All of our staff are trained in parenting strategies that incorporate improving relationships between parent and child as the basis for change.
These strategies are often based on increasing parental awareness, mindfulness and playfulness while also assisting children in decreasing defensive, angry and defiant behavior and turning the parent/child relationship into a more loving and nurturing partnership.
It is our collective belief and training that typical ‘behavior modification’ strategies which do not incorporate and focus on the parent/child relationship are not as effective as those which place a focus on strengthening the relationships between family members and healing relational conflicts while ‘resetting’ the parenting relationship.
Our staff are trained in the following attachment
focused parenting
strategies:
Theraplay® is a treatment modality, which helps children to regulate emotions, decrease arousal levels and improve the parent/child relationship, thus enhancing and improving compliance with behavior expectations. Theraplay® is a loving and nurturing approach to parenting and behavior issues. Theraplay has been evaluated by the California Evidence Based Clearinghouse as being an ‘evidence based’ treatment for children and adolescents.
Child Parent Relationship Training/Filial Therapy is a play based therapeutic intervention that incorporates and focuses on the relationship between the parent/child and is based on the premise that a secure relationship is imperative for healthy development, effective parenting and parental well being. The focus of CPRT is to teach parents play therapy skills which allow them to better respond to the child’s emotional and behavioral needs, strengthen the relationship and learn effective yet loving ways to set limits with children. CPRT has been granted ‘Evidence Based’ status by SAMHSA as being an effective treatment modality for children aged 3-8 with behavioral, emotional, social or attachment disorders and their caregivers.
Dyadic Developmental Psychotherapy (DDP) is an attachment based, relational therapy that focuses on the parent-child dyad and provides a framework for helping families develop more healthy patterns of communication and interaction. There is a strong emphasis placed on working with parents initially to explore their own parenting and trauma histories and to assist families in forming deeper emotional connections with each other.