When your teen gets their college acceptance letter, it’s an exciting time! Your teen probably started planning right away, tracking down dorm necessities, creating a workable class schedule, finding out which friends will be going to the same school, and thinking about clubs, sports, and extracurriculars.
During this busy time preparing for college, it’s important for you and your teen to consider that this will be a major change for your teen, and they will need more than just academic ability to get through college. Your teen’s ability to manage their emotions, live independently, and navigate the new social experiences coming their way will be a crucial part of their college success.
DBT can help teens thrive in college
When preparing your teen for the college transition, dialectical behavior therapy (DBT) can be as much of a college necessity as a laptop or office hours. Teens in DBT programs benefit from learning practical skills that help them face life’s challenges in a constructive and healthy way.
Your teen can use mindfulness, emotional regulation, distress tolerance, and interpersonal effectiveness skills as college independence skills. DBT can expand their ability to manage their own life, so they can embrace accountability, build strong, stable relationships, and take better care of themselves.
Let’s explore how DBT can help teens transition to college living with fewer growing pains.
The transition to college challenges teens’ ability to regulate their emotions
When your teen, say, realizes they need to do laundry and they don’t know where the laundry room is in their dorm, how to use the machines, or they aren’t sure how to do their own laundry, a simple situation like this can lead a sensitive teen into a shame spiral.
Feel free to replace laundry with any college scenario, like:
- A party where everyone is drinking
- The first time your teen has to find their classes
- Facing the balance of time for homework and time for fun
- A really difficult assignment or test
- Figuring out what to do when they get sick
- Missing home and feeling lost
When your teen is facing a lot of changes and new challenges all at once, it’s intense. It can overwhelm them, especially for emotionally sensitive teens. Without the right coping skills, they can resort to lashing out or exploding emotionally; they might try to find relief in risky behavior like drinking, gambling, overspending, or distracting themselves with sexual pursuits, or they may shut down and shut out solutions to their challenges.
How can DBT for college transitions help with emotional regulation in college?
Instead of shutting down and avoiding the issue by wearing dirty clothes, impulsively spending money on new clothes, or lashing out to try to get you, their parent, to do their laundry, DBT can help your teen get their laundry done and manage their emotions.
When your teen is emotionally overwhelmed by college, the What and How DBT mindfulness skills can be powerful tools to help them re-engage with the moment.
The What skill tells your teen what to do when overwhelmed, so they pause, take in the facts, and keep moving forward, even when they’re upset:
- Observe what’s happening within and around them.
- Describe to themselves what they’ve observed to name their emotions and get a firm grasp on the facts in the moment.
- Participate in what’s happening right in front of them (like looking up “how to do laundry” or asking a friend for directions), focusing all their attention on the task at hand.
The How skill directs your teen on how to behave, guiding them on their attitude and demeanor so they can de-escalate how they’re feeling instead of feeding their emotional spiral:
- Take a non-judgmental stance on the situation. (Nobody is born knowing how to do laundry; this is just my time to learn)
- Focus the mind on the moment at hand. (I need to figure out the first step in this process; maybe I’ll look it up)
- Choose the most effective next steps. (I want to scream, but I’m going to start the laundry first)
College is a place to learn independent living skills, too
College is a place to learn independent living skills, tooCollege is a learning environment, and not just an academic one. Your teen will have to navigate campus, manage their schedule, figure out how to feed themselves, schedule and attend their own doctor appointments, network, plan for their future, do their own laundry, try to have some fun, make sure to sleep enough, check in with themselves about their mental health, and more.
These skills may seem routine to an adult who has been managing their own life for years, but a teen transitioning to college is also transitioning to taking care of themselves in a way they’ve never had to do before.
How can DBT support learning college independence skills?
DBT can help your teen fully embrace developing their independence skills, without emotional overwhelm derailing the process.
