Help for Children With Behavioral Problems

Having children with behavioral problems can be stressful, especially if you feel like you are doing the best you can and things are not improving. If your child is having trouble, do not be embarrassed to seek help for them and for your family. Though it is tempting to try to solve your child's behavioral issues on your own, including the help of professionals might make resolution come more quickly and easily.

  1. Get Your Child a Physical

    • Bring your child to your family doctor or pediatrician for a basic physical. Explain your behavioral concerns to the physician and ask for a thorough examination complete with blood work to check on all of the major systems and hormone levels in your child's body. Your doctor might recommend that you break the blood workup into a few sessions so that it is not as overwhelming for your child. A complete medical workup will help to eliminate any physical causes for your child's behavioral issues.

    Get Your Child a Psychological Evaluation

    • If your child's physical examination comes back normal, ask your child's physician for a referral to someone who does pediatric psychological evaluations. During the psychological evaluations, a qualified professional will ask your child questions directly, through playing, and/or in written form. Your child's responses will help to determine whether there is any correlation between mental illness and your child's behavioral issues.

    Find a Cognitive Behavioral Psychologist

    • Once you have the results of your child's psychological evaluation, consider asking your child's physician, or the professional who gave the psychological testing for a referral to a psychologist who practices cognitive behavioral therapy and specializes in working with children. Cognitive behavioral therapists focus on helping your child to change thoughts in ways that change behavior. Although it is not a quick fix, over time your child's behavior may improve as thought processes change.

    Consider Family Therapy

    • Your child is not the only person affected by behavioral problems. Everyone in the family system is affected by the behavior and needs a place to process their feelings. Family therapy can help your family learn to work together, process feelings and cope while your child works on their behavioral issues.

    Think Teamwork

    • While working through your child's behavioral issues, make sure that all of your professionals are working as a team. You might be dealing with several professionals such as your child's pediatrician, a psychologist, a family therapist, a psychiatrist and a social worker. The number of professionals involved will depend largely on your particular situation. It is imperative that you sign release forms so that the professionals on your child's care team can communicate openly with one another. This will help to ensure that care is consistent from one professional to another and that everyone knows the plan of care.

    Reevaluate as You Progress

    • As your child's care plan progresses and behavior changes, it will be important to schedule meetings to reevaluate and check in with the care professionals. Once every month or two, you might want to schedule a meeting with everyone present so that you can go over what is working, not working and where you would like to see things go.

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