Guacimara Hernández: "In parenting there must be family agreements"

The stage of childhood and adolescence is a phase of life in which we are especially exposed to certain psychological problems that, if consolidated, can mark the development of the person during the adulthood. That is why it is important to detect them quickly and intervene in time.

That is why child-juvenile psychotherapy is fundamental, and In this interview with the psychologist Guacimara Hernández we will talk about its main components.

• Related article: "The 6 stages of childhood (physical and mental development)"

Interview with Guacimara Hernández: Child and adolescent psychotherapy, the most common disorders in childhood and how to treat them

Guacimara Hernández Santana is a health psychologist with a practice in the city of Arrecife, where she cares for people of all ages. In this interview he talks about child-juvenile therapy.

Is it necessary for a child to have developed a psychological disorder to benefit from psychotherapy?

With diagnosed or undiagnosed psychological disorder, a boy or girl can benefit from therapy; You don't have to have a disorder to see a specialist. We must open our minds to the possible aspects that a psychologist deals with, from the disorder to the fear of speaking in public, the use of study techniques, the problems of

self esteem, lack of concentration or future fears, among others.

Today therapies are essential so that we can manage any future problem, always I recommend people to have an initial psychological assessment and from there we explore what we can to work.

What are the main stages of the child-juvenile therapy process?

Child-juvenile therapies are marked by six major psychological structures.

First, the initial evaluation: this is where I make direct contact with the patient and with his environment to have the maximum possible information and in this way look for all those tools to achieve the objective wanted. Open patient expression and honesty are needed here.

Then I establish the hypothesis: here I establish a series of objectives, and propose an adequate and effective psychological intervention.

Thirdly, I let the patient and his family know the goals I want to achieve and we get down to work; I propose an intervention plan in which we are going to achieve the objectives that we have proposed.

In the treatment phase, we initiate the intervention and inform the parents, creating guidelines and strategies, not only to solve his current problem but so that in the future the little one does not suffer other types of situations uncomfortable; You will be taught to think more productively, to feel...

Throughout the follow-up we apply techniques and verify that the patient carries out the new skills in their daily life and, therefore, we carry out continuous follow-up.

As we get what was established at the beginning in therapy, we are already proposing the end of therapy, reaching the main objective that led to asking for psychological help.

From what you have observed in your consultation, what are the most common psychological disorders among adolescents?

There are quite a few, but most often I see generalized anxiety disorders in adolescents, ADHD, conduct disorder, social phobia or defiant disorder.

In adolescents we find the difficulty of age, that is why taking the case on time is what feasible as possible, since it is these ages in most cases there are many mood swings, passivity...

And what are the most common psychological disorders among young children?

Here we have ADHD again as one of the most visited in consultation; Also noteworthy are learning disorders, autism spectrum disorder (ASD), anxiety disorders or eating disorders. It is very easy to work with these ages, since we take it on time and do very fun dynamics to obtain the expected result.

How do you make a young child understand that he has developed a pathology such as ADHD?

We must act in the same way as we did before the diagnosis so that he does not see that it is something strange but rather normalizes it; being small, it is explained to him that there is a little problem (depending on the age we use several different mechanisms of explanation) for which his body cannot be still for a long time, so we are going to work to control those impulses, language, etc.

As a psychologist, what do you think are the main theoretical principles of child and adolescent therapy that parents can apply to raising their children at home?

Each case is different, but above all, if there is a stable base, there must be a communication fluid, some limits of rewards or punishments, some established schedules and also certain family agreements.