Behavioral Health Counseling: A Positive Path Forward

Article written by Elishae Johnson, PhD, LPC, CAADC, Psychotherapist, Bronson Director of Health Services and Center for Learning.

Mental and emotional well-being are important factors in your overall health. When life feels difficult, you don’t have to struggle alone. Speaking with a behavioral health counselor offers the opportunity to get help from an unbiased person who is specially trained to help you work through problems.

Counseling can be beneficial for people of all ages:

• Adults and seniors can benefit from speaking with a counselor to help them process difficult emotions, learn to cope better, set goals for the future and explore the impact of past experiences. Counseling can help adults and seniors foster better relationships and have a more fulfilling life.
• For adolescents, talking with a counselor can help them navigate the transition from childhood to adulthood. It can help them work through issues at home, at school or in their social life.
• Young children sometimes need help learning how to express and process their feelings. If a child is having trouble in school or at home, counseling can help them gain skills to make life easier.

What to Expect

The first time you meet with your counselor will be filled with lots of questions. This helps your counselor get to know you and understand your current situation. Counselors are trained to listen and help you process your feelings and thoughts. A counselor can help with:

• Anxiety and chronic stress
• Depression, including post-traumatic stress disorder
• Eating disorders
• Family and relationship struggles
• Life changes
• Substance abuse and smoking cessation
• Work-related challenges
• And more

Common Types of Therapy

One-on-One Counseling

During this type of counseling, you meet with your counselor in private. You are in control of the conversation and what you want to work on. Your counselor is there to listen, provide emotional support and help you learn coping skills.

Couples and Family Counseling

Problems within a relationship or family can cause stress, anxiety and fear. Talking with a counselor is a great way to learn, grow and heal. As a small group, you and your loved one(s) will share your stories, feelings and concerns. Your counselor is there to listen and help you find new ways to work together.

There are many forms of therapy that counselors use to help patients. The most common are cognitive-behavioral counseling (CBT) and dialectical behavior counseling (DBT).

CBT helps people learn how to change their thoughts and behaviors in order to cope with stress and anxiety. It focuses on teaching new skills to manage emotions and thoughts. In a CBT session, you and your counselor work together to identify and challenge negative thought patterns.

For example, a client comes to my office feeling anxious about an upcoming job interview. They are sure they are going to mess it up and not get the job. As their counselor, I help them identify these anxious thoughts and what may be causing them. I then challenge the patient by helping them find reasons that dispute their anxieties such as thinking of times they’ve had interviews in the past that lead to a job. Replacing negative thoughts with ones that are more true and balanced help to gain a more rational perspective. They are now feeling less anxious for their job interview and have the tools to cope with anxiety next time it arises.

DBT helps people learn how to control emotions and reduce distress. It combines CBT with mindfulness and acceptance-based strategies. In a DBT session, I may introduce a patient to a relaxation technique like mindfulness. I will teach my patient new exercises like grounding or box breathing. The goal is to help the patient learn the techniques to help ease negative thoughts whenever they arise.