Home › Consultation › Parental Counselling

Parental Counselling in Gurugram — Dr. Prerna Kohli

Parenting in modern India has never been more complex. Parents today navigate screen addiction, academic pressure, changing gender roles, intergenerational conflict, and the challenge of raising children in a rapidly shifting cultural landscape — often without adequate support.

Dr. Prerna Kohli has worked with parents across India and globally for over 30 years, helping them develop consistent, loving, and effective approaches to raising psychologically healthy children — at every stage from toddlerhood through adolescence and young adulthood. Sessions are available in-clinic at DLF City Phase 3, Gurugram and online for parents across India and globally.

What to expect: how parental counselling works

Parental counselling is not a therapist taking over your parenting — it is a series of focused conversations that help you understand what is really driving your child's behaviour or your family's dynamic, and gives you practical strategies you can sustain at home. Often the first session is with the parents alone: you know your child best, and Dr. Kohli begins by understanding the family, its history, and the specific worry that brought you in. Depending on the child's age and the concern, later sessions may involve the child, both parents together, or the whole family. The emphasis throughout is on small, consistent changes that actually hold— not one-off advice.

Does it help — and why early support matters

Yes— and with children, timing matters more than most parents realise. Childhood and adolescence are when most lifelong emotional patterns take shape, which is exactly why noticing and responding early makes such a difference.

Sources: WHO & UNICEF (2024); WHO; India's National Mental Health Survey (NMHS). Figures are offered as general context, not a verdict on any one child.

None of this means a struggling child is “broken.” Most childhood difficulties respond well to the right support, and early help is far gentler than untangling entrenched patterns years later. Where a condition needs medical treatment, that is a conversation for a doctor— counselling works alongside it, focused on the child's emotional world and the family around them.

What parental counselling addresses

• Screen addiction and managing technology use in children and teenagers
• Academic pressure, exam anxiety, and performance stress
• Behavioural problems — aggression, defiance, or withdrawal
• Parenting disagreements between partners — getting on the same page
• Single parenting and co-parenting after separation or divorce
• Adolescent mental health — depression, anxiety, identity issues
• Raising children with learning differences or developmental challenges
• Intergenerational conflict — balancing traditional values with a child's evolving needs
• Children and teenagers confiding in AI chatbots and companion apps
• NRI parenting — raising children between cultures and managing identity confusion

That second-to-last one is newer than the rest, and it comes up in the consulting room now almost weekly. Research suggests most teenagers have used an AI companion, and around a third have taken something genuinely serious to one instead of to a person. The behaviour itself is ordinary — adolescents have always confided somewhere other than their parents. What is worth understanding is why the app felt safer, and how to open that conversation without closing it.

Dr. Kohli's approach

Dr. Kohli works with parents — individually, as a couple, or together with their child — to identify what is driving difficult behaviour or family dynamics, and to develop practical, sustainable strategies that work within the family's specific cultural and emotional context. She does not offer generic parenting advice. Every family is different, and her approach is always tailored to the parents' values, the child's temperament, and the specific challenges the family is facing.

Who this is for

Parental counselling is valuable for parents at any stage — from new parents struggling with the transition to parenthood, to parents of teenagers navigating rebellion and identity formation, to parents of adult children managing complex family relationships. It is particularly beneficial for NRI parents raising children abroad who are navigating cultural identity, and for parents dealing with a child's mental health diagnosis.

Parenting in the Indian context

The pressures on Indian parents are specific. Academic competition starts early and runs hot; screens arrived faster than any rulebook for them; and children are often raised inside a joint family where grandparents, uncles and aunts all hold a view. In three decades of practice in Gurugram, Dr. Kohli has found that many parenting struggles are really struggles over whose approach wins— parents and grandparents pulling in different directions, or two partners who never agreed on the rules. Add the quiet weight of log kya kahenge, and the particular task facing NRI parents raising children between two cultures, and generic Western parenting advice often simply doesn't fit. Counselling that respects this context helps you build an approach that works for your family, your values, and your child's temperament.

A brief illustration (a composite, not a real client): the parents of a bright, anxious ten-year-old found every evening dissolving into a homework battle— until it became clear the pressure the child felt was as much the grandparents' expectations as the parents'. The work was getting the adults aligned first.

When to seek help — and what's just a phase

Much of what worries parents is ordinary development— testing limits, big feelings, a teenager pulling away. What's worth a professional conversation is when a change is lasting, intensifying, or getting in the way of a child's daily life: their sleep, appetite, friendships, school, or joy. You don't need to be certain before reaching out— parents can see Dr. Kohli first, without the child, simply to think it through. And if a child ever speaks about wanting to harm themselves, treat it seriously and seek help promptly.

Explore parenting support by topic

Whatever stage your child is at, the full library is grouped below by what you’re facing — from the first worries, through the school and teenage years, to keeping children safe.

Frequently asked questions

This page is for general information and is not a substitute for individual professional assessment or treatment. If you are worried that your child may be at risk of harming themselves, please seek help urgently — contact a crisis helpline in your area or your local emergency services right away.