Sibling Counseling NJ
The licensed therapists at Gaming Approaches Towards Education, LLC (GATE) specialize sibling counseling in NJ, including New Brunswick and Edison. We help mediate sibling conflicts for siblings of all ages. Whether you are looking to help your children develop a healthier relationship, or you are an adult seeking to resolve disputes with your sibling(s), GATE can help you devise a therapy treatment plan that suits you and your sibling’s needs and mental health.
Sibling Conflict Therapy Treatment Plans
We use three different formats for sibling thearpy depending on you and your siblings’ needs. GATE utilizes the following types of therapy to resolve sibling conflict.
Individual Therapy
The therapists at GATE can work one-on-one with you and your sibling(s) to help plan and prepare strategies for conflict resolution. We will address your perception of family relationships and your place in it to help you discover the best path forward in your relationship with your sibling(s) and your personal mental health.
Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy (CBT)
CBT therapy examines the relationship between your thoughts and the resulting behaviors that come from them. By helping to change your thought process, you can make noticeable changes to your behavior. This is useful for analyzing why you act the way you do in your relationship with your sibling(s). Using meta-cognition, or thinking about thinking, our sibling therapy can help you prepare to address the conflict.
Group Therapy
For sibling conflicts, group therapy can work in two complementary ways. A therapist specializing in family conflict remediation can help guide you and your sibling(s) to a resolution in a group setting. For children, this might take the form of family therapy. Additionally, you and your sibling(s) can enter a larger group session consisting of a group therapy counselor and other siblings working on their relationships. This group perspective can change how you see your relationship.
Play Therapy
At GATE, we combine sibling counseling and gaming. We use tools such as board games, storytelling, role-playing, sand trays, and expressive arts in our therapy services.
Therapy Based on Your Needs
At GATE, our licensed sibling conflict counselors help create a unique therapy plan for your exact mental health needs.
We never want you to go without the care you need, so we accept insurance. Some providers we accept include Horizon and CIGNA.
How Our Counselors Can Help with Sibling Rivalry
At GATE, our counselors specialize in helping clients meet their mental health goals. We can help you and your sibling(s) resolve conflict and trauma that may be holding back the growth of your relationships. Schedule an onboarding session with us to learn more about our sibling counseling in NJ.
Causes of Sibling Conflict
Sibling relationships can be highly complex, especially when two or more siblings don’t get along well. While the occasional spat is normal and often essential to developing a healthy sibling relationship, persistent conflict can be damaging.
Sibling conflict can become so frequent that it may be challenging to determine the inciting factor, but most derive from a deeper issue with the family unit itself. To get at the heart of what causes sibling conflict, it’s essential to understand how the structure and support of the family as a whole may contribute to it.
Lack of Familial Structure
Children, especially those of a particularly young age, require a sense of structure to grow into functioning individuals. If a household does not have a distinct familial structure where certain members handle regular responsibilities while also guiding children, those children will be left to their own devices.
In the case of a sibling relationship, a lack of a family system may compel one sibling to designate themselves as an authority figure over the other(s). This can create numerous conflicts, as some siblings may find the dynamic unfair due to a sense of feeling powerless, while in other cases, the sibling “in charge” may be too harsh and domineering.
Without any proper sense of structure or direction from the parental figures of the family, the children will have to operate and struggle under their limited notions of structure and responsibility.
Modeling Parental Tension
Parental figures serve as essential role models to children in many ways. This makes it necessary to set a good example for everything from table manners to public etiquette, but one thing that can often go overlooked is setting an example for appropriate emotional responses and interpersonal communication.
If a young child sees their parents fighting frequently, or expressing feelings of tension or hostility, that child may express similar feelings of tension in their relationships. In the context of a sibling relationship, a fight between parents may turn into a fight between siblings because their role models have set a tense emotional tone.
Lack of Conflict-Resolution Skills
While many children may demonstrate a high emotional intelligence that allows them to avoid conflict, most require instruction on essential conflict-resolution skills. Effective empathy and collaboration with other people is something that’s better taught than learned through extensive conflict. If siblings are allowed to fight out all of their problems, there will likely come a time when disputes are never resolved. Unless siblings can compromise with one another and disregard their selfish needs, they may do irreparable damage to their relationship in the long term.
Benefits of Sibling Therapy in NJ
Through sibling therapy in NJ, you can expect you or your children to develop the following skills:
Better Communication
The therapists at GATE help clients develop better communication skills to set healthy boundaries, express needs, and wants and navigate conflict in a healthy way.
Improved Empathy
Our therapists can work with siblings to develop their empathy skills through role-playing and other skill-building techniques. This will help rebuild these sibling relationships by re-establishing connections.
Healthy Emotional Expression
Clients can expect to learn appropriate and healthy ways to express the negative and positive emotions they experience in their relationships. Our counselors can help siblings emote and express themselves in a healthy, positive manner.
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