As a parent, watching your teen make life-changing mistakes is heartbreaking. Whether your teen is acting out due to trouble in school, family issues, substance abuse (themselves or a family member), or other emotional disturbances, what happens to your teen affects the entire family. Oftentimes, when a teen becomes troubled, professional intervention is necessary in order to steer them back onto a healthy life trajectory.  However, not all professional sources offer the long-term support your troubled teen may need. If you find yourself asking, “Why isn’t counseling helping my child?” or “Why haven’t I seen behavioral changes even though I am giving my full attention?” then it may be time to look into a long-term solution such as a therapeutic boarding school. 

Are Therapeutic Boarding Schools Best for My Teen?

Choosing whether to send your child to a therapeutic boarding school can be daunting. But it’s important to remember that, unlike part-time treatment such as counseling or after-school programs, therapeutic boarding schools surround your child with specialized structure, support, and 24/7 professional help. When a child is suffering from overwhelming behavior issues and emotional distress, they need help beyond what traditional middle and high schools can offer. In traditional settings, only surface-level issues are addressed, and bad habits can easily turn into life-long patterns. By sending your kid to a long-term therapeutic boarding school, you are giving them the opportunity to correct their behavioral patterns for the long run and return to their lives with coping strategies and mindsets that breed success. 

Teen Substance Abuse Concerns

Often, a teen’s behavior, like substance abuse, is the result of a deep-rooted challenge that requires the professionalism of a counselor to uncover and resolve. Therapeutic boarding schools offer specialized counseling components with licensed professionals where individual sessions and group therapy are provided on a daily and weekly basis. Therapists will work together with your teen to set and achieve goals that lead to better mental health. Additionally, the staff and faculty are highly trained to manage troubled teens on a 24-hour schedule, gently reminding them of the skills they are learning in therapy and redirecting them when they become emotionally dysregulated. This type of attention is crucial so your teen can continuously practice their skills and eventually cultivate a healthier emotional baseline. 

Therapeutic Boarding School Approach

Furthermore, the academic approach at therapeutic boarding schools is more conducive to supporting a troubled teen than that of a traditional school. In most cases, troubled teens are uninterested in engaging in academic affairs. This can be because they have fallen so far behind that catching up feels too daunting, because they have a learning disability that causes them to feel bad about themselves, or because they cannot channel their energy into productive activities such as homework. In a therapeutic boarding school setting, teachers work with each teen individually to strategize an academic plan for success, helping students reach their goals and instill hope for their futures. This includes:

• Goal setting and achievement
• A plan for catching up on missed coursework carrying over from their previous school
• Addressing any learning disabilities and finding appropriate accommodations
• Paving a pathway for on-time graduation and, in some cases, early graduation
• Discussing options for higher education

Therapeutic boarding schools are a fantastic solution to addressing your troubled teen’s behavioral defiance and emotional dysregulation, allowing them to realign with a bright future. It’s a hard decision, but removing your child from their traditional school, bad friends, and untrained faculty might be best for them. You’ll be amazed how your teen will thrive in a therapeutic boarding school as they interact with others who face similar challenges and find success in an environment specifically structured to help them set and achieve goals. Therapeutic boarding schools may be the answer you’ve been looking for as you search for ways to bring your entire family back together again.

For guidance on choosing the right therapeutic boarding school for your family, please contact us at Help Your Teen Now.