Play Therapy / Art Therapy

Play Therapy

Play Therapy is a therapeutic intervention where a qualified counselling professional uses different kinds of toys, games and activities to engage children in therapy. This type of service has proven to be much more effective when working with children than traditional ‘talk therapy’ for all the reasons you would guess if you know any children. Lots of times when children are struggling with problems too big for them to handle alone they don’t have the language and cognitive ability to express their thoughts and feelings in a verbal way, but play is what they know best! Play therapy is beneficial for children struggling with all kinds of things whether it is at home, at their school or in the community. Here are a few of the situations that play therapy is helpful with:

• Children who are going through or have gone through a change in their family dynamic like separation or divorce of their parents, or an introduction tonew step parents.
• Children who have experienced sexual, physical or emotional abuse. Regardless of how ‘ok’ your child looks they need to see aprofessional to help them sort out all their confusing feelings.

• Children who have experienced the death or loss of a loved one. This can span all situations from being brought into foster care to having an oldersibling move away to college to the death of a grandparent – or even a family pet!
• Children who have a physical illness and require hospitalization and their siblings. Often parents are so worried about their child’s’physical health they forget about their mental.
• Children who have been involved in a motor vehicle accident or who have had a loved one involved in a motor vehicle accident. Such traumatic eventscan leave lasting damage if not dealt with.
• Children who have other diagnosis such as a Learning Disability or ADD / ADHD often feel alone and like an outsider. Play therapy is a great way to reallyknow how your child is feeling and how best you can help them.
• Any child who has come from a home with violence in it, has witnessed violence or has even had a family member who has been assaulted needs tosee a professional. It is amazing how much fear and guilt children can carry with them after these situations.

In addition to the above situations please be aware of some of the following that could be signs your child may need help

• Do they seem overly angry or have aggressive behaviour?
• Does your child seem sad or fearful for no reason?
• Is your child overly anxious when you are separated?
• Is your child’s shyness causing problem?
• Is your child displaying behaviours that they had grown out of? Such as sucking their thumb or talking in ‘baby talk’?
• Does your child seem to have low self-esteem?
• Does your child have problems sleeping, eating or eliminating waste?
• Do you see a preoccupation with sexual behaviour?
• Does your child complain of physical symptoms such as headaches or stomach aches that don’t seem to have any connection to their physicalhealth?

Our Play Therapists work with children individually as well as with their families to identify the root of problems and work towards getting your healthy and happy child back. Here are some of the benefits you can expect to see by bringing your child to play therapy

• An increase in self-confidence
• A reduction in anxiety
• An increased ability to express their feelings
• An ability to develop healthy boundaries
• An ability to trust themselves and others and feel safe
• A reconnection of healthy relationships
• An increase of more appropriate behaviour