Why In Step
In Step is the rare therapy practice that specializes in individual, family, and group therapy services. We know through experience that each of our clients is unique in their needs, and we tailor our services accordingly. We pride ourselves on listening to you and if we don’t have the service you need, we will help you find it.
About our Founder/Clinical Director –
Cathi Cohen
Cathi Cohen, LCSW, is a therapist, parent coach, and clinical director and founder of In Step, a mental health group practice in Fairfax, Virginia. She is the author of several books including Raise Your Child’s Social IQ: Stepping Stones to People Skills for Kids, Outnumbered, Not Outsmarted!, and Stepping Stones to Building Friendships. Through her books and workshops, she has become an internationally recognized expert on parenting and social/emotional development in children and teens.
Cathi’s Books
In order to provide crucial social and emotional scaffolding for our children, we need to start by taking a look at ourselves as parents. And I mean really look. This is not about how many of their soccer games you attend or the number of times you screamed at them and took away their phones. It’s about evaluating your strengths, as well as areas that need improvement, and then very purposefully moving forward armed with that information.
Parents, this book offers direct, sense-making, step-by-step exercises that you can do with your children to increase their social skills and awareness. Based on the highly successful social skills taught for many years in Cathi Cohen’s training groups, Raise Your Child’s Social IQ provides parents with the structure to work on skills at home—how to join a group, how to choose friends, how to notice what people around them are feeling, how to handle angry feelings and much, much more. This updated version features new sections on cyberbullying and social media.
Many children have difficulty making friends on their own; they need help. Research has shown that social skills can be taught and the most dramatic improvements are accomplished in a group setting. Camp, with its new people and activities, is a natural setting to develop social skills and build strong friendships.
Meet the Team
Each of In Step’s licensed clinicians enjoy their own unique specializations and are also qualified group leaders. In Step clinicians collaborate with each other and outside professionals to help our clients achieve growth and change.
Areas of Expertise
ADHD
Not all children, teens, and adults with ADHD have social and/or emotional challenges. ADHD-related behavior comes in various forms. As the saying goes, “if you have met one person with ADHD, you have met exactly one person with ADHD”. No two people with ADHD are alike. Depending upon the number, the severity, and how the symptoms manifest in everyday life, a person with ADHD and their family members may be impacted very little or greatly. The important thing for families impacted by ADHD is awareness, compassion, and motivation to change unproductive patterns of behavior.
High Functioning Autism (HFA)
Children, teens, and adults with HFA may need help learning to manage their HFA symptoms. HFA is a highly complex, variable neurological condition — and, as such, looks very different from person to person. The symptoms of HFA may actually become increasingly debilitating over time as the stakes of life get higher and higher.
A multi-modal approach offers kids, teens, parents, adults, and couples strategies and methods for managing their HFA symptoms.
Our LEGO Social Development Groups are ongoing therapy groups specifically geared towards children who have ASD or demonstrate other significant social communication difficulties is an evidence-based social skills program that has aided thousands of children with HFA and their parents learn and practice needed social skills such as listening, reading social signals accurately, and managing challenging emotions.
In Step offers skill-based groups for teens on the spectrum . We also offer interpersonal therapy groups for teens on the spectrum that help teenagers develop meaningful relationships with others.
Our parent coaching sessions — offered in groups and one-on-one — use the principles outlined in Cohen’s Raise Your Parenting IQ workbook to aid couples and parents impacted by a family member with HFA.
Depression
All people are sad sometimes, but depression is different from sadness. Depression is persistent and may be communicated in varied ways in children, teens, and adults. It’s typical for kids and adults alike to experience ups and downs in life.
However, some behaviors are outside of the norm that may indicate a need for outside help.
Therapy is extremely effective in treating depression.
Anxiety
Anxiety is the most common psychological problem treated at In Step. This debilitating disorder affects a suffering person’s thoughts, body, and behavior, impacting children, teens, and adults. Anxiety becomes especially painful when it interferes with typical development and life’s activities.
Therapy can help modify the core components of anxiety: anticipating an undesirable future, imagining the worst, and engaging in avoidance behaviors. Understanding the connection between thoughts, feelings, and behaviors can help generate alternative explanations for events. When employed thoughtfully and professionally, therapeutic methods such as cognitive restructuring, relaxation exercises, mindfulness, and exposure are healing.
Trained clinicians use evidence-based CBT (cognitive-based therapy) and DBT(dialectical behavior therapy) to help people with anxiety.
Resilience | Self Esteem
Some people have difficulty coping with mistakes and disappointments. For these people, everyday challenges can feel insurmountable. Negative, all-or-nothing thinking may be a constant source of stress, and they have little confidence in their ability to solve their own problems and bounce back after adverse events.
With parental support and therapy, children who may not be naturally hard-wired with resilience and optimism can develop critical coping strategies and skills to use when confronted with setbacks, mistakes, and life stressors. With increased feelings of self-efficacy and interpersonal empowerment, kids and teens recognize and appreciate their strengths and talents, thereby helping them feel more comfortable in the world.
Executive Functioning
Difficulties with executive functioning skills explain why so many teens who seem very capable and bright still struggle academically to meet their obvious potential. These young people struggle to initiate a present awareness with future anticipation and past experiences to create a realistic goal and plan. When your child reaches their pre-teen and teen years, their problems are exacerbated by increased pressures and demands on top of their age-appropriate desire to be independent. Parents frequently feel frustrated and thwarted in their effort to offer their child the scaffolding s/he needs.
Self-Harm
Experiencing relationship conflicts or feeling overwhelmed by emotions and situations is something we all face from time to time. For some, this stress, combined with already heightened emotions, is extremely difficult to manage. In efforts to regulate their emotions, individuals may resort to destructive behavior such as self-harm, suicide attempts, or other unsafe behaviors.
Trained clinicians use evidence-based DBT (dialectical behavior therapy) to help people with maladaptive coping skills.