all of humanity encounters. In family relationships, God set the blueprint at creation in a perfect environment. God created a world for His people to live in harmonious fellowship with Him and one another free from trauma. Despite this, a real enemy threatened what God had envisioned. He sought to destroy the Father’s Image by persuading Adam and Eve to not only doubt God, but themselves, and one another. Although Adam and Eve were made from the same material and fashioned by the same God, sin split their bond. Disobedience distorted their perceptions to view the Father as withholding goodness. Instead of acknowledging the role of the serpent and their own culpability, they blamed one another. Their experience reveals how sin fragments us and weakens our connections. We tend to believe the lies whispered by our enemy instead of embracing the Truth that we were created to live. Tormented by trauma The Genesis story is rather familiar because it seems that we have heard it many times. However, as many times as we have read about it, we don’t realize that we are often living the same script. Like the first humans, we mirror Adam and Eve who cowered in the shadows. While they assembled fig leaves to shield themselves from their awareness of vulnerability and exposure, we tend to cover ourselves with possessions, seeking people, or pursuing activities to keep our minds busy. In doing so, we break fellowship with the Father and injure one another because we worry about what we might discover about ourselves in the stillness. Rebellion created a chasm of emotional distance and dysfunction. Sin changed the way that humanity would experience relationships going forward. We still experience its effects today. Our fallen world, full [...]

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Pause, Pray, Plan: Mapping Strategies to Manage Stress

Pause, Pray, Plan: Mapping Strategies to Manage Stress

By Kate Motaung|2024-09-27T09:54:49+00:00February 8th, 2023|Featured, Individual Counseling, Personal Development|

Stress has often been labeled as a silent killer. Its effects don’t only undermine physical health, but also impact our emotional and mental wellness. When we place too much expectation or activity on ourselves, the results of an overload will show. Instead of savoring the gifts that life has to offer, we find ourselves in survival mode, trying to subsist on the fumes of leftover energy from one day to the next. We may not realize it, but the struggle associated with stress keeps us one stressful moment away from a crisis. External pressure that is not balanced by internal resilience will cause us to implode. The lopsidedness of life without margin squeezes our capacity to dream and hope, despite the presence of stressors. Stress builds its own frenzied momentum, frustrating instead of fueling us toward God-given dreams and purpose. Invariably, our lives and bodies, when crushed under the weight of stress, will tell a story of a purpose thwarted, not thriving. God created us for nothing less and nothing different than abundance. As sons and daughters in God’s kingdom, we are formed for lives that overflow with peace and joy. We need to be aware that our enemy seeks to steal, kill, and destroy. Strategies to Manage Stress Stress is one of the tools that he uses, flooding our thoughts and schedules with activities that fluster rather than fulfill (John 10:10). However, we can buffer our souls, building them up with spiritual truth and practical strategies that will manage our stress and make room for the God dreams we were intended to live. Time. So then, be careful how you walk, not as unwise people but as wise, making the most of your time, because the days are evil. Therefore do not be foolish, but understand what the [...]

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What to Do When You Feel Depressed

What to Do When You Feel Depressed

By Kate Motaung|2024-09-27T09:53:57+00:00January 19th, 2023|Depression, Featured, Individual Counseling|

Everybody has bad days where they are worn out, agitated, and depressed. Although it’s common to experience grief in response to unpleasant life events, loss, or changes, these feelings can occasionally persist for a while if unresolved and make it challenging for you to get through each day. You can’t just will yourself to “snap out of it” when you’re depressed. What distinguishes sadness from being depressed? Many stressful and traumatic occurrences might bring you down, whether you’ve lost a loved one, moved to a new location, or missed a career change. The difference between sorrow and depression is that the former normally passes quickly, but the latter is a mood disorder that can occur suddenly and linger for two weeks or longer. Your life is affected by depression in practically every way; it interferes with your thoughts, feelings, and routine tasks like sleeping, working, and socializing. Typical signs of depression include: feelings of emptiness difficulty concentrating, low energy, trouble sleeping, or excessive sleep, alterations in weight or appetite a sense of helplessness a decline in interest in hobbies or activities easy irritation or restlessness aches and pains that don’t have a clear physical origin suicidal or death-related ideas These signs and symptoms must be present for at least two weeks, approximately twenty-four hours a day, to be considered depressive. Why is overcoming depression so challenging? Depression saps your motivation, hope, and vitality, making it challenging to perform the actions that will improve your mood. Sometimes it might be difficult or stressful to even think about doing the things you should do to feel better, like exercising or hanging out with friends. The dilemma of depression recovery is as follows: The most difficult things to undertake are also the things that help the most. However, there is a significant [...]

