Therapy for Young Adults

Therapy for young adults page created 11-10-21 by Brittney Romagna, MA, LPCA & Lucrezia Mangione, LPC, LCPC, NCC, BC-TMH, DCEP

Are you at a period in your life where you’re learning who you are?

Does it feel like you’re going through a lot of changes and struggling with this new version of yourself?

It's a big time of change. The transition into being an adult can be hard, stressful, overwhelming, and sometimes tiring. These changes that happen when you become an adult can leave you feeling open, vulnerable and alone. It’s not only a time of change, it might also be a time of letting go.

Young adults like you may face a number of challenges. The emotions can feel like roller coaster. From feeling good about yourself to feeling lost, to school or work pressures, to feeling alone, to feeling better and having a good day to having problems and struggles with your relationships.

Are you experiencing any of these things? If you are, holistic therapy for young adults may be good way to move through the rough waters. Holistic therapy can be a healing place where you figure out what's going on. It's a space to find answers for yourself and explore what's possible. It's a safe place to go to feel supported in your decision-making and problem-solving.  Working with a counselor is like having someone walk beside you step-by-step on your journey towards feeling better.

Specific topics about therapy for young adults:

Body Image: When I look in the mirror, I don’t like what I see
School-College Stress: I Feel Like My Grades Are More Important Than My Mental Health
Loneliness: I Feel so Alone
Brain Stress: I Have so Much to Do and Am Overwhelmed

Therapy for young adults: Body Image

When I look in the mirror, I don’t like what I see.

Have you ever skipped going out because you feel as though your body will be on display?  Do you think about all the ways your appearance isn’t like everyone else’s?
It’s all so draining. It can take up so much of your mental and emotional bandwidth that you feel exhausted.

You may begin to think “Why can’t I just be happy with how I look? or Will I ever like what I see in the mirror?"

Things Can Change

Feeling confident, being connected, experiencing love and kindness is hard when your body has become something you don't like.  It is possible to feel better about you and your body.

The picture of what an ideal body is starts in our culture. The media can overwhelm us with images of what they think is the best. Family or friends, too have their own ideas.  Together, this can make you feel that your body is not good enough. It's a lot of pressure.

What can help? It starts by thinking for yourself and questioning when someone is telling you that your body is not good enough. Give yourself the space to consider why you are feeling you “should” look a certain way. Shifting your focus to what you need for your own happiness and health is a starting point for healing.

In holistic therapy for young adults, you can figure out, explore and talk about your feelings, all of them. With a therapist that works with young people, you get to process your pain around not being able to feel as though your body is worthy. In therapy, you can begin to grow respect for yourself and your struggles. Over time, you can begin to grow more feelings of self-worth.

Working together with a therapist, helps you figure out your who you are. It might even help you shift your focus from “what’s missing” to being surprised by what you already have.

It’s possible to feel confident in your body and in yourself. When choosing to start holistic therapy that service young adults, you allow yourself to take a therapeutic journey. This journey can improve your relationship with yourself and create a deeper, more positive connection between your mind and your own, unique body on your own terms, not someone else’s.

Benefits

The potential to feel better exists.  You can work towards better feelings to feel:

• Good feelings about your body and your being
• Confident in who you are
• Connected with yourself, your family and friends
• Worthy of happiness and contentment in who you are.

Therapy for young adults: School/College Stress

I Feel Like My Grades Are More Important Than My Mental Health

The pressure to be a good student can be at battle and create mental distress. It can also impact how you see yourself and your self-worth.  Right now, with many classrooms either online or in a hybrid format, it can feel like class is always in session. You might feel isolated and unsure of where to look for support. It is an extremely difficult time to be a student.

Did you know that stress about doing well in school can actually make the opposite happen? It does.  Feeling stressed out and overwhelmed is real. 

The constant worrying about your work can take up a lot of emotional and mental energy.
Do you ever find yourself staring at an assignment and not able to start because you are too tired or even exhausted? Sometimes, you can get to the point where “good grades” don’t bring joy but “bad grades” make you feel quickly ashamed, stressed, and hopeless. To keep up with the demands of school, you might find yourself letting go of the things that actually make you feel better. All of this could make you feel stressed and alone.

The pressures to perform in school can come from a lot of different places. Sometimes we feel as though our parents will be disappointed if we don’t do well. Other times, we put this pressure on ourselves to meet our own high expectations. The weight of needing to do well can be so heavy that it affects your relationship with family and friends. And here’s the surprise, over time, feeling stressed and overwhelmed can feel like the “new normal.”
You might be thinking, “Do I always have to feel like this in order to find success?”

In holistic therapy for young adults, your worries, your low energies, your sadness, and the stress can be addressed.

