Parent Support for Child and Teen Anxiety and OCD
SPACE therapy for parents in San Marino, minutes from Pasadena, and throughout California via telehealth
When your child is struggling with anxiety or OCD…
The whole family can get pulled into trying to keep their anxiety under control.
You may find yourself reassuring your child over and over, helping them avoid things that scare them, participating in OCD rituals, changing family plans, or doing things for them that they no longer feel able to do.
These patterns are called family accommodation.
They usually come from a caring place. But over time, they can unintentionally help anxiety or OCD become stronger.
SPACE gives parents another way to help.
What is SPACE?
SPACE (Supportive Parenting for Anxious Childhood Emotions) is a parent-based treatment developed by Dr. Eli Lebowitz for children and teenagers with anxiety, OCD, and related difficulties.
In SPACE, parents attend the therapy sessions. Your child does not need to participate directly.
The work focuses on two things:
responding to your child’s anxiety with support and understanding
gradually reducing the ways the family has learned to accommodate the anxiety or OCD
The message to your child becomes:
I understand that this is really hard.
And I believe you can handle it.
What Is Family Accommodation?
Family accommodation happens when parents or other family members change their behavior to reduce a child’s anxiety or distress.
That can look like:
repeatedly reassuring your child that they are safe
answering the same anxious question again and again
participating in OCD rituals
helping your child avoid feared situations
changing family routines around anxiety
doing tasks your child is afraid to do themselves
allowing anxiety or OCD to determine where the family goes and what the family does
Accommodation often works in the short term. Your child feels better, and everyone gets some relief.
Unfortunately, that relief can also teach the brain that the feared situation really did need to be avoided, escaped, or made certain.
SPACE helps parents become less accommodating without becoming less supportive.
What Happens in SPACE?
SPACE is practical. We focus primarily on things you can change as a parent, rather than trying to convince your child to stop being anxious.
We typically:
Identify how anxiety or OCD is affecting your family.
Notice where reassurance, avoidance, rituals, or other accommodations have developed.
Learn ways to respond that communicate both empathy and confidence.
Choose one specific accommodation to begin changing.
Make a clear plan for communicating that change to your child.
Prepare for the anxiety, anger, frustration, or resistance that may follow.
Continue making gradual changes as your family becomes more confident.
You do not need to eliminate every accommodation overnight.
The goal is to make planned, manageable changes that help your child develop greater confidence and independence over time.
A typical course of SPACE is approximately 12 sessions, although treatment can be adjusted to the needs of your family.
What If My Child Refuses Therapy?
Parents can still make meaningful changes even when a child refuses therapy.
This is one of the biggest advantages of SPACE.
Your child does not need to:
attend the sessions
agree that anxiety is a problem
complete exposures
be motivated for therapy
agree to change their own behavior
Instead, we work with the part of the system that parents can actually control: how you respond to anxiety and OCD at home.
SPACE can be particularly useful when a child or teenager is highly avoidant, resistant to therapy, or not yet ready to participate in Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP).
It can also be used alongside a child’s individual therapy when family accommodation is making it harder for treatment gains to stick.
Support Without Reassurance
One of the hardest parts of parenting an anxious child is figuring out the difference between supporting them and helping anxiety get what it wants.
For example, your child may ask:
“Are you sure I’m not sick?”
“Promise nothing bad is going to happen?”
“Are you positive I didn’t do something wrong?”
Giving reassurance can feel loving and completely reasonable. It can also become part of an OCD or anxiety cycle when the child repeatedly needs certainty in order to feel okay.
Parent work can help you respond in a way that says:
I see how hard this is. I’m here with you. And I believe you can tolerate not knowing for sure.
For more about reassurance, compulsions, ERP, and childhood OCD, you can also read my OCD Treatment FAQ.
My Approach to Parent Work
My graduate research focused on the role of parental support in the treatment of childhood anxiety, and parent involvement remains an important part of my work with children and teenagers.
I have completed training in SPACE in a workshop taught by Dr. Eli Lebowitz, the developer of the treatment, as well as additional training in applying SPACE principles to Failure to Launch and Avoidant/Restrictive Food Intake Disorder (ARFID).
When OCD is part of the picture, I also draw from my training in Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP) to help parents better understand compulsions, reassurance seeking, avoidance, and the OCD cycle.
This work is not about blaming parents.
You did not cause your child’s anxiety or OCD.
It is about identifying the places where small changes in the family’s response can create opportunities for your child to become more confident and capable.
Could SPACE Help Our Family?
SPACE may be worth considering if:
your child or teenager struggles with anxiety, OCD, or significant avoidance
reassurance has become a constant part of family life
your family has changed routines around your child’s fears
you frequently help your child avoid difficult situations
anxiety or OCD is causing conflict between parents and children
your child refuses therapy or is not ready to participate
your child is already in therapy, but anxiety continues to dominate life at home
you feel exhausted, stuck, or unsure whether you are helping too much or pushing too hard
You do not need to know whether SPACE is definitely the right treatment before reaching out. We can talk through what has been happening and determine whether parent-based treatment, individual therapy, or some combination makes the most sense.
Getting Started
I provide SPACE and parent-based therapy at my office in San Marino, near Pasadena and South Pasadena, as well as by telehealth for families throughout California.
I offer a free 20-minute consultation where we can talk about what has been happening, what you have already tried, and whether working together seems like a good fit.