Who We Serve

Many of the teens and young adults we treat are challenged with one or many of the following issues or disorders:

Mood Disorders, Depression, and Anxiety

Oakwood is adept at working with teens who struggle with mental health issues that negatively impact their quality of life. Receiving proper support in addressing self-defeating and self-harming behaviors related to depression, anger, mood instability and isolation is crucial to helping young people find solutions to these challenges. When needed, we also coordinate our services with medical health professionals, ensuring that our clients receive any ancillary medical support needed.

Risk-Taking Behaviors

Oakwood’s clinical staff has been treating risk-taking behaviors including binge drinking, and drug and alcohol use for the last quarter century. We believe in educating families as to the neurobiological, psychological, and social components of substance use in the hope that knowledge will facilitate awareness that will impact future life choices. As such, this is the first component in our multi-phasic treatment. Parent coaching, adolescent peer support, relapse prevention, and step-based recovery are also incorporated in Oakwood’s structured format of treatment.

Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder

Poor academic performance, difficulty staying on task, and impulsivity may indicate that a child struggles with ADHD. Our therapists understand the need to identify these issues so that an appropriate treatment approach can be established that is tailored to each child’s specific challenges and needs. Understanding how brain biology informs the choices we make is essential in helping our teens find the courage and resources to recapture their self-esteem and better function with ADHD. When needed, we also coordinate our services with other health professionals and academic service providers to create a network of support that facilitates the best possible outcome for your child.

Low Self-Esteem

Supporting our children and helping them build a good sense of self is essential to living a productive life. There are many reasons why our children judge themselves harshly and suffer from low self-esteem. This can be related to such factors as family dynamics, personality type, or even brain biology. Regardless, our children need to feel valued and value themselves. Our clinical staff works intricately with our families and teens to help teens challenge old self-concepts, allowing teens to meet newfound goals, create change, and develop a more positive sense of self. In addition, we offer parent coaching to teach supportive parenting techniques that facilitate this process.

Co-Dependency

An individual’s inability to establish healthy boundaries with others — the crux of co-dependency — can create unnecessary ruptures and disharmony in interpersonal relationships and family systems. As such, many parents and teens that come to Oakwood struggle with co-dependency. At Oakwood, we work intensively with both teens and parents to help all family members learn how to be conflict resolute rather than conflict avoidant. All family members learn the communication tools that are essential to establishing healthy relationships and healthy family systems.

Family Conflict

At Oakwood, we believe that each individual is a valuable part of the whole. Families are dynamic and, over time, establish a complex co-created existence that is as unique as its individual family members. When parents are open to change and direction, many corrective changes can and do occur. At Oakwood, families are a necessary and integral part of the therapeutic process, and when united in the process of recovery have the capacity to overcome many obstacles.

Academic Failure and Learning Disorders

Many of the children who enter our program have encountered learning difficulties or poor academic performance. Frequently, we find that these children have a learning disability that has gone undiagnosed. As a result, they have not received the appropriate support necessary to achieve better academic success. Their self-esteem is negatively impacted resulting in declining motivation and a negative cycle of failure. By recognizing learning challenges when they are present, we help teens access the support needed to address their challenges and experience academic success.

Non-Verbal Learning Disorders (NLD)

Probably one of the most misunderstood and underdiagnosed problems for children today, this condition leads to deficits in perception, coordination, socialization and problem solving. Experts have found that many children with ADHD also have a NLD. At Oakwood, we provide the psycho-education and skill building for these children and their families that are essential for corrective change.

Sexual Orientation Issues

Adolescence is a time of self-discovery and self-definition. During adolescence teens begin to define their sexual identity, and through this process many of our children begin questioning their sexual orientation and preferences. This can be a very confusing and challenging time, and a high risk stage of development for teens that are struggling with their sexual orientation. Oftentimes teens have strong fears of parental or peer rejection in light of their emerging sexual identity. At Oakwood, we foster a supportive environment for our young people to engage in this process of self-definition, emphasizing the development of self-esteem and self-acceptance.

Academic Failure and Learning Disorders

Many of the children who enter our program have encountered learning difficulties or poor academic performance. Frequently, we find that these children have a learning disability that has gone undiagnosed. As a result, they have not received the appropriate support necessary to achieve better academic success. Their self-esteem is negatively impacted resulting in declining motivation and a negative cycle of failure. By recognizing learning challenges when they are present, we help teens access the support needed to address their challenges and experience academic success.

