Ep.31 You're On Fire, It's Fine: Parenting Teens with Big Emotions with Katie K. May, LPC, DBT-LBC

In this powerful conversation, Dr. Patty and Lizzie welcome bestselling author and DBT clinician Katie K. May to discuss her book You're On Fire, It's Fine, a deeply personal and skillful guide for parents navigating the overwhelming world of parenting teenagers with big emotions and mental health struggles.

Katie brings both professional expertise and lived experience to this discussion, openly sharing her own journey as a teenager and as a current parent of a teen facing mental health challenges. She breaks down why teens with biological sensitivity feel like they're "on fire" with their emotions, why self-destructive behaviors actually make sense as attempts to put out that fire, and what parents can do instead of minimizing, dismissing, or trying to fix it fast.

Katie emphasizes one critical message: Parents go first. When parents learn to regulate their own emotions, validate authentically, and repair harm, they become the most powerful agents of change in their teen's healing.

If you're parenting a teen who's struggling, if you work with families, or if you're simply trying to understand how to show care and concern for a loved one—this episode is will not disappoint.

In This Episode We Explore:

• How self-destructive behaviors (self-harm, substance use) work to make emotional pain go down, why teens keep doing them, and how NOT to reinforce them
• The connection between emotions and behavior: behaviors are communication
• The various types of validation to show you care, but don't support their destructive behaviors
• Radical acceptance as a grieving process: Letting go of the idealized vision of parenting
• The "good enough parent" theory

About Our Guest

Katie K. May, LCSW, is a DBT board-certified clinician, bestselling author of You're On Fire, It's Fine, and founder of a group therapy practice specializing in high-risk teenagers. Drawing from her own experience as a teen who struggled and now as a parent navigating mental health challenges with her own child, Katie brings deep compassion, clinical expertise, and radical honesty to her work. She leads parent skills groups, trains therapists, and is passionate about empowering parents to become agents of change in their teen's healing.

Links & Resources

→ You're On Fire, It's Fine by Katie K. May: Linked

→ Katie's DBT practice: creativehealingphilly.com @creative_healing

→ Sacred Treehouse programs: sacredtreehouse.org

→ Patty's team: therapeuticoasis.com Lizzie's team: beenentherapygroup.com