Feeling Like a Burden: Support Options for Struggling Teens
Understanding these experiences matters because burden-based thoughts often occur alongside anxiety, depression, and even suicidal ideation. Many teens hide their struggles because they are scared of causing worry or disappointment, or dragging down the people they love.
If your teen is finding it hard to cope, professional guidance is always recommended. This article can also help you understand the feeling like a burden teens can experience by exploring:
- Why teens may feel like a burden
- Common warning signs to look for
- How to talk about these feelings
- Coping strategies that really help
- Effective treatment options
- Where to find professional support for struggling teens
Understanding Why Teens Sometimes Feel Like a “Burden”
Invisible pressures often shape these thoughts. Many teenagers want to “keep the peace” at home, rather than “make things harder” for the people they love, especially during times of stress. Therefore, when emotional struggles build up, teens might view their need for support through a fog of guilt or self-blame, misinterpreting their needs as evidence of being a burden.
What Causes Feelings of Being a Burden?
Burden-based beliefs rarely appear out of nowhere; they are often shaped by a combination of life experiences, emotional patterns, and mental health challenges. Some contributing factors include:
Mental health conditions: Depression, anxiety, bipolar disorder, trauma-related conditions, and personality disorders can intensify feelings of being a burden. Depression in particular is strongly linked with feelings of “perceived burdensomeness” – one of the core depression symptoms in adolescents, which is connected to suicidal thoughts.3-5- Cognitive distortions: Thought patterns like personalization, mind-reading, emotional reasoning, discounting the positive, or “should” statements can shape a teen’s interpretation of events, fuelling their belief that they are a burden.6
- Low self-esteem or negative self-image: Teens with a low sense of self-worth, often due to conditions like depression or anxiety, are more likely to assume they cause problems by needing help.5
- Past experiences: Being told they are “too much,” experiencing rejection, or feeling responsible for other people’s emotions can reinforce the belief that they are a burden.
- Family stress or conflict: During times of tension at home, teens may think they should keep their feelings quiet, rather than “adding fuel to the fire.”
- Societal and cultural pressure: Social comparison, such as that caused by social media, can make teens feel like they should be “better,” “stronger,” or “more successful,” sparking shame and self-blame.7
These issues can become dangerous if left unaddressed, and may lead to thoughts like “others would be better off without me,” which are associated with a higher risk of suicide.8 And, when one in five teens has seriously contemplated suicide, it’s imperative to recognize these feelings and thought patterns early on.1
These beliefs often hide beneath everyday behaviors, so knowing the signs to spot that a teen may be silently struggling is essential for ensuring support for struggling teens.
Warning Signs That a Teen May Feel Like a Burden
Recognizing the early mental health warning signs teens show helps adults understand what a teen may be carrying emotionally. While signs may seem subtle at first, when put together, they could reveal a young person who feels undeserving of care, love, or support.
Some of the most common signs of teens feeling like a burden include the following.
- Emotional symptoms, including:
- Persistent sadness or irritability
- Increased guilt or shame
- Hopeless thoughts teenagers often experience
- Behavioral signs may include:
- Social withdrawal
- Academic grades slipping
- Avoiding asking for help
- Changes in sleep or appetite
- Talking about wanting to “disappear,” “take a break from everything,” or “not be a problem anymore”
- Thought-based patterns may include:9
- Believing they are a “burden” or “liability”
- Self-hatred or feeling inherently flawed
- Thinking people are “tired of them”
- Assuming they cause stress by simply existing
- Self-critical thoughts like I’m too much, I ruin everything, or People would be better off without me
These are distress signals from a teen feeling like a burden, especially if they intensify over time.
Furthermore, the following symptoms are red flags that require immediate and urgent support:
- Talking about suicide
- Self-harm
- Mentioning death as a “solution”
- Giving away belongings
- Sudden calmness after distress
If your teen is suicidal or in danger, seek help immediately by calling a crisis hotline (such as 988) or 911. You could also attend your nearest emergency department so they can provide the suicidal ideation support teens require.