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How to Find Hope and Develop a Lifestyle of Gratitude in Uncertain Times

How to Find Hope and Develop a Lifestyle of Gratitude in Uncertain Times

By Kate Motaung|2024-09-27T09:55:02+00:00January 7th, 2023|Featured, Individual Counseling, Personal Development, Spiritual Development|

Are you struggling to know how to find hope in a difficult situation? Consider these scenarios: Nancy is a twenty-something who grew up in a home where her parents always struggled. Their power and gas were cut off frequently, sometimes dinners consisted of stale bread and a dollop of off-brand peanut butter, and she was often made fun of for her raggedy clothes and stained shoes. Tom is a career firefighter who commits his life and safety to the well-being of others. He comforts rape victims, runs into burning buildings, responds to life-changing incidents, and sees people take their last breath as a “normal” day at the office. Tanya is a social worker who does home visits for children in foster care and is part of the process of removing children from harmful and heartbreaking home situations. She has seen children dropped off and discarded like they are garbage (even from wealthy homes), which has resulted in her constantly looking over her shoulder and wondering if people are who they say they are. Dan is a war veteran who served overseas on many tours. He saved many, many lives and served with every inch of his heart. While he was serving his country, his wife asked for a divorce via text, and when he returned, their home was empty, and she avoided contact with him. He was left feeling hopeless and alone and wondering what he could have done to prevent it. Perhaps you have dealt with a heartbreaking situation like one of the above scenarios and are currently wondering how to find hope amidst turmoil. Perhaps you are trying to count your blessings but are having trouble pointing them out. When people struggle, they often wonder where God is. When people struggle, people often doubt (or want to [...]

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Created, Chosen, and Called: Self Esteem and Your Path to Purpose

Created, Chosen, and Called: Self Esteem and Your Path to Purpose

By Kate Motaung|2024-09-27T09:53:36+00:00December 23rd, 2022|Featured, Individual Counseling, Personal Development, Spiritual Development|

Ecclesiastes informs us that God has set eternity in the heart of humanity (Ecclesiastes 3:11). For all of our quests for understanding, significance, and self-esteem beyond the routines of daily life, we will never unravel it apart from the Everlasting Father. Yet, God reserves some eternal mysteries for Himself such that what we seek can only be found in our Creator. There is a certain fulfillment that He reveals as we delve deeper into the unique purpose He’s assigned to us. He is the Beginning and End, who created, chose, and called us for Himself. (Revelation 1:8) It may present no alarm to us that the same enemy who sought to sabotage Adam and Eve opposes us. He persuaded them that they lacked what they had already possessed, causing them to view themselves as less than what God had already settled. They didn’t need to consume fruit from a forbidden tree to be like God as the serpent suggested (Genesis 3:5). They already were, as God had created them in His Image and likeness (Genesis 1:26). Sin’s effects have continued to filter through humanity, infecting us with the same distorted view. We contend against demonic forces that pit themselves against our God-given identity (Ephesians 6:11). They have influenced our fallen world, releasing the enemy’s schemes to intercept our ability to see ourselves as God does. Although the war waged against our minds and emotions is not a flesh-and-blood fight, it is still very real. God has equipped us with all that’s needed to stand against the devil’s wiles and experience the settled victory in Christ (Ephesians 6:12). By choosing to agree with and activate what His Word says about our true identity, we can esteem our path into purpose and partner with God to be and do greater than [...]

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