Jillian is WONDERFUL! She’s knowledgeable, helpful, listens and really works to get to the heart of matters. While we have been working with Jillian for some time now, I can tell you with confidence that my son and our family would not be where we are if it wasn’t for Jillian. She’s provided us with tools that truly make us a better/stronger family. We’re well equipped and confident to handle situations that are thrown our way. My son was really struggling in school and I knew that what we were doing at home in terms of our discipline and overall structure just wasn’t working. I had exhausted all other options as we had tried everything we could think of. [Our son] was not a terrible child, but he’s definitely a child that responds best to a more personalized type of parenting – Jillian helped us figure all of this out! To give you a better idea, [our son] was in Young 5’s and his teacher had recommended that we have him checked out for ADHD. I knew in my heart that wasn’t an issue but his behavior was so that his Young 5’s teach had said to me “Thank goodness he’s in young 5’s because this type of behavior wouldn’t be tolerated in Kindergarten – you would be getting phone calls to come pick him up!” Imagine the heartache that comment caused. Enter Jillian! Now, I realize that not all situations will work in the time that ours did BUT within that first month of working with Jillian, [our son’s] teachers made comments about his changed behavior and how he had “made a complete turnaround!” He was handling situations better, he wasn’t getting into trouble like he had before. We made tremendous progress! As a family, we continue to see Jillian because I know that her guidance, tools and techniques work!

My wife and I found Jillian after adopting three children with different issues. We were able to learn and respond to most of the issues, but our youngest girl was beyond some of the basic help that we were able to offer her. She is a fetal alchohol baby, and several years developmentally behind my other children. My wife and I were at wits end on how to communicate and help her. That is where Jillian came in. She is an absolute expert in helping us to help understand the limitations and issues that our youngest was going through. She introduced some very simple straight forward changes in our thinking and our household and it has helped in ways I don’t think we can fully understand.

Our daughter was 3.5 at the time we reached out. We had just moved overseas so she had a big transition… I reached out precisely because I was feeling completely lost, scared, and hopeless! I was terrified about the changes I was seeing in my daughter and even more terrified with the way I felt like my heart was hardening against her. I couldn’t recognize my little girl anymore. I really was thinking that she might have had bi-polar disorder because sometimes she would just seem completely possessed. I felt like I was completely losing her as a person. I was afraid that I was going to become so hardened to her that I wouldn’t even like her at all anymore… She is incredibly smart for her age- she can grasp complex vocabulary and concepts, but her emotional intelligence is still a 3.5 year old. Some of her behaviors were extreme screaming meltdowns, lying, and very subversive, manipulative misbehavior (again, she’s very smart). Also, impulsive outbursts and a complete inability to regulate herself once she “got going” with a tantrum. She was full of anxiety. Bedtimes were especially problematic. The reason we ultimately reached out is because we could see our child changing, mainly due to the anxiety. As parents we had no clue how to help. And to be quite frank, her behavior was so bad that we were often relieved when we could send her to time out or take away story time at bedtime as a consequence just so we could get away quicker. The Holy Spirit totally convicted us that we were not doing well with her. So ultimately we reached out because we felt so out of control ourselves. The biggest thing I can say about our time with Jillian is that I now feel much more confident to handle her behaviors. We have strategies and methods. I yell a LOOOOOT less. Can’t say I’m perfect with this but I can honestly say that I rarely yell anymore. I don’t feel like I’m foundering to figure out what to do or say. Certainly my daughter is still a young person and she continues to come up with new creative ways to misbehave (don’t we all?!?), but I feel like I have an arsenal to try and trouble shoot so that I don’t feel so out of control all the time myself. And obviously when I’m in more control, she can be more in control, too. Her behaviors have DEFINITELY improved. Again, she is still a child. There is no magic fix to the sin nature in each of us. But she has come a long way with working through her anxiety and behaviors. And she rarely has screaming meltdowns anymore; these are very few and far between now. Another thing to note is that Jillian’s strategy of a reward system was VERY manageable for me. I’m a person who is VERY inconsistent with “systems” – they are always great ideas but quickly become overwhelming to me and I don’t do them because it’s too much to keep up with. There have been times in the past five months where we have ebbed and flowed a bit with our consistency but we’re able to “check ourselves” and get back on track. It’s been overall very manageable for me to keep up with it. And I appreciate how Jillian combines positive rewards and praise with recognizing the Biblical need for consequences. Our daughter is always going to be our “spunky” child. She’s not only difficult with her behaviors, but her personality is particularly difficult for me as a person. (Just being honest.) But I have been able to enjoy my child so much more in the past few months since we started working with Jillian.

