COBYS Family Services Offers the Blues Program

COBYS Family Services has been facilitating the Blues Program for over 6 years, offering the program both in-house to schools as well as virtually to the community, serving close to 300 adolescents.  For the past 4 years, they have also been the sole provider of training Blues Program facilitators across the nation.

The Blues Program teaches teens the skills needed to combat depression, stress, anxiety, or negative thoughts.  When asked to name one of the most valuable skills taught in this program, our educator, Bria Griffin, mentioned the What’s the Alternative skill.  Bria replied, “I’ve seen the What’s the Alternative skills help students – and even myself – think about problems differently and experience more positive emotions.”  “It helps to find alternative ways to look at our problems.”  Abby Keiser, Director of Family Life Services at COBYS, identified the Having More Fun activity as a valuable tool . . . “the Having More Fun activity they identify can bring pleasure to their lives, helping them not to be isolated, thus decreasing depression symptoms.”  Holly Hardin, Family Life Education Supervisor, loves to see when “teens often have a lightbulb moment when they understand that our feelings are not caused by what has happened, but by what we think about what has happened.”  “Trigger + thought = feeling.”  “And about 75% of the time our automatic negative thoughts aren’t even true if we really look at them.”  “Understanding that, can break the cycle of false negative thoughts.”

The Blues Program helps teens to benefit from connecting with their peers and having the opportunity to talk about topics, such as anxiety, that can often make them feel alone. Griffin recommends that we make sure to listen to our teens, normalizing their emotions, and finding ways to help them feel safe and connected to others . . . all things that our educators try to do in the Blues Program.

The Blues Program fills an important need in today’s world.  Both Keiser and Hardin mentioned that the need for programs that address teens’ mental health remains strong, with only about half of teens with mental health struggles actually receiving help.  The Blues Program aims to “catch it low” when problems with depression, stress, or anxiety start, therefore preventing these issues from growing into more serious problems.  Unfortunately, one of the reasons that adolescents may not be receiving the help they need is due to a lack of the number of therapists in our nation to meet the needs of adolescent mental health. In this case, The Blues Program can serve as a stop-gap measure while the teen is on the therapist’s waiting list.  Another reason may be due to a teen’s reluctance to seek the help they need.  Keiser emphasizes that the teen needs to be able to trust an individual they are sharing information to, therefore the best practice would be to have the teen meet with a therapist for five sessions to see if rapport can be built between the teen and the therapist.  Hardin reminds us that mental health can still carry a stigma which can make some teens reluctant to reach out for help.  “We like to talk about some benefits of attending the group -- such as more control over our emotional wellness, feeling more balanced, or understanding how to reach our potential and meet our goals – to encourage the teens to give the program a try.”  “Once they start, they usually see the benefit themselves and continue to come.”

The Blues Program empowers teens with information they can use to make their lives better.  When training our staff, we often hear that they wish they would have known this information when they were young – it is simple and practical information that creates lasting improvements in how we feel.  COBYS Family Services has also been able to reach a variety of different groups, including school’s gifted programs, student leaders, etc.  Keiser reported that “many times these students may not show depression or anxiety symptoms because they are good at hiding it from others due to expectations and even perceptions of other people in their lives.”  “It has benefited these students to learn these skills for themselves and then help their peers.”  

If you’d like to find more information on The Blues Program, please visit https://bluesprogram.org/.  If you or your loved one is experiencing difficult emotions or challenging behaviors, please be sure to contact professional help and advice as needed.