Adult Counseling

ADD Counseling for Adults

Many adults suffer with ADD/ADHD. As a result, they experience high levels of frustration that eventually turns into Low Frustration Tolerance (LFT). At CURE Counseling & Assessment Training Centre, we provide the opportunity for a valid diagnosis for adults that may have ADD/ADHD. The ADD test was developed by Dr. Brown and an overview and sample can be downloaded for your convenience in our download section under assessments. After the test is completed it is very easy to determine which of the 6 areas of Executive Functioning are causing the most difficulty. After determining the level of possible dysfunction, interventions can be targeted to aid in the process of providing new coping skills that will make life more manageable. Most people who have ADD need three things: 1) structure, 2) novelty, 3) positive encouragement. The test can be taken at the office for a nominal charge.

From more than 25 years of clinical interviews and research with children, adolescents and adults who have ADD/ADHD, Dr. Brown has developed an expanded model to describe the complex cognitive functions impaired in ADD Syndrome. This model describes executive functions, the cognitive management system of the human brain.

Everyone has occasional impairments in their executive functions, individuals with ADD Syndrome experience much more difficulty in development and use of these functions than do most others of the same age and developmental level. Yet even those with severe ADHD usually have some activities where their executive functions work very well.

They may have chronic difficulty with ADHD symptoms in most areas of life, but when it comes to a few special interests like playing sports or video games, doing art or building lego constructions, their ADHD symptoms are absent. This phenomenon of "can do it here, but not most anyplace else" makes it appear it that ADHD is a simple problem of lacking willpower; it isn't. These impairments of executive functions are usually due to inherited problems in the chemistry of the brain's management system.

Utilizing clinical interview methods, Dr. Brown studied children, adolescents and adults diagnosed with ADHD according to the DSM criteria. He compared their descriptions of their problems with those of matched normal controls. Comparisons between the ADHD-diagnosed and the non-clinical samples in each age group yielded reports of impairments that can be recognized in the six clusters of this model of executive functions:

▪ Activation: organizing tasks and materials, estimating time, prioritizing tasks, and getting started on work tasks. Patients with ADD describe chronic difficulty with excessive procrastination. Often they will put off getting started on a task, even a task they recognize as very important to them, until the very last minute. It is as though they cannot get themselves started until the point where they perceive the task as an acute emergency.

▪ Focus: focusing, sustaining focus, and shifting focus to tasks. Some describe their difficulty in sustaining focus as similar to trying to listen to the car radio when you drive too far away from the station and the signal begins fading in and out: you get some of it and lose some of it. They say they are distracted easily not only by things that are going on around them, but also by thoughts in their own minds. In addition, focus on reading poses difficulties for many. Words are generally understood as they are read, but often have to be read over and over again in order for the meaning to be fully grasped and remembered.

▪ Effort: regulating alertness, sustaining effort, and processing speed. Many with ADHD report they can perform short-term projects well, but have much more difficulty with sustained effort over longer periods of time. They also find it difficult to complete tasks on time, especially when required to do expository writing. Many also experience chronic difficulty regulating sleep and alertness. Often they stay up too late because they can't shut their head off. Once asleep, they often sleep like dead people and have a big problem getting up in the morning.

▪ Emotion: managing frustration and modulating emotions. Although DSM-IV does not recognize any symptoms related to the management of emotion as an aspect of ADHD, many with this disorder describe chronic difficulties managing frustration, anger, worry, disappointment, desire, and other emotions. They speak as though these emotions, when experienced, take over their thinking as a computer virus invades a computer, making it impossible for them give attention to anything else. They find it very difficult to get the emotion into perspective, to put it to the back of their mind, and to get on with what they need to do.

▪ Memory: utilizing working memory and accessing recall. Very often, people with ADHD will report that they have adequate or exceptional memory for things that happened long ago, but great difficulty in being able to remember where they just put something, what someone just said to them, or what they were about to say. They may describe difficulty holding one or several things "on line" while attending to other tasks. In addition, persons with ADHD often complain that they cannot pull out of memory information they have learned when they need it.

▪ Action: monitoring and regulating self-action. Many persons with ADHD, even those without problems of hyperactive behavior, report chronic problems in regulating their actions. They often are too impulsive in what they say or do, and in the way they think, jumping too quickly to inaccurate conclusions. Persons with ADHD also report problems in monitoring the context in which they are interacting. They fail to notice when other people are puzzled, or hurt or annoyed by what they have just said or done and thus fail to modify their behavior in response to specific circumstances. Often they also report chronic difficulty in regulating the pace of their actions, in slowing self and/or speeding up as needed for specific tasks.

Most adults with ADHD report these six clusters of impairments as chronic, to a degree markedly greater than persons without ADHD. The clusters are not mutually exclusive categories; they tend to overlap and are often interactive. Executive Functions impaired in ADHD are complex and multi-faceted.

Addiction/Substance Abuse

Although the term substance can refer to any physical matter, substance abuse has come to refer to the overindulgence in and dependence of a drug or other chemical leading to effects that are detrimental to the individual's physical and mental health, or the welfare of others.

