Individual and Family Therapy for Caregivers in Seattle
Therapy for parents, partners, adult children, siblings, friends, or caregivers who are supporting a loved one in crisis or with a chronic mental illness. Learn what to do if someone is having a mental breakdown, how to best communicate, and focus on steps towards healing.
Challenges helping your loved one with mental illness
Do you or your family have a loved one who has a chronic mental illness or is experiencing a crisis, such as a suicide attempt or harm to themselves, a manic episode, or dealing with hallucinations or delusions?
Have you considered yourself a family caregiver, struggling to prioritize yourself without feeling guilty, or have you lost a sense of your own identity?
Are they frequently hospitalized and have trouble following through with taking medications, going to appointments, maintaining their mental health, or agreeing to keeping themselves safe?
Have you or your family felt emotionally drained and burned out trying to support or communicate with them, set healthy boundaries, and navigate a complex and fragmented hospital and behavioral health system?
Or is that loved one in your life dealing with a new diagnosis or mental breakdown for the first time, and everything feels confusing and overwhelming?
Feeling supported and understood as a caretaker
It’s a heavy load to carry, and I want to acknowledge your efforts, care, and resilience in doing your best to be there for your loved one going through a crisis. You may feel you want to give up at times, but you are still pushing through. Wherever you are on this journey, it’s crucial to have a safe space for you to feel supported as well. I help individuals and families as we work together towards a sense of peace, healing, and happiness. We can get to a place where you can hold healthy boundaries with your loved one and have tools for better coping now and in the future.
Increasing effectiveness of caring and communicating with your family member with mental illness
With over eight years of experience in inpatient psychiatric and behavioral health settings prior to private practice, I regularly coordinated with family, friends, and loved ones of patients on my caseload to support them through a very confusing, frustrating, and difficult time. I gained a wealth of knowledge about mental health and substance treatment options in the community, what is accessible based on financial means, and how to get creative with navigating barriers to care. The system has many gaps and it’s challenging to know all your options. While we can’t change the system itself, I can help you either through individual therapy or in family therapy.
In therapy together, you can expect support with problem-solving around these systems, learning how to set healthy boundaries with your loved one and with yourself about what you have capacity to support them with, learning strategies to effectively communicate with them, building skills to better advocate, exploring recommendations for the best options for treatment, and ultimately, helping you take care of yourself during these distressing times. I also incorporate elements of the LEAP (listen, empathize, partner, and agree) approach into my work with family caregivers.
Ready to get started? Reach out for a free phone consultation here!
FAQs
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This can be very nuanced, not knowing the severity of your loved one’s mental health concerns.
If they aren’t in immediate crisis and are open to accepting and hearing feedback, it’s important to find the balance of identifying what their their needs are with how much capacity you have to help them. It can be useful to think about how their symptoms or stressors could be reduced or managed and what they want to do about it. Your loved one may be more likely to make changes if you can express your empathy and understanding and explore what they think would help them feel better.
If they are in immediate crisis, such as having suicidal thoughts or harm to self, homicidal thoughts, experiencing delusions or hearing voices, or dealing with a manic or depressive episode, this may be the case where you need to utilize a crisis line or go to the ER for a higher level of care, especially if they cannot keep themselves safe at home. Please see my resources page for crisis information.
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Carrying the weight of caring for a family member with mental illness is extremely challenging. You’re likely burned out and exhausted, with little time for yourself or your own needs.
It’s important to keep checking in with yourself and know what you have the bandwidth for. I find that some individuals and families want to exhaust their options and try setting more boundaries and use new communication strategies before they walk away, while others may have a different threshold entirely.
There is no right or wrong answer, and if you need to do this, it’s very likely this is the best choice for you and your own mental health. It’s not an easy decision to make, but it’s also okay that you may have thought about this. It doesn’t make you a bad person or any less caring or supportive.
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You’ve probably heard the saying, “You can’t take care of anyone else unless you first take care of yourself?” While it’s easier said than done, I’d start by asking yourself to reflect how you are taking care of yourself or what it would look like to start.
Do you need to get more sleep, catch up with friends, or even make it to that yoga class you haven’t been to in months? Just as much as you are helping your family member, it’s crucial to make sure you are checking in with your own stressors and the impact their mental illness is having on you.
Seeking a therapist that understands what your loved one is going through and how to support you as a caregiver can be a game-changer. Please don’t hesitate to reach out for a free consult call, and I’d love to hear from you!