You Deserve Compassion

You are worthy of compassion. No matter what the grade you earn, you deserve kindness. It is shown that school stress can lead to struggles with mental health, like anxiety and depression.

Seeking holistic therapy, you can focus on your mental health and set yourself up for greater success in the classroom. With holistic therapy for young adults, we will explore what you need help with and how to help you help yourself. Some of things could be seeing where the pressure is coming from and how it hurts you. Or talking about the pain and suffering that comes with the struggle to keep up with schoolwork. We can work together to help you find ways to cope with the stress. And ways to better healthy habits that work for you. We might also work on time management, setting goals and other study skills. Together you and your therapist can help you set yourself up for success. 

It’s possible to feel confident in your ability as a student. It's possible to maintain your mental health. Allowing yourself to be seen and heard in therapy geared for you, a young adult can bring about better feelings.  Holistic therapy can help you to feel more at peace with who you are as a person and as a student.

Not keeping up with your academic expectations?  Using the safe, healing space of holistic therapy for young adults, you may begin to reduce some stress, and increase feelings worthy of more happiness, even if there is a test coming up.

Therapy for young adults: Loneliness

I Feel so Alone

• Feel as though you have nobody to call if you’re upset?
• Wonder what you will do to fill your weekend time since there doesn’t seem to be anyone who wants to hang out?

You're not alone in your struggle with finding connections.  Especially with many schools/colleges shifting to online spaces, young people are feeling isolated and disconnected. It can be exhausting to find new ways to put yourself out there. Sometimes it’s even terrifying.

You begin to resent yourself and wonder why nobody wants to spend time with you. There has to be something wrong, right?  Holistic therapy for young adults can help you find connections.

You Are Worthy of Connection

You are enough. Who you are as a person is unique, interesting, and beautiful. Finding the people who you connect with is possible. In working with a therapist who is skilled with working with young adults, you and your therapist can come up with ideas to make this happen. Giving yourself the space to discuss the things that make you who you are can be the starting point for healing. Understanding what you bring to the table is important and can help you feel worthy of a seat.

When you come to holistic therapy for young adults, you talk about what's bothering you.  Focusing on your struggles to connect with others, we may even take a look at your way of connecting with yourself. Together with your therapist, you can take steps to less loneliness, grow confidence and create connections with others.

Allowing yourself to be seen and heard in holistic therapy, especially therapy for young adults, can improve your relationship with yourself and help you create deeper, more positive connections with others. Here are some of the benefits. You can develop and grow more

• Good feelings about who you are and increase your pride in yourself
  
• Confidence
• Connections with others
  
• Experiences of belonging
  

Therapy for young adults: Brain stress

I Have so Much to Do and Am Overwhelmed

Struggling with the ability to focus can be stressful, upsetting and exhausting. Going through your days unable to meet your goals can make you feel like a failure. It might lead to feeling as though you will never be able to keep up. Do you:

• Feel like you have a million things to do each day and you only finish a few?
• Is it difficult to focus on your work?
• Do you find yourself getting distracted easily?
• Switch from task to task and having a hard time staying focused on one thing?
• Get stuck on negative thought loops of “I’ll never get this done,” or “I’m just not capable of this.”
• Find yourself worrying and thinking about the worst case scenarios?
  

You might be thinking, “Why does it seem like I’m the only one who struggles to get things done?”

You Are Not Alone

Struggling to keep up with all the tasks in a day is not your fault. As we grow up, we are given more and more responsibilities and daily things to do, and somtimes we're not taught how to best manage it all.

It can feel like you are working to keep your head above water. And you’re not sure what to do to make things better. In holistic therapy for young adults, we can look at your workload. Maybe figure out better tools or habits that might help you feel more in control of your day.

Sometimes these struggles might even make you feel badly about yourself. In therapy for young adults, you give yourself the space to talk about being overwhelmed can help. Once you start using the new tools you learn or discover in holistic therapy, you will likely start to experiencing some wins. We can celebrate these together!

In working with a therapist and using holistic therapy for young adults, you can explore better skills to manage your time and get things done while reducing your stress and feeling better. It’s possible to wake up feeling energized and ready to tackle the day.

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Therapy for young adults with Brittney Romagna.  Brittney Romagna is a Licensed Professional Counselor Associate at Mind Body Well Therapy, Pllc. She is a licensed professional counselor associate in the State of Connecticut and is actively pursuing a PhD in counseling psychology at Fordham University. View her profile.

Lucrezia Mangione is the Clinical Director of Mind Body Well Therapy, Pllc. She is a board certified licensed professional counselor, board certified telemental health provider, neurofeedback trainer, counselor supervisor, educator, and nurse wellness education consultant. View her profile.