At Long Island EMDR, we are committed to assisting frustrated parents in restoring their confidence in parenting and cultivating a better understanding of both their children and themselves.
Our clients, who are like you, confront a wide range of difficulties despite being loving, compassionate, and hardworking individuals. They describe daily episodes of tantrums and challenging power struggles when they first seek our help. Even though they cherish their children, certain times of the day such as mealtimes, bedtime, or coming home from work become sources of dread for them. While peaceful and joyful moments do exist, our clients struggle to fully experience them because they fear that chaos could erupt at any moment. They often feel like they are coming up short, and they constantly feel depleted and disconnected from their children, sometimes even finding them challenging to be around.
Our clients feel like they are stuck in a cycle that seems too far gone to reverse. They fear that they will end up parenting their children in the same manner that they were raised themselves. They experienced a less-than-pleasant childhood, and they do not want to perpetuate those same patterns.
All this chaos, conflict, and confusion have taken over the lives of these parents, making it challenging for them to enjoy life to the fullest. They operate in survival mode, just moving through the tasks of the day, and putting out the fires as they come. They don't feel present and they feel like they are failing as parents. Their confidence in their ability to be the parent they envisioned is plummeting.
When they initially approached us, many of our parent clients believed that they were beyond help. As mothers and fathers, they were concerned that things could not change, and resigned to riding the wave until their children grew out of their current behavior. Individual counseling, however, offers frustrated parents a way out of this uncomfortable cycle.
You, like our clients, are entitled to savoring joyful moments with your children and breaking free from the patterns that sustain this unhealthy cycle. If you are reading this and looking for support to get out of this cycle, then you are already a good parent. You deserve to reconnect with the happiness of parenting, and we are here to assist you in doing so.
We will start by identifying the issues you see coming up for you in parenting. Together we will work on identifying what behavioral issues you are seeing in your child and what areas you want to improve on as a parent. We will also discus you own childhood history to create an understanding of how you were parented, and how that is influencing you now.
Next, we will decide on what issues you want to prioritize and focus on first. Then we will identify strategies you can implement immediately. In your sessions you will gain an understanding of your thought patterns, how your emotions are impacting your behavior and that of your child, build coping skills and resiliency to get you through the rough patches and identify what you are already doing right.
Depending on the client, some individuals decide to delve more deeply into the impact of their upbringing on their current parenting style and challenges. Others, chose to focus more on the here and now.
We will work with you to get you to enjoy being a parent again. You will have a safe space to work through often uncomfortable and conflicting emotions. We will help you allow yourself to enjoy “me time”- without the guilt – and truly embrace that taking care of you is part of taking care of them. When you are ready, we will end but you will always be welcome back for refresher sessions if need be.