Why Choose Art Therapy?

“How can art therapy help me?”
"How does it work?"

Some people mistakenly assume that art therapy is only for children. While art therapy can be a great choice for your child, it can also help adults, teenagers, and many special needs populations with a variety of challenges and experiences.

Art therapists are trained in counseling plus the use of art to promote self-expression and healing. I use art as a tool to achieve the same goals as traditional therapy, and we use a lot of talk therapy too. Here are some unique advantages that art adds to the therapy:
1. The creative process engages the whole brain which enhances focus
2. Doing art can provide an immediate physical and emotional release
3. Exploring your artwork with an art therapist can give you a new perspective
4. Art connects to the unconscious and assists in the expression of non-verbal experiences
5. Learning to do art can be a creative coping tool

One client commented on her process below:

"Coming to art therapy gives me a chance to organize my thoughts and get much more clarity. As I start working on an art project, usually related to the challenges in my life, my mind focuses on the task, and I start to make decisions about how I want the project to look. As I do that, it's like a parallel part of my brain is thinking about my life, based on my art project. A lot of the time I'm surprised at where the art takes me.

Let me give you an example. One day I was feeling like a terrible mother. I started building a sculpture of my home out of clay, and I made a room in the back for my oldest son, who has severe anger outbursts that threaten the entire family. I put a thick door on the room and a lock from the outside. In my mind I locked the door and felt a strong sense of relief. Now that his door was locked, I could focus on my other children, something I hadn't been able to do, and figure out what they needed from me. This was a huge breakthrought for me." - Evelyn, 43 (names and details have been changed to protect privacy)

This anecdote shows how Evelyn used art to focus on what was happening in her life. Working with the art materials and observing her creation helped her be more objective. The artwork that she did provided an important emotional release and gave her the ability to move forward in her therapy goals.