About Art Therapy
Are you having trouble expressing yourself through words?
If so, this may be the perfect method for you.
Art therapy is a form of psychotherapy that uses the creative process of making art to improve and enhance the physical, mental, and emotional well-being of individuals of all ages. It is based on the belief that the creative process involved in artistic self-expression helps people to resolve conflicts and problems, to develop interpersonal skills, manage behavior, reduce stress, increase self-esteem and self-awareness, and achieve insight.
Art therapy is used with children, adolescents, adults, older adults, groups, and families to assess and treat all sorts of disorders. Anxiety, depression, eating disorders, trauma, along with many other mental and emotional problems and disorders are just a few of the areas that can be helped.
With eating disorders, symptoms tend to numb and camouflage the self. I frequently encourage the use of art therapy and journaling as a form of self expression. You might write a letter to your body and/or to your eating disorder. You may do a life-size body tracing or create a life-size doll. These are all ways of reaching deeper inside the self to figure out who you are and what you are feeling. The goal is to reduce your symptoms so that you can begin to work on yourself.