Slowing down and taking things step-by-step helps your teen develop independence in college
STOP is a good starting point. When your teen feels overwhelmed, they can use this skill to stop, take a step back, observe the situation (including their own emotions), and proceed mindfully, giving them some breathing room.
Emotional dysregulation can convince your teen they need to be an expert NOW, and if they aren’t, they never will be. Build Mastery is another DBT skill that can help them embrace independence by learning in stages, not demanding excellence right away.
When faced with a class that’s really challenging, they can build mastery in the subject through attending office hours, creating set times to study, and paying close attention in class. Instead of being daunted by the need to learn, they can build confidence through taking on the classwork step-by-step, learning from failure and celebrating their successes.
Being consistent about physical and mental health is an important part of developing independence too
DBT can guide your teen on maintaining their physical and mental health, making them less vulnerable to emotional overwhelm. ABC PLEASE is a simple phrase to remember, but it contains a wealth of ways to care for yourself that your teen can use to consistently and independently prioritize their wellbeing, including:
- Accumulate positive emotions by making sure you have some fun.
- Build mastery, see above!
- Cope ahead by planning how you’ll respond in an upcoming stressful situation.
- Treat physical illness and follow instructions from your doctor.
- Eat nourishing food to cut down on mood swings and keep your body healthy
- Avoid mood-destabilizing substances like drugs and alcohol
- Prioritize sleep
- Exercise regularly
College means teens face complex interpersonal interactions
College students face a wide range of social interactions every day, and for emotionally sensitive teens, the complexity of these interactions can quickly lead to emotional overwhelm. You may be most worried about peer pressure and dangerous situations, but your teen is facing much more than a constant party. They’re facing interactions they need to navigate gracefully, in a way that preserves their self-respect while ensuring they respect others, and for overwhelmed teens, this gets tricky.
- Your teen may try to put on a show, being the person they think others expect them to be, neglecting their own values and needs to fit in and not speak up.
- On the other hand, a sensitive teen may find themselves lashing out in moments of interpersonal stress, exaggerating or downplaying in the moment, or testing other people to see if they’re worth trusting.
Knowing how to effectively interact with others in all situations, so your teen neither ignores their emotions nor lets emotions get in the way of thoughtful communication, is a crucial college independence skill, and DBT can help.
How can DBT expand your teen’s interpersonal skills?
As you consider the DBT interpersonal effectiveness skills we outline below, think about how your teen could use them in these common college scenarios:
- Getting along with randomly assigned roommates
- Peer pressure to try substances, or to drink to excess
- Dating and friendship situations your teen has never faced before (positive and negative!)
- Professors, TAs, and fellow students who have high expectations and limited time to help
- Parties, classes, cafeterias, dorms, and student groups where your teen doesn’t know anyone
- Philosophical, political, or interpersonal differences
GIVE and FAST are DBT skills your teen can use in any interaction, especially ones where they feel uncertain or like they’re about to resort to an ineffective reaction to cope with the conversation.
GIVE tells your teen how to manage their demeanor to stay respectful during the conversation, including:
- Gentle words/tone
- Interest in what the other person is saying
- Validating the other person’s point of view (without invalidating yourself)
- An easy, relaxed manner of standing and speaking
FAST gives your teen a way to maintain their self-respect and consider themselves a priority in the conversation through:
- Being fair to yourself and others
- No excess or unnecessary apologies
- Stick to your values
- Be truthful, no exaggeration or downplaying
Suffolk DBT can help teens learn skills that prepare them for the transition to college
Suffolk DBT offers quality dialectical behavior therapy for teens and families in NYC, Suffolk County, and Long Island who want to develop college independence skills they can use lifelong. You’re invited to connect with us today to support your teen in learning practical, useful DBT skills that will help them navigate the challenges of college life.
Our experienced NYC counselors specialize in serving teens, children, adults, and college students struggling with emotional, behavioral, cognitive, and interpersonal dysregulation, and can guide you and your children in using dialectical behavior therapy (DBT) skills and treatment to help your teen create a college life worth living!