Anxiety and Self Esteem (April 14, 2014)

(Because these interviews and sessions are completely confidential, to share their experiences I am giving my four group members fake names- those of a color to be exact. You will be reading about purple, red, green, and blue. I spend an hour with each for every session.)

My very first session! To be completely honest, I was very nervous! But I wanted to make sure that they felt comfortable and I needed to be sure that they felt like they were in a safe place where they wouldn't be judged. Because it was my first session it started off a little slow with each of them. The main focus of this session was on anxiety. I had each of them answer some questions from a worksheet my mentor, Dr. Rosemary, gave me. These questions would help me understand their feelings and actually calculate his level of anxiety. Purple scored a considerably normal amount of anxiety. The symptoms he occasionally feels are ups and downs that the Beck Anxiety Inventory thinks to be normal. Red, on the other hand, scored to have mild anxiety disturbances. In red's situation, some symptoms she feel increase when she is under a lot of pressure, leaving her very anxious in uncomfortable situations. Green also scored to have mild anxiety disturbances. One thing that he feels stands out the most is his inability to relax which is very interesting. Lastly, blue scored to have borderline clinical anxiety, mainly from her shakiness. She also claimed to be a "nervous" person. Another main focus of this session was on their self esteem. With another worksheet provided by my mentor, I had them answer certain questions about themselves, this gave them the chance to really analyze how they sees themselves. Purple's self- esteem score was very normal. Although there is always room for improvement, his self- esteem is in a healthy state. Red, on the other hand scored a very low self- esteem, unfortunately. I told her that an important thing for her to learn to do is to give herself compliments every once and awhile to remind herself how great she is and how worthy she is of being loved by herself. Green scored on okay level for his self- esteem. We discussed that he also needs to remind himself of how talented he is, not only as a student but as a person as well. Blue scored a low self- esteem. Her biggest issue is with her body, which is normal in a female teenager. We discussed that it's okay to be different but it's important to accept yourself for just the way you are. A main thing mentioned all around is the importance of a good self-esteem and weighed the pros and cons. I feel like we could definitely work on all of their self-esteem! For our next session, I'd like to learn more about their next move, as in what they plan on doing after high school because I know thinking and planning out our futures can create a lot of anxiety for some people.

Time logged: 4 Hours