Cognitive Behavior Therapy

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I have recently started sending my son to Cognitive Behavior Therapy to help him with anxiety. He is 7 years old right now. I have spoken to a couple of "behavior" therapists and I don't like their approach so I thought I would try this.

Has anyone sent their child to a Cognitive Behavior therapist? that young? and how did it go? Any red flags?

Has anyone gone to a CB Therapist themselves? and how did that go? Anything I should look or ask for? Any red flags?

I know a lot of people on here don't like professionals, and I'm still not sure this will work with my son. I want to give it a shot, but I don't want to make a mistake or waste (a lot) of money if it's not going to help or turn him off.

Any thoughts would be much appreciated!

I'm not a parent but I should personally be starting Cognitive Behavioural Therapy soon, I must admit though 7 years old does seem a bit young to be sending people to CBT, I'm 17 myself, I would like to know what's going to happen as well, I'm rather nervous and uneasy about myself to. I've tried looking it up on the internet but it didn't make it much clearer to me as to what it actually was.

From what I understand it takes your perspectives and beliefs that cause anxiety and depression and changes them to something more positive and/or more realistic. For example, my son...the perfectionist. He has the belief that he has to be perfect, and he's a failure if he can't do something perfect the first time he tries. If he can't do something the very first time, he freaks at his "mistake" and won't try again. (I have no idea how they teach him at school). I am hoping that this therapy will help him deal with mistakes in a more positive way. Hopefully she will help him change his expectations which are way too high and unachieveable right now, not to mention very hard for him to deal with emotionally, to something he can work with, or even use to his advantage.

That's kind of an example of what I think it is. I started young because I want to start early before these beliefs get too ingrained in his personality, and because if he is comfortable with "trying", then he will get a lot more out of his other therapies, particularly speech. Right now he won't even guess what color crayon is in my hand for fear of being wrong, even though there is NO way he or anyone else could know. We've been working on guessing for a very long time.

Good Luck with your therapy. I have gone to therapy (not this particular approach however) a few times for things and have had very positive results. It changed my life actually. I hope it will do that for you and my son. I would love to know how it goes.

Hello

For starters, Cognitive behavior therapy is very very broad definition for many different treatments. Saying that your son is getting CBT is like saying he is getting surgery. Just as there is many different types of surgery (knee, hip, lung, heart, spine, etc.) there is many different types of CBT. So, to give you advice about all of CBT would be very difficult. You need to specify more specifically about what is being done.

From what you have posted, I think your son is getting a type of CBT called cognitive restructuring. You can read the details here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_restructuring

I personally am a strong proponent of this type of therapy. It is much better to rationally face your fears and sources of anxiety and come up with effective means of dealing with it, then to just hope it goes away, or medicate it. I have recommended this type of therapy multiple times before on this forum. I even have used it on myself. Whenever I am becoming stressed out, I will go some place, quiet, relax, and rationally think through my anxiety and fears, address the problem directly, and thus overcome the problem. However, having somebody to help you is usually easier then trying to do it yourself.

I can tell you that these sessions will probably not be the most enjoyable thing for your child. After all, directly confronting your fears is not an easy, nor fun thing to do. But it is unfortunately an important step to fixing the problem. I applaud you for doing this early and trying to fix these problems with a rational, and effective strategy. It is a much better approach then letting the fears grow over time and become more entrenched. It also has less side effects then medication, and has a life long benefit long after the sessions are over.

The only thing I would worry about is finding a kind, supportive person to help with this. Trying to force your child to face his problems when he isnt ready isnt a great idea. But encouraging, and supporting him through the process in a helpful manner can bring about much better result. To be honest, the therapist's personality is much more important then their experience in this matter. If I needed somebody to help me with this, I would much rather go to my father who has no training whatsoever in therapy then go to some random psychologist. If I were you, I would read up on it a bit, and maybe try it at home. Despite what the medical industry says, you dont need to pay somebody else to talk to your child for you.

My 6yo daughter is going to be doing some cognitive behaviour therapy using the Tony Attwood book on anxiety management:
http://www.amazon.com/Exploring-Feeling ... 1932565221

My daughters counsellor is going to be working through the book with her.

I think as long as the program is tailored to needs of your child and with his level of understanding in mind it is well worth a try.

On mistake that is often made with my daughter is assuming that because she is 6yo she is not ready for certain things. Annie has much more understanding of some concepts than NT children her own age.

Thank you all so much! The person I am sending him to is highly certified and very passionate about CBT, which is why I started with her. So far I like her a lot, and she has been very honest with me and kind to my son. She said from the beginning that my son may not take to her, and if he doesn't she won't be able to help him. Personalities have to go together so I appreciated that. She talks to me a lot, and I email her extensively about my son and she always encourages feedback because it helps her. I am also invited to be in there with her, but my son won't talk to her when I'm in the room because he wants me to do it for him, so I eavesdrop to get information. She also is a guide for me too. Sometimes I think I need her guidance as much as my son.

I have actually purchased Tony's book and looked through it. I think it is for a child a little farther along than my son, but I am hoping that we can use it in the near future. I have not ask his therapist about it because we just started and she is just getting to know him, but I have thought about using it with her. I think using that is a great idea.

BTW, Cognitive Restructuring sounds exactly what I want for him. He has so much potential that is being squashed by having to be perfect in every way.

Sorry but its all a load of modern bull mess come on people and start questioning this kind of scientific mass control, are we wrong to have negative thoughts they all natural. Robot or Human you choose

When I started reading about CBT I recognized it as the same basic technique I used on myself growing up. It works.

On WP I've seen two main descriptions of peoples' experiences. One is the Cognitive Restructuring, which has gotten generally good reviews. The other is desensitizing therapy, which seems to work for some things, but is basically 'poke the aspie with a stick'. Not useful.

It sounds like you're signed up for the good kind, and you can never start too early. Good Luck!

I don't have an issue with negative emotions. In fact, I know that they are useful and motivating. Anger particularly for me is VERY motivating. However, when fear of making a mistake keeps a very intelligent little boy from reaching his potential then there is an issue. Mistakes are necessary for learning, but for my son it's debilitating, it's wrong, it's bad. Also, from a social perspective, it's OK to be upset if you lose a race, but you cannot take out the winner just because they won and you didn't. The last thing I want to do is change and control my son, I love him for who he is. What I don't want is anxiety to rule him. He's way to smart and capable for that.

That's nice to hear that it worked for you! I often wonder if I started too young also. His therapist says this is the perfect time. Thank you for your input!

We got help form a CBT therapist who used cognitive restructuring to help our then-5-y-o AS son with a fear of dogs that had started generalizing. She was able to help him adjust his (pretty rigid) belief that all dogs were dangerous. After that we were able to help him learn appropriate behavior with animals.

No need to be afraid of therapy - it does work!

That's really nice to hear. Thank you!