Child, Adolescent and Family Therapy
Doctoral-level psychologists and licensed therapists who treat the child, bring parents into the work, and know how school and health fit in.
Navigating Child and Adolescent Therapy
What Is Child and Adolescent Therapy?
Child and adolescent therapy is psychological care for young people ages 4 through 17, built around where a child actually lives: at home, at school, and inside a body that may be dealing with problems of its own. It treats anxiety and low mood, behavior that has stopped responding to ordinary parenting, and the patterns a family builds up while trying to cope.
You’ve probably heard some version of “he’ll grow out of it,” or “she’s just being a teenager,” or “all kids do that at this age.” Almost always it is meant kindly, by people who want to put your mind at rest. It still leaves you holding the same worry, now with a quiet suggestion attached that you are making too much of it. Parents can usually tell the difference between a hard week and a pattern, and you’re allowed to act on what you’re seeing.
Our psychologists work in behavioral medicine, which is health psychology applied to medical conditions and their treatment. With children that matters more than it sounds. Stomach aches every school morning, sleep that fell apart months ago, a new diagnosis, a hospital stay: these arrive attached to the same child who is also struggling in class and melting down at bedtime. You won’t have to decide which half to bring.
Why Is Therapy Important for Children and Teens?
Therapy matters for children and teens because these difficulties usually start early, and carried alone they tend to get heavier rather than lighter. Nearly 1 in 5 children in the United States have been diagnosed with a mental, emotional, or behavioral condition, and by high school 2 in 5 report persistent sadness or hopelessness. The first number tells you your family isn’t unusual. The second tells you what the next few years look like without help.
The teenage climb is the part parents rarely see coming. Difficulties that looked manageable at nine can get heavier at fourteen, when school stakes rise and a teenager starts working hard to keep the whole thing off your radar. Low mood at that age is treatable, and depression therapy works.
%
Of Children Ages 3 to 17 Have a Mental Health Diagnosis
Nearly 1 in 5 US children ages 3 to 17 had ever been diagnosed with a mental, emotional, or behavioral health condition (2021). Source: CDC, Data and Statistics on Children’s Mental Health.
%
Of High School Students Felt Persistently Sad or Hopeless
Among US high school students in 2023, 40% reported persistent feelings of sadness or hopelessness in the past year. Source: CDC, Data and Statistics on Children’s Mental Health.
What Symptoms and Situations Do We Help With?
We help with the worry and the low mood, the trouble at school, growing up alongside a medical condition, the losses and the changes at home, and the parenting that has to hold all of it together. Most families arrive carrying several of these at once. Here’s what people bring us.
Anxiety, Low Mood, and Sleep That Stopped Working
Anxiety in children often shows up as a stomach ache, a refusal, or a tantrum long before anyone calls it worry. Depression in a teenager can look like irritability and a closed door rather than sadness. Sleep is usually the first thing to go and the last thing anyone thinks to mention, and sleep problems are treatable in their own right. We work on all three together, because in a young person they feed each other.
School, Attention, and Behavior
Trouble in class is rarely only about class. We work with school stress, attention problems, and behavior that shows up at school, at home, or both, alongside social skills, teasing, bullying and rejection, and the self-esteem that takes a beating when a child spends all day feeling behind. Where attention is the central question, ADHD therapy and formal psychological assessment are part of what we do.
Growing Up With a Medical Condition
This is our home ground. A child living with a chronic illness, a long recovery, or repeated hospital visits is already in the right building. We also see the siblings, who tend to hold themselves together so well that nobody thinks to ask how they’re doing.
Grief, and Losses a Child Cannot Name Yet
A death in the family, a pet, a move, a friendship that ended. Children grieve in fragments, cheerful one hour and inconsolable the next, which adults sometimes read as being over it. Grief and loss therapy gives that its own space rather than waiting for it to surface as behavior.
Divorce, Blended Families, and Conflict at Home
Separation, a new stepparent, a sibling relationship that has turned into a daily war. We work with the child on what they are carrying and with the household on what it is doing, because a child’s behavior at home is rarely a solo performance. Where the adults need a room of their own, couples therapy can run alongside.
Parenting, When What Used to Work Stops Working
Every parent we meet has already tried a great deal. Positive parenting work isn’t about starting over. It’s about finding which of the things you’re already doing is landing, which has quietly stopped, and what to do at 7pm on a Tuesday when it has all gone wrong again. Stress management for the adults is part of it, not an afterthought.
How Do You Get Started With Child Therapy?
Getting started takes four steps: you reach out, our intake team talks with you first, we match your child with a therapist, and sessions begin. Starting is the part that stalls parents longest, usually somewhere between the third bad week and the phone call from school. Here’s exactly what happens, from the first call to your child’s first session.
Start by Reaching Out
Call us directly, fill out the interest form, or schedule a free consultation, whichever is easiest to do between pickup and bedtime.
