Former Blue Ridge Student Returns as Field Staff Six Years Later

A More Integrated Approach to Family Therapy at Blue Ridge

September 15, 2026

When an adolescent comes to Blue Ridge, they aren’t the only person entering into a process of change. Their family is part of that process, too.

The challenges that bring a young person to treatment often exist within a much bigger picture. Anxiety, depression, substance use, school avoidance, emotional dysregulation, or behavioral concerns can affect communication, trust, boundaries, and relationships throughout the family. Over time, families can find themselves caught in patterns that are difficult to recognize and even harder to change.

That’s why family therapy has always been an important part of treatment at Blue Ridge.

While students are doing their own therapeutic work in the field, parents are engaged in a parallel process at home. Our goal is to help both sides better understand what has been happening within the family and begin developing different ways of communicating, responding, and relating to one another.

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Family Therapy Is More Than a Family Session

Family therapy at Blue Ridge doesn’t happen only when everyone is sitting together in the same conversation.

Students explore their relationships and family experiences through individual therapy, group work, experiential activities, and specific therapeutic assignments. At the same time, parents participate in weekly parent coaching and remain connected with their child’s Primary Therapist throughout treatment.

This gives both parents and students space to look at their own experiences before bringing those perspectives together.

For parents, that might mean examining how they respond when their child is struggling, recognizing patterns that have developed over time, or considering how family dynamics may need to change when their child returns home.

For students, it can mean learning to identify and communicate emotions, exploring experiences of conflict or disconnection, understanding their role within family patterns, and practicing more effective ways of expressing what they need.

The work is different for every family because the relationships, histories, and challenges each family brings into treatment are different.

Connecting the Work Happening on Both Sides

One of the most important parts of family therapy is helping the work happening with parents and students inform one another.

A student may be developing greater awareness of a particular family pattern while their parents are examining that same pattern from a completely different perspective. Both experiences matter.

Primary Therapists help connect those pieces throughout treatment through their work with students and ongoing communication with parents. Depending on the needs of the family, this may also include family-focused assignments, letter writing, facilitated conversations, and opportunities for parents and students to communicate the impact of their experiences to one another.

We are now creating even more opportunities for that connection to happen in real time.

Kathy Donovan, who provides weekly parent coaching and direct supervision to our therapists, will also spend time in the field one to two times each month working directly with students. She will collaborate closely with Primary Therapists, including Ellianna and Logan, on family-focused assignments, conversations, and interventions.

When clinically appropriate, Kathy may also help facilitate student impact letters to parents, support parents in writing letters of awareness and accountability to their child, or join Primary Therapists in important family conversations.

Because Kathy will have direct relationships with parents, students, and therapists, she can help connect the family work and address dynamics as they emerge.

Practicing Change Throughout Treatment

Family work isn’t something we want to save until the end of treatment.

Families need opportunities to practice what they’re learning along the way.

Sometimes that means having a difficult conversation differently than they have before. It might mean a parent listening without immediately trying to solve a problem, a student communicating something they have struggled to put into words, or both sides developing a clearer understanding of how the same experience affected them differently.

It can also mean taking responsibility.

Family therapy gives adolescents space to consider the impact of their choices and behavior while also giving parents opportunities to examine their own patterns, acknowledge hurt, and make changes where needed.

These conversations can be difficult, which is why direct clinical support matters. Therapists can help families slow down, recognize familiar cycles as they happen, and practice responding differently.

Preparing Families for What Comes Next

The family work happening during treatment also helps prepare everyone for the transition beyond Blue Ridge.

An adolescent may make significant progress while away from home, but returning to the same relationships and patterns without additional family change can make that progress difficult to sustain.

Parents need time to practice, too.

Throughout treatment, families can begin thinking about what needs to look different at home: how they will communicate during conflict, how boundaries will be handled, how parents will respond when their child is struggling, and how the family can support progress without immediately falling back into familiar roles.

The goal isn’t to eliminate conflict or create a perfect family dynamic. It’s to help families understand their patterns more clearly and develop healthier ways of navigating difficult moments together.

Continuing to Strengthen Family Therapy at Blue Ridge

Our expanded approach builds on family work that is already happening throughout a student’s time at Blue Ridge.

Parents will continue receiving weekly coaching. Students will continue working closely with their Primary Therapists. Therapists will continue helping families understand and address the dynamics that brought them to treatment.

What we’re adding is another layer of connection between those pieces.

By creating more opportunities for the clinicians working with parents to also know and work directly with students, we can better connect what is happening across the family system as treatment unfolds.

Because meaningful change for an adolescent rarely happens in isolation. When families have opportunities to understand their patterns, take responsibility, communicate differently, and practice new ways of relating, everyone has the opportunity to participate in what comes next.

About Blue Ridge Therapeutic Wilderness

Located in the Blue Ridge mountains of North Georgia, Blue Ridge Therapeutic Wilderness is the leading nature-based therapy program to integrate a family systems approach, whole body health and wellness, and holistic, assessment driven, clinical treatment for troubled youth with anxiety, depression and other mental health challenges.

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