Steps from the Green Line
Adjustment Disorder Treatment in Boston
If you’re severely struggling after a big life event, then you may have developed an adjustment disorder. Symptoms of an adjustment disorder include feeling overwhelmed, struggling with your daily life, anxiety, depression, and more.
Adjustment disorders can happen to anyone. Risk factors include big life changes, such as a divorce or the death of a loved one. You might even experience adjustment disorder symptoms after less serious events, such as a big move to a new state.
If you are struggling after a big change in your life, you deserve help from a mental health expert like us. With our help, you can develop coping skills and build up a support system that can help you improve your emotional well-being.
What is an Adjustment Disorder?
An adjustment disorder is not just a reluctance to adjust to changes in one’s life. It’s an extreme emotional or behavioral reaction to change. The change could be something others see as a boon, like a new job or moving. In other cases, the stressful life event could be traumatic, for example, the death of a loved one.
Adjustment disorders do tend to crop up with other mental health conditions. You are likely to experience symptoms like depression or anxiety, for example. Mental health is rarely straightforward, and whether you have an adjustment disorder or an anxiety disorder means little if it impacts your quality of life.
That’s why it’s so important to seek out a mental health professional if you find yourself struggling with adapting to a change in your life, especially if you think your response is unreasonable. Our treatment plans work with you, meaning we can help you regardless of the behavioral symptoms you are experiencing.
Adjustment Disorders vs PTSD
While adjustment disorders share many of the same symptoms as post-traumatic stress disorder or anxiety disorders, they are not exactly the same. Their main difference is in the inciting incident.
Adjustment disorders happen after a stressful event, not necessarily a dangerous or traumatic event. Stressful events can be non-life-threatening or non-harmful events.
Technically, you can develop PTSD following a divorce, for example, if you survived abuse during the relationship.
A stressful event is one you would normally expect yourself to manage in a healthy way but seemingly are unable to. A move, a new job, or even starting university can all act as the inciting stressful event for those with an adjustment disorder.
When to Get Adjustment Disorder Treatment
There’s no need to wait to have all of the adjustment disorder symptoms in order to meet diagnostic criteria, either. The list of symptoms is not a checklist you need to complete.
You can get help from expert clinicians, psychologists, and psychiatrists who can help you get to the bottom of your depressed mood and help you build up the skills to lift yourself out of it.
If, during evaluation, we diagnose you with an adjustment disorder, then you can use that to empower and inform your treatment plan. Otherwise, we’ll treat you for your other mental health conditions. An adjustment disorder with anxiety and depressed mood is fairly common for those with an adjustment disorder.
What are the Emotional or Behavioral Symptoms of Adjustment Disorders?
Those with an adjustment disorder respond to changes in their life in an unhealthy or even excessive way. It’s normal to get nervous before starting a new job or sad after moving away. If your nervousness becomes unending anxiety, however, then you may be experiencing an adjustment disorder.
Similarly, if your depressed mood after the big move persists and it’s now progressed into a major depressive disorder, you may be dealing with an adjustment disorder mixed with other mental disorders like depression.
The symptoms those with adjustment disorders experience vary significantly from one person to another. They can include both mental and physical symptoms:
Emotional Symptoms
Some of the major symptoms of an adjustment disorder are emotional. You may feel:
- Hopelessness
- Emptiness
- Depressed
- Anxious
- Fearful
- Irritated
- Angry
More than that, however, you may experience difficulty concentrating, a loss of interest in activities you once enjoyed, emotional numbness, or you may start lashing out. In short, you’ll be experiencing symptoms similar to both depression and anxiety, only in this case, the triggers are directly related to the change in your life.
Behavioral Problems
There are also behavioral issues associated with adjustment disorders. Those with an adjustment disorder may:
- Find it difficult to concentrate
- Over or under-eat
- Become more hostile or aggressive towards themselves, others, or objects
- Turn to substance use
- Withdraw into themselves
Social withdrawal, addiction-related behavioral problems, and aggression are all common for those experiencing symptoms of an adjustment disorder.
Other Common Symptoms
There are a few other common symptoms that you may experience:
- Fatigue
- Trouble sleeping
- Headaches
- Digestive difficulties
You may also find it difficult to accomplish tasks. For example, you may find it hard to keep up with your university’s course load or with your job. Because of these symptoms, you might end up in legal or financial trouble.
Adjustment Disorder Timeline
Adjustment disorders tend to come to a head weeks or months after the change. This is because experiencing feelings after a big change is normal. If those negative feelings persist and don’t seem to get better, however, then you may be experiencing adjustment disorder symptoms.
What's the Treatment Plan for Adjustment Disorder?
Adjustment disorders require a personalized touch and the help of a mental health professional, particularly if you have a chronic adjustment disorder that includes persistent symptoms.
Here at Back Bay Mental Health, we’ll put together your very own personalized adjustment disorder treatment plan. This can include:
Talk Therapy
You will work with a therapist to help you understand the underlying cause behind your adjustment disorder. Getting to the root cause can help you understand the reasons why you are responding the way you are, which is a key step in taking control of your responses.
Cognitive Behavioral Therapy
CBT therapy will help you identify negative thoughts and challenge them as they happen. CBT can help if you experience suicidal thoughts, intrusive thoughts, anxiety, or disturbed emotions. It’s one of the top tools for managing the stress and anxiety associated with adjustment disorders.
Group Therapy
You will also have access to a support group. Support and group therapy works to help you connect with others, feel less alone in what you’re going through, and is a great source for building up your social skills and other coping skills.
Medication Management
As we have psychiatrists on staff we can help you medically as well as psychologically. If your psychiatrist believes it helpful, for example, you may be prescribed anti anxiety medications. We will then monitor your condition and make adjustments to help you find the right medication and dosage.
Holistic Recommendations
Your therapist will help you develop coping strategies to help you adopt and maintain a healthy lifestyle outside of the clinic. Support for you outside of therapy is to help you continue to build up healthy habits that support the work you do in person, after all.
Do I Qualify for Adjustment Disorder Treatment in Boston?
You will specifically qualify for adjustment disorder treatment if you experience:
- Anxiety or sadness following a non-harmful event
- Fatigue, insomnia, or appetite changes
- Behavioral issues like withdrawal, recklessness, or disassociation
If you don’t quite qualify for adjustment disorder treatment, don’t worry. If you are struggling, you deserve treatment, and we can provide it. The only difference is you might be treated for trauma, PTSD, or anxiety instead.
Regardless of what you specifically have, get in touch with us. We can evaluate you and help diagnose your symptoms so you understand what’s going on with you. We’ll then work with you, your goals, and your preferences to build an entirely personalized treatment plan designed to help you thrive.
Why Choose Back Bay Mental Health for Treatment?
We are a private clinic that offers high-quality treatments with zero wait times. We’re also 100% flexible, so you can work in your treatment sessions around your schedule.
We frequently work with university students and know just how demanding course loads can be. We also work with professionals.
Here, you’ll find a private, safe, and comforting environment where you can get the support, guidance, and help you need to lead a better life.
Get in Touch with Our Experts Today
We are an intensive outpatient program*, meaning you get comprehensive support while living at home or school. You’ll work with a psychologist, psychiatrist, and with group therapy counselors to work through your condition and build up the skills you need to reconnect with others and increase your confidence.
Together we can help you relearn how to adjust to new changes in your life in a healthy way. All that’s left is for you to get in touch with our experts. There’s no waiting list, so we can book you in for your first appointment ASAP.