Anger Issues

Anger is an emotion. The physical effects of anger include increased heart rate, blood pressure, and levels of adrenaline and noradrenaline. Some view anger as part of the fight or flight brain response to the perceived threat of harm. Anger becomes the predominant feeling behaviorally, cognitively, and physiologically when a person makes the conscious choice to take action to immediately stop the threatening behavior of another outside force.

Anxiety

Anxiety is a psychological and physiological state characterized by cognitive, somatic, emotional, and behavioral components. These components combine to create an unpleasant feeling that is typically associated with uneasiness, apprehension, fear, or worry.

Blended Family Challenges

A stepfamily, also known as a blended family or reconstituted family, is a family in which one or both members of the couple have children from a previous relationship. The member of the couple to whom the child is not biologically related is the stepparent, specifically the stepmother or stepfather.

Depression

Depression is a state of low mood and aversion to activity. The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders defines a depressed person as experiencing feelings of sadness, helplessness and hopelessness. In traditional colloquy, feeling "depressed" is often synonymous with feeling "sad", but both clinical depression and non-clinical depression can also refer to a conglomeration of more than one feeling.

Domestic Violence

Domestic violence, also known as domestic abuse, spousal abuse, child abuse or intimate partner violence (IPV), can be broadly defined as a pattern of abusive behaviors by one or both partners in an intimate relationship such as marriage, dating, family, friends or cohabitation. Domestic violence has many forms including physical aggression (hitting, kicking, biting, shoving, restraining, throwing objects), or threats thereof; sexual abuse; emotional abuse; controlling or domineering; intimidation; stalking; passive/covert abuse (e.g., neglect); and economic deprivation.

Eating Disorders

An eating disorder is characterized by abnormal eating habits that may involve either insufficient or excessive food intake to the detriment of an individual's physical and emotional health. The causes of eating disorders are complex and not yet fully understood.

Family Counseling

Family therapy, also referred to as couple and family therapy and family systems therapy, is a branch of psychotherapy that works with families and couples in intimate relationships to nurture change and development. It tends to view change in terms of the systems of interaction between family members. It emphasizes family relationships as an important factor in psychological health.

Financial Counseling

If you have interest in developing a workable spending and savings plan, getting out of debt and understanding how to improve your credit score, make better choices with your finances and work toward better choices for retirement, CURE Counseling is able to assist you in developing a basic financial plan that can be integrated into your counseling experience. If you desire extensive financial counseling we would encourage you to consider taking a the DAVE RAMSEY Financial Peace Seminar and seek professionals who are fully dedicated to complete financial education and service.

Grief-Loss

Grief is a multi-faceted response to loss, particularly to the loss of someone or something to which a bond was formed. Although conventionally focused on the emotional response to loss, it also has physical, cognitive, behavioral, social, and philosophical dimensions.

Handicapped Counseling & Challenges

Life Coaching is a proactive approach that provides an opportunity to be more positive and develop new coping skills and new approaches to become the "best you can be" in the situation in which you find yourself. At CURE, we have Josh Vanderbush on our CURE Team who himself is a paraplegic. Josh works with Dr. Shaffer in providing ways to aid handicapped people with new insights and new direction for their lives.

CURE Counseling & Assessment Training Centre is committed to working with people who are handicapped. Counseling and Life Coaching are viable options that may help further develop the current challenges of those who are handicapped. Life Coaching is a proactive approach that provides an opportunity to be more positive and develop new coping skills and new approaches to become the "best you can be" in the situation in which you find yourself. We have Josh Vanderbush on our CURE Team, who is a paraplegic. Josh works with Dr. Shaffer to provide ways to help handicapped people gain new perspectives and learn new insights that may enable them to re-direct their lives.

Marriage Counseling

Marriage counseling is the process of counseling the parties of a relationship in an effort to recognize and to better manage or reconcile troublesome differences and repeating patterns of distress.

Parenting and Co-Parenting Counseling/Classes

Parenting Classes are skill-based and solution-focused. CURE Counseling & Assessment Training Centre is a Psycho-Educational Teaching & Training Centre. In short, our goal is to teach parents new skill sets that will allow them to be more functional and to develop higher levels of relational satisfaction with their children and families. Co-parenting counseling is also offered for parents who may be divorced/separated and are parenting the same children at different times. A certificate for court is available on completion of our Parenting or Co-Parenting Classes.

Personal Counseling (Guidance/Psychotherapy)

Personal counseling is an intentional interpersonal relationship to aid people in problems of living. It aims to increase the person's sense of well-being and can be designed to meet the needs of each client as agreed on by the client and therapist. CURE Counseling strives to provide practical solutions to everyday challenges while encouraging the client to take responsibility for his/her counseling. Personal counseling can include GUIDANCE (the process of helping people make important choices that affect their lives) and/or PSYCHOTHERAPY (were serious problems are focused on to help resolve personal issues or conflicts. Every effort is expended to diagnose and treat the root of the presenting concern. CURE Counseling & Assessment Training Centre is a COUNSELING CENTRE, an ASSESSMENT CENTRE and a TRAINING CENTRE.

