Healing starts at home.

Raising angry teens, raising challenging children, difficult phases of parenting, helping

John Murphy, MA, LCMHC

Why work with me?

• Expertise You Can Trust: With advanced training in childhood trauma, parent/teen conflict resolution, and family systems, I have the tools to address even the hardest situations.

• A Holistic Perspective: I understand how career pressures, family dynamics, and personal values intersect—and I help parents find solutions that work in the real world.

• Faith-Informed Support: For those seeking it, I offer a Christian perspective that integrates faith with proven therapeutic techniques.world.

• I’ve counseled the toughest cases in the state: Before becoming a clinician, I was a behavioral counselor for court-involved teens in an outdoor program, and later at a residential facility for the NC Department of Public Safety. I can teach you how to keep your game face on when angry kids of any age try to intimidate you.

Parenting kids and teens isn’t easy, but you don’t have to face these challenges alone. Together, we’ll work toward a stronger, more peaceful home where everyone can thrive.

Let’s turn the chaos into clarity and create the family life you deserve

Need more reasons?

  • I started working with kids in 2007, and have grown to appreciate the needs of children who don’t get to choose their circumstances, as well as the adults who were once children themselves, doing the best they can with what they have.

    I was raised by parents and stepparents in two very different homes in separate towns. I know what childhood PTSD feels like, and I know what unmet developmental needs can do to affect our outlook, self-perception, and choices.

    And of equal importance, I understand how childhood affects adulthood. And very often it takes an adult’s perspective to address what went wrong during childhood.

  • My counseling experience includes 2 years as a one-on-one assistant for a grade schooler with autism, a year in a wilderness camp for adolescents and teens who were court-involved, a year as an intensive in-home counselor helping to stabilize kids and families in challenging life circumstances, 2 years in a day treatment facility helping stabilize the behaviors of K-12 children who were too disruptive for school, and 5 years at the NC Department of Public Safety as a Juvenile Justice Officer for juvenile offenders.

    Today I’m a licensed clinical mental health counselor (LCMHC) helping North Carolinians navigate the rigors of childhood, and parent with cognizant compassion.