Understanding "Storytelling" in the Playroom: A Child-Centered Play Therapy Approach

In this episode of the Play Therapy Podcast, I answer a question from Sweeney in India about how to handle a 12-year-old client who frequently makes up elaborate stories in the playroom. Sweeney is concerned that the child’s storytelling might be problematic, especially since the stories appear to reflect a fantasy version of her life, and the child’s mother has noticed an increase in this behavior. I explain that children often use storytelling as a coping mechanism to manage their emotions and create a sense of control in their narrative, which is common in child-centered play therapy (CCPT).

I also discuss the reasons behind this behavior, including attention-seeking, projecting an idealized version of reality, and managing anxiety. I reassure Sweeney that this is a natural part of the therapeutic process and that the child will reduce this behavior over time as her self-esteem and emotional regulation improve through therapy. By continuing to reflect the child’s feelings and providing a supportive environment, the child will naturally address the underlying issues driving the storytelling.

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Common References:
Cochran, N., Nordling, W., & Cochran, J. (2010). Child-Centered Play Therapy (1st ed.). Wiley.
VanFleet, R., Sywulak, A. E., & Sniscak, C. C. (2010). Child-centered play therapy. Guilford Press.
Landreth, G.L. (2023). Play Therapy: The Art of the Relationship (4th ed.). Routledge.
Bratton, S. C., Landreth, G. L., Kellam, T., & Blackard, S. R. (2006). Child parent relationship therapy (CPRT) treatment manual: A 10-session filial therapy model for training parents. Routledge/Taylor & Francis Group.
Benedict, Helen. Themes in Play Therapy. Used with permission to Heartland Play Therapy Institute.

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
You're listening to the Play Therapy Podcast with Dr
Brenna Hicks. Your source for centered and focused play therapy coaching.
Hi, I'm Dr. Brenna Hicks, The Kid Counselor.
This is the Play Therapy Podcast where you get
a master class in child-centered play therapy
and practical support and application for your
work with children and their families.
In today's episode. I am answering a question from Sweeney in India

(00:24):
and her question is about a child that is
constantly making elaborate stories up in the playroom.
So really interesting
topic, we briefly discussed a similar topic on the Collective last week.
So I feel like this is something that a lot of us are dealing with.
So I'm glad to be able to talk through this.

(00:45):
So let me read parts of Sweeney's email and then we'll dive into the question.
So she says I'm a therapeutic play practitioner based out of India.
Your podcasts have been invaluable to me as I navigate the
play therapy space and come into my own as a therapist
in a culture that values structure, conformity, filial,
piety and obedience over individual autonomy.

(01:07):
It's been revolutionary personally and professionally
to practice child-centered play therapy.
I am so excited about that. Thank you. For sharing that in this email.
So then the question is
I have a 12 year old client that I've seen for 14 weeks.
She was initially referred for ADHD and frequent emotional meltdowns.

(01:27):
There are some syndromic presentations but she does not
have downs and genetic tests have been inconclusive.
She struggles with being organized at school, frequently misplaces books,
struggles with making friends and hates that she has to go to
the SEN department a few times a week for her different therapies
in the playroom.
We've managed to build a trusting relationship and she

(01:48):
frequently comments on how she likes to come to me
as she can do things that make her feel calm such as paint and do work in the sand.
Here's the main bit when she comes in,
she tells me elaborate stories about her life related to school and family
that I can tell are made up.
It's usually about how the shadow teacher won't leave her alone.
She follows me home, for example,

(02:10):
or about her having great friends and play dates and art shows, et cetera.
I always reflect the feeling underneath her stories.
For example, with the shadow teacher,
you feel like someone is in your space all the time
that usually helps her focus more on the feelings
and give me, gives me bits of reality.
It seems to me that when she's in the room, that's how she controls her narrative.

(02:31):
However,
I also worry whether I'm enabling this pattern because during our last check
in mom mentioned that the instances of her making things up has increased.
I'm starting to doubt myself and wondered if you have any insight.
I would appreciate your thoughts.
Also,
I've asked mom to revisit genetic testing to see if we can
get more conclusive results on what the child is struggling with.

(02:54):
Ok,
so Sweeney, thank you so much for the question. And
I think before I get into some of the other
comments,
I want to say that
the only reason that it would be relevant for mom to revisit the genetic testing
would be if

(03:14):
there are some kind of services that would only
be provided and that would be helpful to her
if we had conclusive results. In other words,
the genetic results are not going to
influence anything that happens in the playroom,
they're not going to influence anything about the way
that you and or her mom interact with her.
So in my opinion, hearing this,

(03:37):
I'm not sure that revisiting the genetic testing is necessary
unless she needs some kind of support and she won't get it without tests.
So that would be my thought on whether or not that is warranted or not.
But now we'll all talk through what it's like
to have a child that is making up stories and

(03:59):
fictionalizing things in the playroom.
All right. So
it's very common
that children will either lie in the playroom or tell stories in the playroom.
It's also very common that they will do this in other environments as well.
So I think we begin with the notion that this is age appropriate behavior.
She's 12, but the fact that she has syndromic presentations

(04:23):
and we're not really sure exactly what it is that
she might
officially have as a diagnosis.
She's probably either mentally or emotionally immature for her age.
So even though she's 12 chronologically,
we would assume she's probably younger than that for other considerations.