After ensuring safety, have an open, compassionate conversation about feelings to help your teen.
How to Talk About Feeling Like a Burden
Suicide is the second leading cause of death for 10 to 24-year-olds in the US, which means learning supportive communication skills can be a genuine lifesaver.1 Below, we provide some suggestions for communication strategies teens respond to, helping parents and teens approach these conversations with clarity and compassion.
Helpful Communication Strategies for Parents
Suggestions of communication tips for parents may include:
Active listening: Show a genuine interest in what your teen says, be patient, and give them time to speak and express themselves without interrupting- Validating emotions: Instead of saying things like “You’re not a burden”, you could try something like “It makes sense that you feel overwhelmed by everything that’s happening.” Or you could say, “You don’t have to be okay for me to care about you.” This validation can reduce shame and encourage teenagers to share information more openly.
- Gently prompt: Using phrases like “Tell me more about…” or “Help me understand what that feels like…” can keep the conversation going without adding pressure on the teen.
- Avoid dismissive reassurance: Comments like “You’ll be fine” or “Don’t be so silly” can make teens feel unheard, dismissed, ashamed, or guilty.
- Respond to hopelessness with calm and steadiness: Let them know that you take their feelings seriously. For instance, you may say, “I’m really glad you told me how you’re feeling. We can figure this out together.”
- Normalize seeking help: Reducing the stigma mental health teens face can empower them to seek help. This is why it’s so important to normalize therapy as a strength, not a failure.
Tips for Teens Communicating Burden-Based Feelings
Some tips for teens wanting to talk about heavy feelings with an adult may include the following:
- Use feeling statements: When talking about your emotions, try to use clear statements. For example, you might say, “I feel like I’m dragging people down” or “I feel scared asking for help.”
- Identify safe adults: It’s important to know which adults you feel safe talking to and that you know will listen. This might be a parent, a caregiver, another trusted adult, or a school counsellor.
- Practice asking for support: Knowing how to ask for help without feeling ashamed can help you get the conversation going with more confidence. For instance, you might practice beginning a conversation by saying “I’ve been struggling more than I’ve been saying” or “Can we talk about something that’s been weighing on my mind?”
Open conversations like these lay the groundwork for safety and support for struggling teens, especially when emotions feel overwhelming.
Practical coping tools can also help teens rebuild their self-worth and cope with overwhelming emotions, which are explored next.
Coping Skills for Teens
Learning coping skills gives teens practical tools to manage and soothe their emotions and challenge unhelpful thinking patterns, which is particularly important for the self worth struggles youth face.
Some helpful coping strategies for your mental health toolkit include:
- Journaling: To explore your emotions, thoughts, beliefs, and personal patterns.
- Grounding techniques: Such as deep breathing exercises. This can help reduce emotional overwhelm and bring you back to the present moment.
- Challenging negative thoughts: By considering the evidence to question self-blaming thoughts.
- Celebrating small wins: This can reinforce confidence and competence in your abilities.
- Engaging in enjoyable activities: These can boost your self-esteem and improve motivation.
- Setting healthy boundaries: This is especially important for relationships that you find stressful or emotionally draining, as it can help protect your time and mental health.
- Prioritize sleep: Poor sleep can severely affect moods and thoughts.
- Eating regular, balanced meals: Good nutrition can positively impact mental health.
- Physical activity: Regular exercise is a great stress-buster and mood-booster.
- Reducing digital overload: This can be especially important if harmful social comparisons leave a bad taste in your mouth.
While coping skills can help manage symptoms, many benefit from structured support for struggling teens, especially when self-worth is low. This is where professional treatment enters the conversation.
Professional Support and Treatment Options
Many families search for “teen therapy near me” when looking for guidance, but understanding the full array of treatment options can help make decisions clearer.
Professional treatment provides teens with a safe, compassionate space to explore the beliefs and experiences contributing to feeling like a burden. Therapy can help teens rebuild self-esteem, strengthen emotional regulation, challenge self-blame and negative thinking, and improve communication skills.
