You may have heard the great news that we are now offering 2 (yes, that’s right TWO!!) specially trained art therapists in our Leonardtown office. Art therapists are hard to find so we’re super excited and honored to be able to offer this skillset to our communities.
But what you may not know is why and how this kind of therapy can be so effective both with you and with your daughter/child.
To get a closer look on this, I asked our art therapists themselves to weigh in and here’s what they said…
Kelly Muldoon, LCPAT, LCPC, ATR-BC on Art Therapy
How art therapy helps you
Art therapy can be helpful for so many people in different settings. It can be used with individuals, couples, families, and groups, and can benefit all ages.
One of the most powerful parts of utilizing art therapy is being able to communicate the things that are hard to put into words. Using art therapy can help provide a different perspective for a client who is working through something. Art therapy can help us explore our relationships with people, understand ourselves better, and problem solve. It can help integrate past traumas into our narratives so we can continue moving forward while managing our trigger responses. It can also help someone understand their anxiety, depression, or other mental health struggles, and find ways to navigate those struggles.
There is such a wide variety of how art therapy is helpful – it’s hard to cover it all in a paragraph!
Art therapy effectiveness
Art therapy can be an incredibly effective tool.
There’s plenty of research showing mass improvements for people who struggle with symptoms of PTSD, mood and anxiety disorders, trauma, family struggles, etc. There’s so much amazing work the brain can do when you’re in a safe place with someone you can trust to be vulnerable with. Doing art therapy in a setting like that activates different parts of the brain that allows it to create new neural pathways and rewire connections and associations we have with certain experiences. It can help us reconsolidate difficult memories and make them more manageable to sit with.
I like to refer people to the American Art Therapy Association, their website covers a lot of ground about how it has helped all kinds of people through different approaches and modalities. There’s so much research out there on how it can be helpful.
How I incorporate art therapy into sessions
I usually like to brainstorm “art therapy directives” before I meet with a client in session. This means that before I meet with a client, I’ll refresh myself on their goals and what’s been coming up in session, and I’ll think of instructions for the client to explore those things.
For example, for someone who wants to improve their ability to identify their emotions and is having trouble expressing their inner experience because they feel like they always have to perform, I may invite them to create an inside/outside mask. This allows the person to depict what their inner world is like either on the inside of a folded piece of paper, or the inside of an actual mask. They can then depict how other people see them and how they present to the world. This art therapy directive can help a client identify their emotions, think of how it affects them to hold emotions in, who they can safety let them out to, and problem-solve ways to be more true to themselves and others if that’s something they think could help them feel more whole.
I will also come up with an art therapy directive on the spot for someone who may come in and may be having trouble with a particular issue. Perhaps the client is having a fight with someone and they need help identifying what makes the conflict intimidating for them, and in session, we can come up with images and metaphors to help approach the issue in a way that works well for that individual.
Other times, people want to make art for art’s sake, and that can be cathartic as well! Sometimes we just need to have a mandala to color in while we talk about our anxiety- there can be something so helpful with the containment of coloring within the lines (if that’s your jam) with something as simple and nostalgic with crayons. We don’t always get the chance to tap into our inner child, so art therapy can help us do that too.
I am intentional with what materials I use with an individual based on what they are struggling with. Some materials may induce certain emotions that could make a client feel emotionally dysregulated, and art therapists are specially trained on what those materials are, when to use them, and how they can be helpful (or harmful).
Art therapy can be an incredibly helpful tool for so many reasons, the possibilities are endless!
Sarah Walker-Leard, LGPAT, ATR, LCPC on Art Therapy
How art therapy helps you
Art therapy can be fantastic for supplementing verbal communication, giving clients a powerful means of self-reflection, and providing opportunities for creativity, sublimation, and play!
It is also a great way for clients who struggle with perfectionism to challenge themselves, and to sit with something that they may not love.
Art making in itself can also be therapeutic and can be used as a form of mindfulness meditation and, when using both hands to create, can help with bilateral integration!
Art therapy effectiveness
Speaking specifically for kids and teens, art therapy can be a really effective means of self-examination, identity development, and communicating about hard things.
I have also seen how powerful art therapy can be as a tool to communicate with parents and siblings!
How I incorporate art therapy into sessions
I use art in therapy sessions in many different ways.
I may have a client create an image depicting something stressful going on in their lives, use clay to create a worry stone, play with watercolors to challenge rigidity and perfectionism, collage about their identity, or use different tools to paint on a canvas. There are so many different ways it can be incorporated to help reach therapeutic goals.
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Well there you have it! Straight from the experts themselves. To schedule with one of them or any of our other rock star therapists, please click here to book online or give us a buzz at 301-690-0779, extension 700.
