Moving Beyond Stuckness: Addressing Substance Use and Trauma Among Teens

Teens seeking mental health services often have substance use issues, trauma histories, or both. As a result, they often seem stuck in endless cycles of maladaptive behaviors, experiencing multiple treatment failures and frustrating even the most dedicated professional helpers. Over time, these teens can seem apathetic, ambivalent, or completely resistant.

Join presenter David Flack for this special online workshop to deepen your understanding of these challenging topics and develop the clinical skills to help these teens get unstuck. Grounded in twenty years of clinical experience, this workshop is packed with practical strategies, stories from the field, and a bit of inspiration.

First half: Substance Use in Teens

Nearly half of all teens receiving mental health services have a diagnosable substance use disorder. Unfortunately, most mental health counselors have little training or experience when it comes to substance use among teens, so these concerns go overlooked and unaddressed.

We will start the morning segment of this workshop by exploring the stages of substance use, diagnostic criteria, and common co-morbid mental health disorders. Next, we will consider reasons that teens use and the stuckness that can develop. Then, we will examine several field-tested approaches for addressing substance use in teens, including ideas for cultivating rapport, fostering change, and getting unstuck.

Second half: Trauma in Teens

Two-thirds of all Americans experience some form of trauma by age 16. If left untreated, this can lead to a variety of emotional, behavioral, and developmental concerns – leading to increased mental health challenges, substance-related issues, school failures, and other issues.

In the afternoon segment of this workshop, we will deepen our understanding of the ways that trauma impacts teens, identify the active ingredients for successful trauma therapy, and explore clinical strategies for treating trauma in teens. Inspired by motivational interviewing, narrative therapy, and trauma-informed approaches, these strategies will increase engagement, improve treatment outcomes, and help teens move forward.

EPDC CE Hours: 6
Presenter: Emily Hughes LMFT, SUDP, CMHS

Emily is a licensed Marriage and Family Therapist, Substance Use Disorder Professional and a clinical supervisor with the state of Washington. Emily has a private practice that is telehealth based with an office in South King County. She sees adults, teens and couples. Emily has also been involved in training and teaching and has done so with NW ATTC, the Washington Mental Health Counselor’s Association, City University of Seattle and she has been a guest speaking at a variety of schools in the greater Seattle area. Throughout her career she has worked in crisis management and stabilization primarily with youth and young adults. This work was done in a community based mental health agency, as the lead for a crisis outreach team and as a mental health evaluator at Seattle Children’s Hospital emergency room. In her work with clients, her areas of expertise include working with teens, young adults, adults and couples in life transition and mood-related disorders, and around self-harm/suicide assessment, prevention, intervention, and management, the intersection of co-occurring disorders and in clinical supervision.