Mental Health – Children's Assessment Center

“I am not what happened to me, I am what I choose to become.” ~Carl Jung

Mental health services are provided to children and families to help restore each child’s sense of self, comfort, and safety. The CAC offers a variety of services including psychological evaluations, psychiatric care, and individual, group and family therapy to children, siblings, and caregivers.

Using a holistic, individualized approach helps restore the child’s sense of self, comfort, and safety. We utilize evidence-based, trauma-informed therapies, such as Trauma-Focused Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (TF-CBT) and Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR) to support clients in their healing journey. We also integrate expressive therapies including play, movement, art, and music therapies to allow children to express their feelings in creative ways. Therapy teaches children that they are not alone, helps them understand that the abuse is the responsibility of the offender, and ultimately provides a healthy, guilt-free way to avoid long-term trauma.

When a child endures a traumatic experience, the whole family feels its effects. We know that caring, supportive adults in a child’s life can lessen the impact. The CAC aims to restore hope in families and empower children by helping them feel seen and heard, learn how to cope with scary thoughts and intense feelings, build resilience, and be around adults who understand the effects of trauma on a young person’s life.

The Benefits of Therapy For Survivors of Sexual Abuse

Find a safe, confidential space and be heard without judgement
- Many time clients are told to “move on and forget it happened” by family and friends after they have disclosed sexual abuse. In therapy, clients have the opportunity to share their experiences with licensed professionals who listen without judgement and help clients share their story at just the right pace.
Making sense of trauma
- Surviving one incident of sexual trauma or ongoing sexual abuse leaves clients feeling confused and helpless by thoughts and feelings. Some may re-experience their trauma through flashbacks or nightmares. Other times, certain sounds, sights, smells, or locations may trigger overwhelming emotions and body sensations. In therapy, clients can unpack these reactions through evidence-based techniques and strategies. Over time, there is a reduction in the intensity of these responses and clients feel more in control of their thoughts and emotions.
Learning and Applying Tools to Cope
- Clients learn different strategies that make their emotions and body responses more tolerable and work with clients to practice and use these techniques. Gradually, these strategies become more ingrained ways that clients can regain control of their reactions.
Recognizing Healthy Relationships
- Mistrust and fear of revictimization is common in survivors of child sexual abuse. By developing a trusting relationship with their mental health provider, clients work through their anxiety in being vulnerable in close relationships and learn that healthy relationships make one feel safe, respected and valued.
Replacing Shame and Self-Blame with Self-Compassion
- Many survivors feel burdened by their feelings of shame and guilt and blame themselves for what happened. In therapy, survivors process these thoughts and feelings and are reminded that the abuse was not their fault.
Rediscovering Hope and Joy for the Future
- Along with addressing past experiences and trauma, clinicians help clients find hope for a brighter future in new dreams, exciting goals and fun hobbies.

Trauma Focused – Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (TF-CBT)

TF-CBT is a type of therapy that helps children and caregivers process trauma by using strategies that reshape thoughts and behaviors, including gradual exposure to trauma memories and triggers and introduction to coping skills.

Trauma-Focused Strategies that are effective
- Psychoeducation : Children and their caregivers learn about trauma, its effects, and the treatment process.
- Safety and Stabilization: Creating a safe and stable environment or the child in the context of therapy and teaching coping skills.
- Gradual Exposure: At a pace that is comfortable and specifically designed to match the needs of the client, the child is exposed to reminders of trauma in the form of thoughts, feelings, situations in a safe and controlled manner.
- Cognitive Processing: Children identify and challenge unhelpful or unhealthy thoughts and beliefs about the trauma, the self, the world, and their future.
- Skills Development: Children learn strategies to manage their emotions, reduce anxiety, improve communication, and cope with trauma-related stressors.
- Family involvement: Caregivers are viewed as partners in the treatment process and are provided with guidance on how to support their child effectively and better understand their trauma responses.

Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR)

EMDR is a way for children and adolescents to process trauma and make sense of what happened to them. While paying attention to back and forth movement or sound/touch, you recall an upsetting situation or memory until shifts occur in the way that you experience that memory and more information from the past is processed. In contrast to other therapies, EMDR doesn’t require talking in detail about traumatic events.

How does it work? Brains store typical and traumatic memories differently. Whereas typical memories are stored smoothly, more upsetting or disturbing events may cause disruptions in how brain networks process and hold on to information. The brain may go offline and a disconnect forms between how we experience (feel, see, hear) and what the brain stores in memory through language. If left unresolved, the brain may continue to sense danger when there is none and new experiences may link to earlier trauma experiences, causing one to experience a negative response over and over again.

In EMDR, clients reprocess and repair these impaired connections in the brain. Clients access memories of a traumatic event through a combination of eye movements or other sensory activations (sound, touch) and guided instructions to help access those memories and reprocess the event in a different way.

What does EMDR therapy involve?

Client history and information gathering: upsetting or disturbing events and memories that are a focus of therapy and become goals
Preparation and education about EMDR sessions, what to expect, things that help clients feel more stable and safe, and tools to help manage emotions.
Assessment: Identify themes and specific memories to focus on during reprocessing.
Desensitization and Reprocessing: One or more negative images, thoughts, sensations or feelings are identified as the focal point while engaging in back and forth movement. During reprocessing, the clinician asks clients to notice how they feel and identify any new thoughts or feelings the client may be experiencing.
Installation: Clients focus on the positive belief they want to build into their memory as they process their experience.
Body scan: Clients assess how they feel in their body as they access their distressing experience or memory. This phase helps clients identify their overall progress and clients see their symptoms decrease over time.
Closure and stabilization is embedded into each therapy session. Clinicians help the client feel calmer and safer after processing and teach clients how to stabilize and manage their thoughts or feelings between sessions.

Play Therapy

Children learn to understand the world and their place in it through play. It’s where they’re free to act out their inner feelings and deepest emotions. Toys can act as symbols and take on greater meaning — if you know what to look for. Since the child can’t adequately express themselves in the adult world, the therapist joins the child in their world, on their level.

As they play, the child may become less guarded and more apt to share their feelings. But they aren’t pressured. They’re allowed to do so in their own time and with their own method of communication.

Play therapy will differ depending on the therapist and the particular needs of the child. To begin, the therapist may want to observe the child at play. They may also want to conduct separate interviews with the child or the parents.

After a thorough assessment, the therapist will set some therapeutic goals, decide on what limits may be necessary, and formulate a plan for how to proceed. Much can be revealed in how a child interacts with different types of toys and how their behavior changes from session to session. They may use play to act out fears and anxieties, as a soothing mechanism, or to heal and problem-solve.

Play therapists use these observations as a guide to the next steps. Each child is different, so therapy will be tailored to their individual needs. As therapy progresses, behaviors and goals can be reassessed. At some point, the therapist may bring parents, siblings, or other family members into play therapy. It can help teach conflict resolution, promote healing, and improve family dynamics.

Play therapy can be directive or nondirective. In the directive approach, the therapist will take the lead by specifying the toys or games that’ll be used in the session to enhance awareness, explore previously unresolved themes or introduce new subjects. The therapist will guide the play with purpose and intention while respecting the child’s voice.

The nondirective approach is less structured. The child is able to choose toys and games as they see fit. They’re free to play in their own way with few instructions or interruptions. The therapist will observe closely and participate as appropriate.

Sessions must take place in an environment where the child feels safe and where there are few limitations. The therapist may use techniques that involve:

creative visualization
storytelling
role-playing
toy phones
puppets, stuffed animals, and masks
dolls, action figures
arts and crafts
water and sand play
blocks and construction toys
dance and creative movement
musical play