(04:43):
So she's not even close to abstract reasoning yet.
And we know that
kids are going to make stories up, they are going to embellish the truth
and they are going to lie for a variety of reasons.
So not only is it age appropriate, but there are lots of causes for this behavior.
So

(05:03):
we realize sometimes it's it's attention seeking behavior.
They learn that people give them attention if they weave these really
intricate elaborate stories together because those
stories are interesting and they're intriguing
and it makes people go wow, really.
And so sometimes it's attention seeking behavior. Sometimes it is

(05:26):
ideal versus actual which what you describe here,
Sweeney has a little bit of that ideal versus actual vibe to me.
In other words, she's painting a story
that is more aligned with her ideal.
She has friends, she does play dates, she does art shows,
these are what she wishes were true.

(05:48):
So I think sometimes this is a projection for her of
what she really ideally would want to be her reality.
Then we have avoidance and it doesn't sound like this is the case here.
But I just want to give some explanations for why children will do this.
Often children will lie or make up stories because they're concerned that

(06:09):
the truth is going to have a consequence or a negative outcome.
So they will
fabricate something because if they say that that happened instead,
they're not responsible, there's no ownership, there's no consequence.
Sometimes it is fantasy driven
when kids struggle to accept what their lives are like

(06:31):
and they're driven by the fantasy element.
And you will see that in specific personalities of kids,
everything that they do has a fantasy component.
So they play that way, they draw that way they talk that way
that is similar to ideal versus actual.
But when there's a fantastical element to it,

(06:52):
it's
I'm actually making this world
that
it's not even possible for it to exist.
But in this world, anything is possible.
So it's possible for me to
jump 40 ft and it's possible for me to throw something a mile and it's possible for me.

(07:13):
So then you get kind of this self-aggrandizing
type of behavior in the lies and the storytelling
that can be tied to that fantasy element.
And then sometimes kids tell lies and stories for shock value
because when you tell something that isn't true,
it can have a factor of unbelief,

(07:34):
you know, like no one would actually believe that's true.
But if you tell it convincingly and people go
oh my gosh, I can't believe that
all of a sudden. Now there's a shock value.
So those are just the most common that I've observed reasons why or the root cause
behind children doing this in play sessions.
So

(07:54):
Sweeney as far as how to handle it,
you accept it as truth.
So when kids tell you their stories,
when you know they're lying, even
you reflect their content
and you accept it as truth,
you also enlarge the meaning like you already shared that you're doing.

(08:16):
I think that was actually a really helpful enlargement.
You feel like someone is in your space all the time.
That
is very
deep
and concise to
what she was describing in that story
and probably in all of her therapies, she probably gets very little
alone time where it can just be her and do what she wants to do.

(08:39):
So I think that was very appropriate to say there,
but we, what we recognize and why we accept this,
we don't accept the notion that lying is OK.
We don't accept the notion that making things up is appropriate.
We're accepting that the child is maladaptive coping through this mechanism.
And therefore,

(09:00):
it's just like when a child comes in and plays aggressively,
it's just like when a child comes in and has power and control grab,
just like when a child comes in
and withdraws and sits in the corner and won't speak to us.
These are all maladaptive coping mechanisms.
So this is no different than anything else that any
other child does in the way that we respond.

(09:22):
We just accept it,
we acknowledge it
and not acknowledge it out loud. I wanna make that really clear.
We don't say, oh you're not telling me the truth right now.
We don't want to do that,
but we acknowledge that this is just a pattern of behavior
and we're OK with that because we unconditionally accept the child.

(09:43):
And here's the beauty of this
as their self esteem increases,
as their self worth increases,
as their coping skills increase,
as their sense of who they are increases
lies naturally decrease.
That is a consistent by-product of the work that they're doing in the playroom.

(10:08):
Think about the four universal outcomes,
they're going to have increased regulation.
They won't need to lie as much. They're going to have an increase in worldview.
They won't want to lie as much.
They're going to have an increased emotional vocabulary.
They won't feel that they have to lie as much
and they're going to have an increase in self esteem,

(10:29):
their lives will no longer serve them in the same way that it did before.
So this will naturally sort itself out
which that's the beauty of CCPT, right?
Things naturally sort themselves out because kids do their work.
They know what they need to work on
and they resolved their issues.
So
your question about, am I enabling this pattern?

