When your child is in therapy, you can sometimes feel unsure of how best to support them. Therapy can help your child to get in touch with emotions that were tucked away, and that rational part of their brain where they can talk to you about what's going on for them might not be accessible.

 

It means that you might need to be able to read some of the very messy stuff that's happening and coming up for your child. They probably will not come out of their therapy session and say, “hey, that was a really tough session”, or “I'm upset”, or “I feel really angry after that session”, or “you know that was really draining emotionally and I'm just really quite tired” because they may not have the words to express that right now. 

 

So instead, what sometimes happens as children go through therapy is that their behaviour changes. They might need a cuddle, they might need some comfort, they might want some quiet time, they might show anger or frustration in another way like being rude or shouting, or the behaviours that probably drove you to want them to go to therapy in the first place might actually be more intense in that first period!