Collaboration is a core principle of adolescent residential treatment. It should characterise the relationships between parents and young people, families and mental health professionals, and young people and treatment providers.
Collaboration is fundamental ethically and practically, a cornerstone of respect, autonomy, and effective treatment.
As teenagers move through residential treatment, they have to make choices. These choices might have to do with selecting treatment modalities or deciding how long to stay in treatment. They might relate to the education and vocational options that they pursue during their program and after they leave.
In order to make the right choices, teenagers require both autonomy and support. Autonomy in decision-making is essential to ensure ownership over their lives and futures. And, of course, teenagers have a deeper and richer understanding of their own values than anyone else. But they also require the support of trusted figures who may have more knowledge and experience in mental health and broader aspects of life.
In this blog, we look at how parents can support teenagers in making great choices through collaboration and validation. We explore the balance between care, guidance and autonomy, and what it means to avoid coercion while keeping boundaries in place.
How Can Parents Engage in Collaborative Treatment?
Collaborative treatment is one of the core elements of adolescent mental health care and an important protector of young people’s rights. However, it’s not always clear – for both parents, young people, and clinicians – what collaborative treatment means in practice.
Here, we explore some ways that parents can actively engage in collaborative treatment, supporting young people to make good decisions while respecting their autonomy.
Supporting Treatment Goals
One of the most important ways that parents can support a teen in residential treatment is by understanding and supporting their treatment goals. When mental health treatment and the broader recovery process align with a young person’s own values and aims, they’re more likely to feel motivated to engage in treatment and pursue positive change.
You may want to ask open questions to understand a teenager’s difficulties, expectations, and perspectives on treatment and recovery. You could also invite a young person to describe what they want to change and how.
You can bring these ideas into meetings with mental health professionals from the treatment program, creating collaborative treatment contracts that clarify preferences and values and select treatment options.
Some experts emphasise the importance of strength-based treatment planning. Strength-based treatment planning involves setting achievable goals that build a young person’s self-confidence and self-belief. It bases treatment planning on a young person’s own goals, abilities, and perspectives.
Choosing a Treatment Team
When a teenager is in residential treatment, their relationships with their treatment team are central to their recovery. Young people should work with professionals whom they trust, connect with, and relate to. They might want to collaborate with a therapist who is from a similar social group or shares certain experiences.
You might want to hold open discussions with a young person about their different therapeutic relationships and which professionals they prefer to work with. This can support a teenager in choosing a treatment team that fits their needs and experiences, nurturing healing and recovery.
Motivational Interviewing
Parents can play a key role in strengthening and supporting a teenager’s motivation for recovery and positive change. However, we need to take care with the way we offer support and encouragement. Some approaches that might feel natural can be counterproductive and leave young people feeling controlled, patronised, or minimised. This can cause greater resistance to treatment.
Following the principles of motivational interviewing, parents should begin by understanding a young person’s own reasons for seeking change. Listen carefully to what a young person has to say and respond with understanding and empathy.
When we understand a young person’s motivation for change, we can work on increasing their confidence in their ability to change. Point out their strengths and recognise and affirm the progress they have made so far. Empower them to make the changes that are important to them, asking what kinds of support might help them to reach their goals. Instil hope in a young person, letting them know that recovery is possible and, with time and commitment, they will feel better.
Try to avoid imposing your own reasons that recovery is important on a young person, especially if they disagree or seem uninterested. Reiterating unsolicited advice with authority or a sense of ‘knowing better’ can push a young person further away and discourage them from engaging in treatment.
Approach a Young Person with Warmth and Calmness
Social support is a core element of recovery. Caring relationships provide a sense of belonging, purpose, and a way of sharing challenges and difficulties. They build self-confidence and provide motivation. They counter feelings of isolation, hopelessness, or despair.
Sometimes, when a young person faces mental health challenges, the reactions of family members can create distance in relationships. This can happen when parents try to avoid confronting what’s going on or express frustration, criticism, or hostility. Unfortunately, strained relationships often exacerbate mental health symptoms.
To support a teen’s recovery, we should approach our relationships with warmth and calmness. Showing warmth and affection helps bring young people closer, nurturing their well-being. It maintains and builds trust, creating a stable base through which parents can help with decision-making, motivational interviewing, and emotional support.
Validation and Empathy
Empathising with a young person’s experience and validating their feelings are core aspects of emotional support. When young people feel heard and validated, it can build resilience, helping them feel secure and cared for despite challenging emotions and experiences.
This means listening and relating in an open way, asking open questions and avoiding judgment. Validate their emotions, letting them know that their feelings are real, reasonable, and deserving of attention. Try to understand how it might feel to be in their shoes, while recognising that you will never understand their experience as well as they do.
Avoiding Coercion and Ensuring Consent
Coercion happens when a teenager is pressured or forced to engage in mental health treatment against their will. In extreme cases, coercion can involve a courtcase for involuntary admission to a program. In other situations, parents might pressure a child to attend treatment using reward or punishment strategies or through forms of manipulation that they may not even recognise as harmful.
Consent and coercion are related but opposite concepts. Consent refers to giving expressed permission for something to happen, such as participating in a certain therapy or extending a residential stay.
In teen residential treatment, avoiding coercion and ensuring explicit consent are crucial to protect young people’s rights and respect their autonomy. Coercion during treatment can also harm a young person’s treatment journey and recovery.
- Involuntary treatment can be experienced as violating and sometimes traumatic for a young person. It can create feelings of shame and guilt that make mental health symptoms worse.
- Involuntary or coerced treatment can harm the trust between a young person and medical professionals. It might affect their willingness to ask for help in the future or prevent them from building trusting therapeutic relationships. It can also damage trust between a young person and their family.
While, in rare cases, involuntary treatment may be necessary to keep a young person safe, it should be avoided as far as possible. Decisions about treatment should be made collaboratively with mental health professionals and the young person, ensuring everyone’s voices are heard, and the agency of young people is respected.
Keeping Boundaries in Place
Boundaries are a key component of healthy family systems and positive parenting. They can help reinforce positive behaviours while discouraging harmful ones. They also provide each family member with a sense of security and stability, providing an idea of what to expect from daily interactions and the tasks of everyday life.
When a teenager enters residential treatment, boundaries continue to hold the same importance. They provide a structure that helps teenagers feel secure and cared for, even when parents are far away. They prevent instability from building within relationships, which may continue to impact family dynamics when a young person returns home.
The Wave Clinic: Transformative Residential Mental Health Support for Young People
The Wave Clinic provides specialist mental health care for young people and families. Experts in child and adolescent psychiatry, we offer residential and outpatient treatment spaces that make a difference in young people’s lives.
Our residential programs follow a therapeutic boarding school model, combining exceptional clinical care with education, vocational learning, and global citizenship projects. We focus on learning life skills, building self-confidence, and forming meaningful connections with others. We support young people to reconnect with themselves, discover new passions, and look towards the future.
Collaboration is central to our philosophy. We respect the autonomy of young people, understanding adolescents and young adults as partners in their mental health care. We fully involve families in the treatment process, from treatment planning to an invitation to our space for a week of family therapy.
If you’re interested in our programs, get in touch today to find out more.
