Counseling Tokyo

Depression & Anxiety

Therapy Approaches
Our Tokyo counseling service takes a balance of the different major types of therapy cognitive/behavioral (CBT), psychodynamic, supportive, group psychotherapy and others) is used to fit with individual needs.

Psychodynamic Psychotherapy: Our Tokyo counseling service also provides psychodynamic or insight-oriented psychotherapy. Further description of this approach is here: Core Issue-Defense Paradigm.
CBT: we also use Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) to correct negative thinking patterns that cause disturbances. CBT can also be combined with medications. This shows how Psychopharmacology-Integrated CBT can be used together as a “medication-illness schema” to integrate with a psychology-psychotherapy scheme in order to become synergistic in effect with counseling and medication interventions.

Medication: sometimes an illness like severe depression or anxiety may require medication in order to allow the talk therapy to jump-start. The therapists at our counseling office have considerable experience in using both non-medical as well as psychiatric medications for these problems.

Substance abuse: It is very important for us to factor in substance use and abuse when people have psychiatric symptoms. You can see this page here Alcohol Treatment in Japan. We are happy to help persons with alcohol or substance abuse issues in Tokyo or greater Japan via phone or Skype counseling at our Tokyo counseling service.

PPD: we also see persons with Postpartum Deression (PPD) at our counseling center. The incidence of PPD is 5% to 9% of women in the first few months after childbirth but can also occur after a miscarriage. The presentation is very similar to that of a major depression, and is probably caused by changes in brain chemistry that accompany the hormonal and other physiologic changes of pregnancy.

ADD & ADHD
Our counseling practice also sees many persons with ADD or ADHD: see our ADD/ADHD article in the Tokyo Families Magazine. ADD stands for attention deficit disorder, and ADHD stands for attention deficit and hyperactivity disorde, common problems in our Tokyo counseling service.

ADD/ADHD is usually first noticed in children and adolescents, but a considerable number of adults with attention deficit continue to experience symptoms such as distraction, clutter, trouble with time-management, hyper focus or "zoning" into certain activities. Hyperactive symptoms such as constantly being on-the-go, over-work, impatience, intolerance may persist into adulthood. This is commonly called Adult ADHD.

There are two major forms of Attention Deficit Disorder; the Predominantly Inattentive Type (ADD) and the Predominantly Hyperactive-Impulsive type (ADHD). Some persons may also have a combined type. While ADD/ADHD has become widely known in society in recent years, many persons do not realize they may have this until it is pointed out to them and explained carefully.

Diagrams of clinical issues at our Tokyo counseling service.

Core Issues & Defenses
- Core psychological issues people have and the adaptive and maladaptive defenses people use. This chart is used to help people understand the fundamental working of, and the weakness and strengths, in their personality makeup.
Mood Effects on Psychology
- how abnormal mood can lead to negative self conclusions which then promote feelings and behaviors that are not optimal.
Self Esteem Needs in Relationships
- how the mechanics of intimate relationships can lead to crashes in self esteem. This graph is useful to help persons who are suffering a break-up in an important relationship.
Obedience & Defiance Cycle
- how a cycle between obedience and defiance can lead to resentment, guilt and fear, secondary depression, anxiety, conflict, and decreased self-assertion.

We strive to provide a flexible approach for persons work thru issues important to them. Thank you for reading this Tokyo counseling service page.