Menny Monahan

Clinical director, Menny Monahan Wellbeing

Objective 

The objective of the workshop is to understand the significance of nurturing resilience in young people.

Outcomes

The outcomes are to:

■ develop an understanding of the development of the adolescent brain;

■ highlight the importance of adopting a ‘bottom-up approach’ to working with this client group;

■ gain ideas for different therapeutic styles and strategies to enhance our therapeutic setting; and

■ offer an array of skills to nurture resilience in our young clients.

Synopsis

Resilience is not something you are born with. Instead, it is something that can be nurtured as a part of development. Resilience is built when young people are offered meaningful support and love from others. Viewing resilience through the lens of the three Rs – relationship, regulation and reason – will illuminate how we as practitioners can nurture resilience within our young clients.

Adolescents are more commonly talked about rather talked with in therapy. Young people feel that they develop the confidence to be heard when they enter a safe therapeutic alliance. In this workshop, we will learn to nurture young people’s ability to get through difficult situations and cope with life afterwards healthily. Nurturing resilience is a wonderful gift for our young people.

Menny Monahan

Clinical director, Menny Monahan Wellbeing

Menny specialises in working with children, adolescents and families and is an accomplished general counsellor. Embracing a postmodern, social constructionist approach to therapy, her work is embedded in trauma-informed practice, where she references and applies theories including the Neurosequential Model, Polyvagal Theory and the Adverse Childhood Experiences study. Menny works in partnership with the YMCA where she led the development of an evidence-based, trauma-informed wellbeing program called Thrive Wellbeing Pathway. Thrive brings life to groundbreaking research that increases young people’s capacity to engage in education. She also delivers Thrive training to all school staff across the 10 campuses of the YMCA Vocational Schools. Menny delivers high-energy keynote presentations to organisations. Her passion is to ‘bring life to literature’. Audiences love her practical strategies, her stories and mostly her ‘Mennyisms’, often describing her energy as witty, fun, inspirational and contagious. Organisations hire her as a keynote speaker because of her strong background in trauma-informed practice, counselling and mental wellbeing. Menny has a Master of Counselling Degree from Queensland University of Technology (QUT), where she developed the Reflecting Partner framework.

Affiliations

■ Menny Monahan Wellbeing, clinical director

■ YMCA Social Impact, Thrive Wellbeing learning coordinator

■ YMCA Social Impact, senior wellbeing counsellor

■ GetSmart99 Counselling and Training, clinical director, 2010–16

■ CADET Training and Employment, wellbeing manager – Jumpstart Program, 2003–10

Education

■ Queensland University of Technology: Master of Counselling