We are a frequent flyer with Jillian thanks to my son. But I can’t tell you how grateful I am for Jillian…. when nothing works, she refuses to give up until we find something that does!! I had exhausted books and support groups and podcasts when I came to Jillian…. My son is as tricky as they come to develop strategies that help, but Jillian has been a lifesaver in that department. Just this week a suggestion she gave has changed my mornings and bedtimes with my son… literally overnight! As he adapts to it and starts acting out again, we tweak it with Jillian.

I give Jillian credit for my son’s medical diagnosis. I don’t know if you’ve heard of PANDAS but it really fits our situation… but it took me going to his doctors and asking about PANDAS for them to be like, “Oh yeah, ok, that might really be it.” Jillian was the one to bring it up when she heard he had a lot of strep infections. Without her, we’d still be without anything to stand on since my son belongs in so many different categories that experts weren’t really able to pick one, and yet everyone agrees he’s not on the spectrum. (Although he can certainly act like it sometimes).

And for me, the best perk of Jillian is that she is available online! It was my saving grace and what finally allowed us to seek expert behavioral help. There was no way I could add more appointments on to our already appointment-laden life, and my son revolts against any appointment and makes it a nightmare for me, and I have a 1 year old too… with Jillian I can be at home during nap time, without my son knowing what’s going on, and my husband joins in from work, so it’s perfect for our schedule. And Jillian is so available by email and Facebook anytime… I don’t know how she does it! And her prices are so reasonable… again, I don’t know how she does it! But we are so grateful for her. She is supportive and never judgey. She helps us find what works for us instead of forcing us into a mold that doesn’t work for our family like everyone else we talk to tries to do. She has reasonable expectations and helps to keep me centered and encouraged. I don’t know about your situation, but we’ve struggled a lot with unfair criticisms and judgment from family, etc, and I’ve lived with so much Mom guilt (it’s my personality to be hard on myself), and Jillian has provided such a fresh and encouraging platform for us. It’s been very healing for my soul, not to mention that she’s helped open my eyes to a likely diagnosis, and as any parent can tell you, just knowing a diagnosis can be one of the greatest reliefs of all. Jillian has been so great for our family which is why we keep her around! She’s the best thing we did for my son. Or maybe for me.

My son has his better days and his rough days, but we are having more connection with him than we have in a long time. He is more receptive to “talking about what happened” after a meltdown, and he shows pride when he does choose to respond to positive incentives. Things are so much better for me if for no other reason than support, hope, and a plan! I don’t feel like I’m out there on my own with no way to navigate the storms. That alone has taken so much stress off our shoulders. And of course the strategies are definitely working with our son….every little bit adds up, and every little success we celebrate. My biggest fear was the future with my son… if things just kept spiraling out of control. So I knew I couldn’t sit back on my own any longer. And when I discovered Jillian, and the online appointment set up, and the way she works with her clients, I knew I had found my match.

We’ve been having some ‘explosive’ reactions from our 3 yr old, and I just felt stuck, not really sure what to do, how togain control, etc. I’m good about consistency once I decide HOW to handle a situation, but it was figuring WHAT to do; HOW to best get through to this 3 yr old. If you are struggling with your kiddos Jillian is amazing… even after one session we’ve come strides with my son’s behavior!

Jillian came into our lives when I felt like I was not compatible with our 3 year old son and that he needed a new mother. Everyone would say it gets better as they age, but that wasn’t a good enough answer. Between yelling, screaming, tantrums, and hitting I was at a lost. Thanks to great friends who recommended Jillian and support of my husband we started our first session with Jillian. After the first session, Jillian gave me hope that we could make lasting changes with Christ at the center. We implemented everything and gave a strong willed child the ability to make decisions with rewards and consequences. We encouraged our son to express feelings and I am happy to say after three months tantrums decreased. I can’t express my gratitude for Jillian’s encouragement and advice. I can’t wait to see what God’s plans our for little boy.

