“I’m so lonely and depressed,” are words I’ve started to hear on a regular basis. Our reduced social calendars due to COVID precautions have been positive in some ways, but for our teenagers this is hard. Teens need to socialize. I have more to say on the relationship between feeling depressed and our socially distant life right now in the short video below. I want us all to be extremely responsible, but we have to balance mental health and physical health. I’m sure that you, like me, are constantly considering how to balance these two things. Mental health is also extremely important, so what are we to do? I don’t have a perfect answer. My only goal for today is to gently remind you that your teenager has to see friends in some capacity to feel right.

Helping teens grow and families improve connection,
Lauren Goodman, MS, MFT