Mental Health Counseling for Individuals with an Intellectual Disability

When your loved one has an intellectual disability (ID), you want to make sure they’re taken care of – and that includes their mental and emotional health.

At WTCSB, we train our counselors to work with individuals with an ID, so that they understand their specific needs, how to best communicate with them, and how to make sure they receive the full benefits of counseling.

If you or someone you love is experiencing a psychological emergency, please contact our crisis line 24/7 at (757) 925-2484

Building Trust

There are many different types of intelligence, and we recognize and celebrate all of our clients. By accommodating our client’s needs, we can understand what they’re going through, and by focusing on their strengths, we invite them to say what’s on their mind. The result is trust.

Through trust, we can help our clients to understand and manage their thoughts and feelings and life’s hurdles.

Improving Quality of Life for Clients with Intellectual Disability

We are able to focus on the specific areas common to those with intellectual disabilities including depression, suicidal ideation, grief, stress, and PTSD as well as managing anxiety, stress, grief, negative self talk, and loneliness.

Counseling can help individuals with an intellectual disability with:

• Socializing and making friends
• Improving relationships with family
• Improving functioning within the family
• Reducing anxiety
• Strengthening healthy coping mechanisms
• Getting and keeping a job
• Overcoming substance misuse or abuse
• Improving school or work performance
• Leading a happier, more fulfilling life

Counseling with Intellectual Disability is Specialized

Our counselors strive to effectively communicate with clients with ID by avoiding long or complex sentences, deep concepts, or figurative language. When appropriate, our counselors will use talk therapy. However, some individuals, such as those who have communication limitations, may benefit from other methods.

We offer a variety of counseling to meet the specific needs associated with an intellectual disability, which may include:

• Talk therapy
• Role playing with toys or stuffed animals
• Art therapy
• Music
• Videos
• Books
• Pictures
• Quiet or rest time

Ready to Get Started?

If you or your loved has been showing signs of depression, anxiety, or other mental health concerns, or if you simply want to improve quality of life, you may benefit from counseling.

Providing mental health care for populations that are often overlooked is important to us, so our counselors are educated on intellectual disabilities and how to appropriately and effectively help the individuals who live with them to manage their thoughts and feelings and how they react to life events.

You can get started today by making an appointment online for same-day access, or you can call us at 757-758-5106.