Parent–Teen Connection Group
Finding Connection While Growing Apart
Adolescence asks families to hold two important needs at once: a teenager’s growing need for freedom and independence—and the continuing need to know that a parent or caregiver is emotionally available, responsive, and safe.
Even deeply loving families can become caught in painful patterns of arguing, criticizing, withdrawing, shutting down, or pushing one another away. Beneath these reactions, parents and teens are often struggling with the same questions: Do you understand me? Can I come to you when I need you? Will you let me grow without letting me go completely?
Based on attachment science and Emotionally Focused Family Therapy, Hold Me Tight® / Let Me Go is an experiential relationship-education program created to help parents, caregivers, and teens understand the patterns that create distance and develop new ways of reaching for one another.
Through gentle teaching, video demonstrations, guided exercises, and meaningful conversations held privately between each parent and teen, families will learn to:
- Recognize recurring cycles of conflict, misunderstanding, and disconnection
- Understand the vulnerable feelings and attachment needs beneath anger, criticism, withdrawal, or defiance
- Communicate with greater openness, curiosity, and emotional responsiveness
- Support a teenager’s growing independence while preserving a secure emotional bond
- Repair moments of hurt and rebuild trust after conflict
- Create safer ways to ask for comfort, support, space, and understanding
- Strengthen the connection that helps families navigate adolescence together
Although families participate alongside others, personal conversations remain private between each teen and their parent or caregiver. Sharing with the larger group is always optional. The experience is designed to honor each family’s boundaries and to feel warm, respectful, inclusive, and emotionally safe.
This group may be especially meaningful for families who love one another deeply but struggle to communicate, feel caught in repeated conflict, or worry that adolescence is creating distance they do not know how to repair. A brief consultation and screening will help determine whether this group provides the appropriate level of support for your family.
Hold Me Tight® / Let Me Go is a structured relationship-education and enrichment experience. It is not a substitute for individualized family therapy, crisis intervention, or treatment when there are immediate safety concerns.
Upcoming dates and registration information coming soon.
Coming Soon — Facilitator Training in Progress