Personality Disorders

Personality disorders, formerly referred to as character disorders, are a class of personality types and behaviors that the American Psychiatric Association (APA) defines as "an enduring pattern of inner experience and behavior that deviates markedly from the expectations of the culture of the individual who exhibits it". In short, they are inflexible and maladaptive patterns of behavior that affect us socially, occupationally or any other important areas of our lives.

Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder

Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder is a severe anxiety disorder that can develop after exposure to any event which results in psychological trauma. This event may involve the threat of death to oneself or to someone else, or to one's own or someone else's physical, sexual, or psychological integrity, overwhelming the individual's ability to cope. Children may develop PTSD symptoms by experiencing bullying or sexually traumatic events like age-inappropriate sexual experiences.

Pre-Marital Counseling

Pre-Marital Counseling is a must for couples who desire to develop the greatest possible relationship. At CURE Counseling we provide assessments that demonstrate, with extreme accuracy, relational strengths and challenges that exist in peoples' lives. As a result of these assessments, we are able to show couples where the need is for new skill sets so they can be more compatible. Additionally, we can project, with high levels of certainty, what a couple's relationship will look like 1 year, 3 years and 5 years later if they do not develop new skill sets to strengthen the relationship. Conversely, we can also validate strengths that will be evidenced for years as well.

Pre-Trial Diversion

CURE Counseling & Assessment Training Centre has provided a Pre-Trial Diversion Program since 2007. CURE has provided hundreds of people an opportunity to work through an approved program to have their first offense expunged from their record. CURE works with your District Attorney or Solicitor General to help remove the first offense by completing our program. At the end of the program you receive a certificate of completion.

Procrastination

Procrastination refers to the counterproductive deferment of actions or tasks to a later time. Psychologists often cite such behavior as a mechanism for coping with the anxiety associated with starting or completing any task or decision. There are three criteria for a behavior to be classified as procrastination: it must be counterproductive, needless, and delaying.

Professional Faith-Based Counseling

Professional Faith-Based Counseling is available to all who desire a spiritual approach integrated with solutions for practical living. CURE Counseling & Assessment Training Centre is a Faith-Based Counseling Centre. Important Note: If a client does not want Faith Based Counseling all they need to do is to share their request with the receptionist or their counselor and we will gladly respect your request.

Rebuilding Your Life When a Relationship Ends

Many adults face the challenge of Rebuilding Their Lives When a Relationship Ends. CURE Counseling provides an opportunity for adults to work through key stages of rebuilding so that they develop a more balanced life after working through key issues.

Issues include working through many of the following stages or rebuilding blocks:

Denial, Fear, Adaptation, Loneliness, Friendship, Guilt/Rejection, Grief, Anger, Letting Go, Self-Worth, Transition, Openness, Love, Trust, Relatedness, Sexuality, Singleness, Purpose & Freedom.

Self-Esteem

Self-esteem is a term used in psychology to reflect a person's overall evaluation or appraisal of his or her own worth. Self-esteem encompasses beliefs (for example, "I am competent" or "I am incompetent") and emotions such as triumph, despair, pride and shame.

Self-Harm

Self-harm (SH) or deliberate self-harm (DSH) includes self-injury (SI) and self-poisoning and is defined as the intentional, direct injuring of body tissue without suicidal intent. The most common form of self-harm is skin cutting but self-harm also covers a wide range of behaviours including burning, scratching, banging or hitting body parts, interfering with wound healing, hair pulling (trichotillomania) and the ingestion of toxic substances or objects

Separation Anxiety Disorder

Separation anxiety disorder is a psychological condition in which an individual experiences excessive anxiety regarding separation from home or from people to whom the individual has a strong emotional attachment. It becomes a disorder when the separation reaction becomes strong enough to impair people's ability to conduct their day to day lives and relationships.

Sexual Harrasment

Sexual harassment is intimidation, bullying or coercion of a sexual nature, or the unwelcome or inappropriate promise of rewards in exchange for sexual favors. In some contexts or circumstances, sexual harassment may be illegal. It includes a range of behavior from seemingly mild transgressions and annoyances to actual sexual abuse or sexual assault.

Shyness

In humans, shyness (also called diffidence) is a social psychology term used to describe the feeling of apprehension, lack of confidence, or awkwardness experienced when a person is in proximity to, approaching, or being approached by other people, especially in new situations or with unfamiliar people. Shyness may come from personality introversion, genetic traits, or the environment in which a person is raised.

Specialized Groups for Adults

Specialized groups are offered for Adults on an "as needed" basis. Parenting, Co-Parenting, Self-Esteem, Anger Management, 7 Habits of Highly Effective Families are just some of the classes offered at CURE Counseling & Assessment Training Centre.

Stress

Stress symptoms commonly include a state of alarm and adrenaline production, short-term resistance as a coping mechanism, and exhaustion, as well as irritability, muscular tension, inability to concentrate and a variety of physiological reactions such as headache and elevated heart rate.

2594 Highway 34 East #B

Newnan, GA 30265

770.252.3760

office@curecounseling.com

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