A new take on therapeutic mindfulness with specific applications to troubled and delinquent youth is the focus of this innovative text. It introduces Family Mode Deactivation Therapy (FMDT) and its core concepts and methodologies, differentiating it from other cognitive and mindfulness therapies for adolescents with problem behaviors and comorbid conditions. Step by step applications of FMDT from case conceptualization to assessment and treatment are featured, with detailed case studies demonstrating its effectiveness in treating mood disorders, aggressive behavior and trauma and guidelines for its use with abusive families and other complex cases. The book's depth of clinical detail and appendix of therapist tools make it especially practical. Included in the coverage: A comparison of MDT with other cognitive approaches. The empirical status of MDT. Mindfulness in MDT process, and in the treatment room. FMDT and sexual offender youth. MDT and mindfulness in the context of trauma. Treating the "untreatable": FMDT and challenging populations. While Treating Adolescents with Family-Based Mindfulness is immediately useful to practicing psychotherapists, it should also be of interest to other professionals with a role in adolescent health care, such as policymakers, social workers, supervisors, juvenile corrections and youth center personnel and students and researchers.

Despite its inherent joys, the challenges of parenting can produce considerable stress. These challenges multiply—and the quality of parenting suffers—when a parent or child has mental health issues, or when parents are in conflict. Even under optimal circumstances, the constant changes as children develop can tax parents' inner resources, often undoing the best intentions and parenting courses. Mindful Parenting: A Guide for Mental Health Practitioners offers an evidence-based, eight week structured mindfulness training program for parents with lasting benefits for parents and their children. Designed for use in mental health contexts, its methods are effective whether parents or children have behavioral or emotional issues. The program's eight sessions focus on mindfulness-oriented skills for parents, such as responding to (as opposed to reacting to) parenting stress, handling conflict with children or partners, fostering empathy, and setting limits. The book dovetails with other clinical mindfulness approaches, and is written clearly and accessibly so that professionals can learn the material easily and impart it to clients. Featured in the text: Detailed theoretical, clinical, and empirical foundations of the program. The complete Mindful Parenting manual with guidelines for eight sessions and a follow-up. Handouts and assignments for each session. Findings from clinical trials of the Mindful Parenting program. Perspectives from parents who have finished the course. Its clinical focus and empirical support make Mindful Parenting an invaluable tool for practitioners and clinicians in child, school, and family psychology, psychotherapy/counseling, psychiatry, social work, and developmental psychology.

Though acceptance and mindfulness interventions have proven enormously effective for adults with stress, anxiety, depression, and other mental health issues, they have not been fully documented for use with children and adolescents. And yet they are a natural fit for children's therapy-the focus on acceptance and mindfulness builds children's psychological flexibility, and the values component of these methods helps young people learn to set goals and take action to achieve them. The chapters in Acceptance and Mindfulness Treatments for Children and Adolescents show how to modify third-wave behavioral and cognitive therapy methods for the treatment of children and adolescents. This book also considers the early evidence for the adaptability and effectiveness of these methods. Edited by two luminaries in the field of third-wave behavior therapy, these essays will be invaluable in helping young patients reap the benefits of acceptance and mindfulness approaches such as acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT), dialectical behavior therapy (DBT), mindfulness-based cognitive therapy (MBCT), and mindfulness-based stress reduction (MBSR). Learn how ACT, DBT, MBCT, and MBSR can be used with young people and their families Discover recent third-wave behavior therapy research Explore the practice issues that arise when acceptance and mindfulness techniques are used with children and adolescents Find out how to put these techniques to work in your own practice

Eastern spiritual traditions have long maintained that mindfulness meditation can improve well-being. More recently, mindfulness-based treatment approaches have been successfully utilized to treat anxiety, depressive relapse, eating disorders, psychosis, and borderline personality disorder. This book discusses the conceptual foundation, implementation, and evidence base for the four best-researched mindfulness treatments: mindfulness-based stress reduction (MBSR), mindfulness-based cognitive therapy (MBCT), dialectical behavior therapy (DBT) and acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT). All chapters were written by researchers with extensive clinical experience. Each chapter includes the conceptual rationale for using a mindfulness-based treatment and a review of the relevant evidence base. A detailed case study illustrates how the intervention is implemented in "real life," exploring the clinical and practical issues that may arise and how they can be managed. This book will be of use to clinicians and researchers interested in understanding and implementing mindfulness based treatments. * Comprehensive introduction to the best-researched mindfulness-based treatments * Covers wide range of problems & disorders (anxiety, depression, eating, psychosis, personality disorders, stress, pain, relationship problems, etc) * Discusses a wide range of populations (children, adolescents, older adults, couples) * Includes wide range of settings (outpatient, inpatient, medical, mental health, workplace) * Clinically rich, illustrative case study in every chapter * International perspectives represented (authors from US, Canada, Britain, Sweden)

Mindfulness-Based Substance Abuse Treatment for Adolescents is a group-based curriculum incorporating mindfulness, self-awareness, and substance-abuse treatment strategies for use with adolescents dealing with substance use. The evidence-based, how-to format provides a curriculum for professionals to implement either partially, by picking and choosing sections that seem relevant, or in full over a number of weeks. Each session comes equipped with clear session agendas, example scripts and talking points, what-if scenarios that address common forms of resistance, and optional handouts for each session. Sections cover the major principles of working with adolescents—relationship building, working with resistance, and more—along with a full curriculum. The book is a natural fit for psychotherapists, but addiction counselors, school counselors, researchers, mentors, and even teachers will find that Mindfulness-Based Substance Abuse Treatment for Adolescents changes the way they work with young people.

Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy for Anxious Children offers a complete professional treatment program designed to help children ages nine through twelve who struggle with anxiety. This twelve-session protocol can be used to treat anxious children in group or individual therapy. The poems, stories, session summaries, and home practice activities on the enclosed CD-ROM supplement child therapy sessions and parent meetings to illuminate mindful awareness concepts and practices. In twelve simple sessions, children will learn new ways to relate to anxious thoughts and feelings and develop the ability to respond to life events with greater awareness and confidence. Help children manage the symptoms of all types of anxiety: •Panic disorder •Agoraphobia •Obsessive-compulsive disorder •Post-traumatic stress disorder •Generalized anxiety disorder •Social phobia •Specific phobias •Separation anxiety disorder •School refusal

This book comprehensively reviews mindfulness-based interventions for specific areas of functioning in children and adolescents, with refreshing insights and perspectives. Based on a solid foundation of research and practice, it presents the nature of mindfulness, examines the psychological processes that may underlie mindfulness, and explores how to assess it. Mindfulness is about how we can be attentive to and present for everything that happens in our daily lives. This book draws upon current research in the field in order to explore topics such as the fundamentals of teaching mindfulness to children and adolescents; assessment of mindfulness in this population; use of mindfulness in educational settings; and clinical applications in mental health, including substance abuse, hyperactivity, and intellectual and developmental disabilities. With contributions from internationally-renowned clinicians and scholars, this book provides a balanced account of the strengths and weaknesses of current research, and how mindfulness-based programs can be used to enhance wellbeing and reduce suffering. This book will be of great interest for academics, scholars and post graduate students involved in the study of the mental health of children and adolescents. It will also appeal to psychologists, psychiatrist, nurses, social workers, rehabilitation therapists and others, such as school counsellors, who provide clinical care to children and adolescents.