The concerns of high school students are cited frequently enough in our
culture: the fluctuations in their dependency on their parents; adjustments to significant changes in the family such as divorce, illness, or death; their values and attitudes about academic achievement; troubling moods; use of alcohol and other mind-altering substances. College students may have left some of the turbulence of earlier adolescence behind but they continue to struggle with many of the same issues at another level of maturation.

College and graduate school students are typically trying to come to terms with many other issues and conflicts as well. These include:

• disturbing and sometime overwhelming feelings of anxiety, panic attacks, phobias
   
• prolonged sad or depressed mood that interferes with normal activities and can even become disabling,such as complete loss of concentration, loss of appetite, difficulty sleeping, inability to enjoy normal interests, social isolation
   
• struggles around feeling intimidated by peers, teachers, deans
   
• difficulties controlling emotions and behaviors that get them into trouble
   
• inability to change entrenched patterns of procrastination or impasses in decision-making
   
• struggles to understand patterns in their social relationships and to disengage from those that tend to become futile or "toxic"
   
• confusion around their sexuality, frightening recognition of the impact that past experiences with neglect or
  abuse have had on them
   
• conflict around having to straddle two or more different worlds with respect to poverty, race, culture,achievement, family values and expectations
   

The past two decades have seen an enormous growth in high schools and on college campuses across the country in the development of various student support services, particularly counseling and psychotherapy for personal concerns such as those cited above. In fact, this has become a routine part of student life, especially at the college level. A relationship with a counselor or therapist is a sanctuary the student can turn to in complete confidentiality, for developing greater self-confidence and stability in their lives. Sometimes a consultation alone is all that is needed to clarify the issues and options available. If the therapist is in the larger community rather than on campus, it is sometimes very important for them to understand the larger context of the school, the degree of its sophistication in understanding the psychological dynamics of its student body ("campus culture") and its procedures and requirements relating to student life.

Parents too may have concerns and would benefit from their own consultation with a clinician who is experienced working with students. This can be particularly helpful when the son or daughter is on a campus at some distance from home and may be contending with an urgent problem such as the breakup of a love relationship or a roommate's suicide attempt. Students start to discover, as we all must, that "life is what happens when you've made other plans."

For further information it may be helpful to consult the Q & A section of this website.