One-on-One Intake Conversation
Our intake team reviews your information and calls you, the parent, first. We talk through your child's history, what school has said, anything medical in the picture, and what you most want help with. If you would rather not do this by phone, it can happen over email.
Expert Therapist Match
Based on your child's age and what's actually going on, we match you with a therapist who works with that age group, factoring in whether in-person or online sessions fit your week.
Start the First Session
Sessions begin at our office or through our secure online platform. With younger children the first session usually includes you. With teenagers it usually doesn't, and we'll explain why before it happens.
How Does Therapy for Children and Teenagers Work?
Therapy for children and teenagers starts with a clear picture of what your child is dealing with at home, at school, and medically, because those three move together.
From there your therapist picks methods with evidence behind them and sizes them to your child’s age. Some of the work happens with your child one to one, some with the family in the room, and plenty of families do both.
Parents Are Part of the Treatment, Not the Audience
For children under six, the American Academy of Pediatrics recommends parent training in behavior management as the first-line treatment, ahead of medication. That’s not a scheduling convenience, it’s what the evidence supports. You learn the skills, you use them in the moments that actually happen, and we adjust them week by week.
Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, Sized to the Child
Cognitive behavioral therapy for the worry, the low mood, and the sleep that goes first. With children it looks concrete: drawings, worksheets, small experiments between sessions.
The hardest part is rarely the appointment itself. It’s the ordinary week around it, and holding the line at bedtime when everyone is already tired.
Mindfulness and Stress Skills They Will Actually Use
Short, practical skills for a body that has learned to run hot. Mindfulness-based therapy works here because it is physical and immediate, not abstract.
Room for a Teenager to Speak Freely
Older teenagers need a room that is theirs, with a therapist who isn’t reporting the contents home. Humanistic and existential therapy suits that stretch.
Coordination With School and Your Pediatrician
With your permission our psychologists work directly with your child’s pediatrician and with the school, so there’s one plan rather than three running separately.
Why Choose Rowan for Child and Adolescent Therapy?
Behavioral medicine is the whole practice here, so a child whose difficulties are tangled up with sleep, headaches, asthma, or a new diagnosis is already in the right place. Your child is the patient. You’re part of the treatment.
The first sessions map what is happening at home, at school, and medically, along with what you have already tried. It's a conversation, not a test, and it shapes the plan.
What we work on depends on how old your child is. A six-year-old’s treatment runs largely through the parents; a sixteen-year-old’s runs largely through them. The plan follows the child rather than a fixed script.
You leave the first few sessions with something to use, not months of background first. The morning refusal, the homework standoff, the 2am wake-up. Small skills practiced early hold up later.
With your permission we work directly with your pediatrician and your child’s school. One shared plan, so the psychological care and everything else are not running on separate tracks.
We track progress against goals you and your child set at the start, not a general sense that sessions are going fine. If something hasn't moved after a reasonable stretch, we change the approach.
Sessions run in person and by telehealth, so a school day, a commute, or a sick week doesn't have to cost you that week’s session.
Frequently Asked Questions About Child Therapy
How is child and adolescent therapy different from seeing a general therapist?
Child and adolescent therapy is delivered by therapists trained in how children develop and how families work, so a six-year-old is not treated as a small adult. The difference shows up quickly. A general therapist can be excellent and still spend the first month working out what is developmentally ordinary for a nine-year-old and what isn’t. There’s a naming problem too. “Child therapist” is not a protected title, so it can describe people at several different levels of training that parents can’t tell apart from a website. Most of ours are doctoral-level psychologists, and the rest are licensed master’s-level therapists. We tell you which one your child is seeing, and why that therapist suits your situation.
Will I be in the room, or is therapy just between my child and the therapist?
With younger children, yes, you’re usually part of the sessions; with teenagers, mostly not, and we’ll be clear about it from the start. A great deal of a young child’s treatment runs through you, because that’s what the evidence supports and because you are the one there at bedtime. With teenagers, most of the session is theirs alone, and that privacy is part of what makes it work. You still get regular contact with the therapist about how things are going and what to do differently at home. What we won’t do is put you in the position of hearing everything your teenager says and then being expected to react to none of it.
My teenager does not want to go. Is it worth making them?
Usually yes, and it works more often than parents expect. Reluctance at the start is close to universal, and it isn’t a good predictor of how therapy goes. What helps is being honest about the terms: this is theirs, it is confidential within the usual safety limits, and nobody is going to be told what they said. We would rather begin with a teenager who is skeptical and present than wait for one who is enthusiastic. If your child refuses outright, we can start by working with you as the parent, which is useful on its own and often changes the answer within a few weeks.
Does insurance cover therapy for my child?
Rowan is in-network with Aetna and Cigna, and non-network certified with Tricare East and West. For other plans we provide superbills that most PPO policies reimburse as out-of-network benefits. Our team can verify your coverage before the first appointment, and full details are on our payment information page. Psychological care usually runs through your behavioral health benefit, which is separate from the rest of your child’s medical coverage.