We sought out Jillian after my son was placed with us (we are a pre-adoptive home). My daughter was 8 at the time and really struggled with personal boundaries and not putting her hands on her brother 24-7. The constant mauling (for lack of a better term) made it very difficult to manage the two without absolute constant monitoring. And even then it wasn’t enough. We would have to physically separate them to get my daughter to stop hanging on her brother… Jillian is an amazing listener and is great at pulling what you would think of as “normal responses” from your child and decoding what they are actually trying to tell you. Another huge thing we gained from working with Jillian were ways for my daughter to deal with her occasional anger toward her brother in productive ways… Also HOW we reacted and interacted with the kids has made a huge difference in our home. We have found out my daughter is on the higher functioning end of Autism, but even before that, we discovered through working with Jillian that she hates chaos. She thrives with organization and peace. If things get chaotic, or yelling ensues, she escalates. That’s not always possible but Jillian helped us work through how to make that happen more often. My daughter also started struggling in school with math and reading comprehension. So Jillian helped us find ways to encourage and help her success, but also finding non-academic ways to help her feel smart. She also helped us with communicating with my daughter’s school this year with getting an IEP in place, which has been immensely successful for my daughter. I am confident because of Jillian’s initiation of contact with my daughter’s school that the PPT [Planning and Placement Team meeting] actually happened, which then led to the IEP. Even though we are not directly counseling with Jillian anymore, she regularly checks in to see how we’re doing … sending articles she thinks might be helpful, resources we might be able to use. I would never hesitate to recommend her services.

I wanted to offer an honest and heartfelt shout out to Jillian & Fly on the Wall Counseling.

We started our journey with Jillian, I believe, in February of 2017. We had behavioral issues with our 5 year old. He was already in young 5’s and his teacher had approached me suggesting we consider having him evaluated for ADD/ADHD. I knew there were issues (excessive boundary pushing – not listening, like it felt like he was never listening to anything we said. He defied his teachers, he screamed and cried every morning at drop off, he hid under the table from his teachers, he would swear at school … He tried to run away from me and refused to come back running through our neighborhood made it a good half a block and around a corner from me. That may have been a final breaking point for me). We were at our wits end. We felt like failures as parents. We were afraid of him starting his school foundation with such a rocky record. We put him in young 5s thinking that would be the year of growth he needed but his behavior was intensifying. I swallowed my pride, because who wants to admit they need help parenting, and reached out to Jillian. At the time she offered a free consultation and I thought “what have I got to lose?” After connecting with Jillian I realized I had everything to lose. She was kind and patient, she offered guidance and she genuinely took interest in my son and what was happening in our lives. I did the consultation alone but saw a real need for her. I felt like she could help. I talked to my partner when he came home and explained that I thought Jillian could help us with our son. He was hesitant. Maybe he didn’t realize things had gotten so difficult (he worked long hours and was often gone) or maybe he was afraid to admit that we were doing something wrong? Jillian met with my partner separately and it was then he too realized the investment that we were about to make in our family.

Now, I know everyone’s story is different but I can tell you with confidence that within a couple weeks of Jillian’s assistance we began to not only see changes in our parenting and in my son’s behavior but we also received compliments from his teachers. They recognized a change in him at school. Don’t get me wrong it was not easy. We had to do soul searching, admit things we maybe didn’t want to. We were committed to making changes and we worked really hard. But it was working. We kept seeing positive changes and Jillian was the only thing we had added to our mix.

By the time school let out we were no longer worried that our son was starting school on a rocky foundation. We were nervous for this coming school year but confident that whatever came up we could work though it.
This year has been a breeze compared to last. Of course, things are not always perfect; our son is still a child and we are still human but we are a better, stronger family and our son is not “that child” anymore.

I needed to share my story because if any of you have been on the fence or contemplating the investment in your family, I wanted you to know that you do have the power to change things. There’s that saying, “parenting doesn’t come with a handbook.” My mom once pointed out to us that “Jillian is your handbook.”

Sorry for the novel but I know the strength it took for me to be able reach out for help. Knowing what I know now, I only wish I had reached out sooner.