The Psychology of Self-Injury: Exploring Self-Harm & Mental Health

If Your Child is in Therapy for Self-Injury, with Dr. Jessica Garisch

Episode Summary

Jessica Garisch, PhD, from Victoria University of Wellington in New Zealand, gives a sneak peek into how she addresses self-injury and self-harm in therapy sessions with youth and their parents.

Episode Notes

Many parents understandably want their child to stop self-injuring immediately, but cessation of self-injury is often a process and recurrence of episodes of self-injury can be expected, even when in therapy. In this episode, Dr. Jessica Garisch provides insight for parents about expectations for therapy and helping their child stop engaging in self-injury and self-harm. For instance, what do you do if your child does not seem to be putting forth effort in therapy? And if you are worried that your child may not be safe enough to go to camp or on vacation, should you keep them home?

To learn more about Dr. Garisch and her work at Victoria University of Wellington, visit https://people.wgtn.ac.nz/jessica.garisch. To learn more about the Youth Wellbeing Study and its research team, visit https://youthwellbeingstudy.wordpress.com/. 

Follow Dr. Westers on Instagram and Twitter (@DocWesters). To join ISSS, visit itriples.org and follow ISSS on Facebook and Twitter (@ITripleS).

The Psychology of Self-Injury podcast has been rated #5 by Feedspot in their "Top 15 Clinical Psychology Podcasts You Must Follow in 2021" and by Welp Magazine in their "20 Best Injury Podcasts of 2021."