Pills Are Not for Preschoolers

Book excerpt: “[Wedge’s] encouragement to look anew at the ‘problems’ our children have . . . is valuable and expert advice.”—Booklist Where can parents turn when their child exhibits disturbing behavior and they want to avoid psychiatric labels and drugs? Pills Are Not for Preschoolers presents a much-needed alternative: child-focused family therapy—a brief, effective approach that involves family members in the child’s therapy. A family therapist for more than twenty years, Marilyn Wedge treats children’s problems not as biologically determined “disorders” but as responses to relationships in their lives that can be altered with the help of a therapist. Parents can now respond to symptoms of ADHD, depression, and anxiety with respectful family prescriptives, not prescriptions—and Wedge brilliantly shows us how easy it can be to understand and implement her pathbreaking approach.