Non-Verbal Learning Disorders (NLD)

Probably one of the most misunderstood and underdiagnosed problems for children today, this condition leads to deficits in perception, coordination, socialization and problem solving. Experts have found that many children with ADHD also have a NLD. At Oakwood, we provide the psycho-education and skill building for these children and their families that are essential for corrective change.

Sexual Orientation Issues

Adolescence is a time of self-discovery and self-definition. During adolescence teens begin to define their sexual identity, and through this process many of our children begin questioning their sexual orientation and preferences. This can be a very confusing and challenging time, and a high risk stage of development for teens that are struggling with their sexual orientation. Oftentimes teens have strong fears of parental or peer rejection in light of their emerging sexual identity. At Oakwood, we foster a supportive environment for our young people to engage in this process of self-definition, emphasizing the development of self-esteem and self-acceptance.

Academic Failure and Learning Disorders

Many of the children who enter our program have encountered learning difficulties or poor academic performance. Frequently, we find that these children have a learning disability that has gone undiagnosed. As a result, they have not received the appropriate support necessary to achieve better academic success. Their self-esteem is negatively impacted resulting in declining motivation and a negative cycle of failure. By recognizing learning challenges when they are present, we help teens access the support needed to address their challenges and experience academic success.

Non-Verbal Learning Disorders (NLD)

Probably one of the most misunderstood and underdiagnosed problems for children today, this condition leads to deficits in perception, coordination, socialization and problem solving. Experts have found that many children with ADHD also have a NLD. At Oakwood, we provide the psycho-education and skill building for these children and their families that are essential for corrective change.

Sexual Orientation Issues

Adolescence is a time of self-discovery and self-definition. During adolescence teens begin to define their sexual identity, and through this process many of our children begin questioning their sexual orientation and preferences. This can be a very confusing and challenging time, and a high risk stage of development for teens that are struggling with their sexual orientation. Oftentimes teens have strong fears of parental or peer rejection in light of their emerging sexual identity. At Oakwood, we foster a supportive environment for our young people to engage in this process of self-definition, emphasizing the development of self-esteem and self-acceptance.

Sexual Acting Out

Times have changed and so have our children. Teens today are faced with a barrage of mixed messages about friendship, relationships and sex through social media and networking sites. Premature access to sexual content and information with limited censorship has put our children at risk for engaging in high-risk behaviors. Children are developing faster, but they are not equipped to handle all the information that family and society offers. Our therapists handle these topics with dignity and sensitivity by allowing teens to gain a better understanding of their choices and behaviors.

Victims of Abuse and Trauma

A noticeable portion of our children entering treatment suffer from some form of trauma — physical, emotional, and/or sexual. Many times teens’ acting out can be seen as a maladaptive attempt to address and cope with the unresolved thoughts and feelings that exist in trauma’s aftermath. As such trauma can have a direct, profound impact on teens’ developing psychology and sense of self-worth. At Oakwood we utilize psycho-education, cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT), and dialectical behavioral therapy (DBT) to help clients heal from trauma. In addition, we help family members learn how to best support their teen in processing a trauma and its aftermath.

Sexual Acting Out

Times have changed and so have our children. Teens today are faced with a barrage of mixed messages about friendship, relationships and sex through social media and networking sites. Premature access to sexual content and information with limited censorship has put our children at risk for engaging in high-risk behaviors. Children are developing faster, but they are not equipped to handle all the information that family and society offers. Our therapists handle these topics with dignity and sensitivity by allowing teens to gain a better understanding of their choices and behaviors.

Victims of Abuse and Trauma

A noticeable portion of our children entering treatment suffer from some form of trauma — physical, emotional, and/or sexual. Many times teens’ acting out can be seen as a maladaptive attempt to address and cope with the unresolved thoughts and feelings that exist in trauma’s aftermath. As such trauma can have a direct, profound impact on teens’ developing psychology and sense of self-worth. At Oakwood we utilize psycho-education, cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT), and dialectical behavioral therapy (DBT) to help clients heal from trauma. In addition, we help family members learn how to best support their teen in processing a trauma and its aftermath.