(10:53):
You're not enabling anything other than
the child has a reason for doing this
and you're providing her
the relationship and the environment within which she can address this root issue.
There's a why there's always a why
the why matters. Hashtag
I'm so conditioned by my staff now about hashtag the why

(11:16):
matters. It's crazy. Anyway,
we, we have to realize that she's doing this for a reason.
So we're not enabling anything other than
I'm going to make sure that she has the relationship and the environment
where she can work through this stuff.
And remember we grant in fantasy, what we can't grant in reality,

(11:36):
she's going to get in trouble for lying in other environments.
There's going to be backlash for her
making up these stories in other relationships.
But you, because you're a CCPT
can grant in fantasy what you can't grant in reality.
And
this is the unique place and person

(11:57):
wherein she can
make up the most embellished crazy stories if she chooses
and it's not going to change anything
but kids know that they're struggling and they know that they
don't want to stay stuck in those maladaptive coping patterns.
So she will naturally address the fact that she does not need to continue to do it

(12:18):
once she builds the other things that she also needs to address.
So Sweeney Thank you so much for the email.
Thanks for that question. I think that's really helpful
and really quickly before we close out, I just wanted to share.
I know you all have heard me say that I get emails all the time,
but every once in a while one hits and I asked permission to share it.

(12:38):
And I just wanted to
read a little bit from
Julia. Julia sent me an email
and I was so encouraged by this
because
I think it's
projective or its representative of what's happening
generationally here.
So Julia said,

(13:00):
if I wasn't so busy serving kids doing CCPT,
I would be more engaged with the live Zooms.
She's referring to the Collective
that said, I'm so grateful you have replays and your podcasts and everything else.
I totally get why you are evangelizing CCPT with such passion and heart.
I'm so deeply grateful for your work and that
I've had the good fortune to stumble upon it,
right?

(13:20):
When I started my new job as a fresh MSW graduate,
I will share playroom stories soon. But I just wanted to say thank you.
And here y'all, here you go, y'all.
I also wanted to let you know that my daughter is studying psychology. Now
I am sharing with her my new found passion.
So we may have another future CCPT practitioner in the family one day

(13:40):
that is so exciting.
And then finally, she said
this place stuff is so powerful.
And as I do the work,
it becomes more and more obvious to me why
this is the modality for supporting children's well being.
So Julia, thank you for the email and for letting me share that and
look, this is, this is how it starts y'all.
One of us gets really,

(14:01):
really passionate and excited and we tell someone else and
they get really passionate and excited and they tell someone
and it is a ripple
and that is how this podcast has grown to the level that it has.
That is why
this movement as I call it or this wave of CCPT
is, is taking over because

(14:22):
once this grabs a hold of you, you can't help but talk about it
and then it evangelizes it to everyone else. So
this, you all are why I do this and without you, I don't do this.
So truly. Thank you. Thank you for how passionate you are.
Thank you that you tell your friends about the model about the podcast,
about your wins, about your struggles.

(14:44):
Thank you that you're talking about CCPT.
Thank you that you're making other colleagues and other coworkers
and other practitioners and family members and friends and whoever.
Thank you that they
are knowing about what you love and what matters to you.
I really quick story.
So one of my husband Eric's favorite
movies is Fight Club.

(15:05):
I, I won't even get into that because that's a whole other,
that would be a whole podcast episode right there.
He and I would never, ever, ever have the same top 300 movies.
Like our lists are so different
and Fight Club is one of his and it would never even make a top
whatever name. The number, it would never make it.

(15:26):
But he loves it.
And one of the memes and one of the lines in that movie is
the first rule about Fight Club is you never talk about Fight Club.
Well, then you know that we do Crossfit.
So there's a secondary meme that says the first rule
about crossfit is that you never shut up about crossfit.
So
I always have those two like phrases kind of circling around in my brain.

(15:50):
And
I, I was thinking about that the other day and I'm like, oh
my gosh, CCPT is going to become the new
like Crossfit where once you do it, you can't help but talk about it.
And I feel like every single one of you that are having
meetings with supervisors and with others at work and with colleagues and

(16:11):
other professionals.
Some of you are still in grad school and you're sharing
stories with me that you've been talking to your professors about
CCPT and other students in the classroom and that
they're deferring to you for your knowledge on this model.
This is how it is,
you get hooked, it hooks you
and CCPT takes over. And as Julia said,

(16:34):
this is more and more obvious to me why
this is the modality for supporting children's well being.
First of all, I couldn't have said that any better.
Secondly,
that is the absolute truth.
It is the modality for supporting children's well being.
And if we have an entire world
that finally is aware of the modality to do that,

(16:55):
think about
generationally, the impact that that has
on
kids right now. Their children, their children's children,
the community, the world at large,
the impact is incredible.
So
I love you all so much.
Thank you so much for hanging out with me, listening to me,
taking me everywhere you go.
We'll talk again soon. Bye.

(17:16):
Thank you for listening to the Play Therapy Podcast with Dr. Brenna Hicks.
For more episodes and resources.
Please go to www.playtherapypodcast.com.