The most common therapeutic approaches used to treat feelings of burden are cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT), dialectical behavior therapy (DBT), trauma-focused therapy, and family therapy. Each of these therapies can help teens in different ways.
CBT helps teens to challenge self-blaming beliefs, negative thoughts, and cognitive distortions, as well as develop more balanced thinking skills.
DBT teaches emotional regulation, distress tolerance, mindfulness, and communication skills, all of which are helpful for teens who feel overwhelmed or misunderstood.
Family therapy supports healthier communication, reduces conflict, and helps families respond more effectively to a teen’s needs.
Trauma-focused therapies, such as eye movement desensitization and reprocessing, help teens process traumatic experiences that may be reinforcing shame, self-blame, or beliefs of being “too much.”
Additionally, higher-level care may be an appropriate option when safety concerns or complex needs arise, offering extra support for struggling teens. Residential treatment programmes, intensive outpatient programs (IOPs), and partial hospitalization programs (PHPs) are mental health treatment programs teens can access when they need more intensive care.
With the right support, recovery is absolutely possible. Compassionate interventions, open communication, and professional help all play powerful parts in empowering teens to reconnect with their strengths and regain hope.
Find Support for Teen Mental Health With Mission Prep
Feeling like a burden is a painful belief, but it is not a truth, a fact, or a reflection of who your teen truly is. With understanding, coping strategies, and professional support, teens can move away from shame and self-blame and toward confidence and connection. And we are here to help.
Mission Prep specializes in supporting teens struggling with emotional challenges. We offer comprehensive assessments, evidence-based therapies, medication management, outpatient counseling, IOPs, PHPs, and additional services designed specifically for adolescents.
Reach out today to discover how we can help your teen and family.
References
- U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). (2024, November 29). Mental health. https://www.cdc.gov/healthy-youth/mental-health/index.html
- Merriam-Webster Dictionary. (2025). Burden. https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/burden
- Hua, L. L., Lee, J., Rahmandar, M. H., & Sigel, E. J. (2023). Suicide and suicide risk in adolescents. Pediatrics, 153(1). https://doi.org/10.1542/peds.2023-064800
- Hill, R. M., Del Busto, C. T., Buitron, V., & Pettit, J. W. (2018). Depressive Symptoms and Perceived Burdensomeness Mediate the Association between Anxiety and Suicidal Ideation in Adolescents. Archives of Suicide Research, 22(4), 555–568. https://doi.org/10.1080/13811118.2018.1427163
- Lin, J., & Guo, W. (2024). The Research on Risk Factors for Adolescents’ Mental Health. Behavioral Sciences, 14(4), 263. https://doi.org/10.3390/bs14040263
- Chand, S. P., Kuckel, D. P., & Huecker, M. R. (2023, May 23). Cognitive Behavior Therapy. StatPearls – NCBI Bookshelf. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK470241/
- Nesi, J., & Prinstein, M. J. (2015). Using Social Media for Social Comparison and Feedback-Seeking: Gender and Popularity Moderate Associations with Depressive Symptoms. Journal of Abnormal Child Psychology, 43(8), 1427–1438. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10802-015-0020-0
- Opperman, K., Czyz, E. K., Gipson, P. Y., & King, C. A. (2015). Connectedness and Perceived Burdensomeness among Adolescents at Elevated Suicide Risk: An Examination of the Interpersonal Theory of Suicidal Behavior. Archives of Suicide Research, 19(3), 385–400. https://doi.org/10.1080/13811118.2014.957451
- Wilson, K. G., Kowal, J., Caird, S. M., Castillo, D., McWilliams, L. A., & Heenan, A. (2017). Self-perceived burden, perceived burdensomeness, and suicidal ideation in patients with chronic pain. Canadian Journal of Pain, 1(1), 127–136. https://doi.org/10.1080/24740527.2017.1368009
