Marcus Behavioral Therapy: A Case for Using Memes in Therapy with Teenagers

Written by Sarah Gerrels-Hinkle, Licensed Psychological Associate

In October of 2025, my friend sent me an Instagram reel of a strange-looking creature from an online game (VR Chat). It was a viral video making its rounds on the Internet. In the video, a chubby, worm-looking creature (but with arms and legs?) is standing in front of a campfire with his buddy. “I don’t like this rock, Robert. It’s pissing me off!” he says in a weirdly monotone voice, pointing at a rock in front of the campfire. His friend (Robert) attempts to console him and offers to stand in front of the rock. Dysregulated and not listening, Marcus then flails around and throws himself into the campfire. His friend Robert pulls him out immediately, and Marcus claims that he “owes Robert everything”. So, why am I writing a work-related blog about a very silly video that my friend sent me? I am writing this because that cringy internet video completely changed the course of therapy treatment with one of my teenage clients. 

In November of 2025, I was at a difficult crossroads with this client. Despite being in consistent, weekly therapy with me for 7 months, this kid was still extremely struggling. Nothing seemed to be helping. We met again one week after they had been fresh out of another mental hospital stay for self-harm behaviors and frequent suicidal ideation. I could see the dark rings under their eyes and the most recent scars from the self-harming attempts. “What is really going on in your head right now?” I asked the client. “Everything is just pissing me off, all the time!” they said frantically. The stupid meme voice echoed in my brain. I don’t like this rock, Robert. It’s pissing me off! I now had an idea. Marcus the worm was going to aid me in therapy. I pulled out my phone and told them I had something to show them. We watched the dumb video of Marcus throwing himself into a campfire because the rock made him mad. The client became silent and then began immediately laughing. “Sarah… I have never felt so seen.” And they genuinely meant it.

Marcus the worm became our turning point in therapy. I scoured online for short-form videos of Marcus the worm and his impulsive behavior. His friend Robert frequently chastizes him for insulting other characters in the game, getting into random fights, and at one point, “removing the entire state of South Carolina”. This behavior stems from Marcus telling Robert that he does not know what to do when he gets “mildly irritated”. I saved these videos for my client and suddenly had a new direction for therapy: engaging in dialectical behavior therapy while using silly Marcus videos as our “bad examples” to analyze during sessions along with the client’s report of what was bothering them that week. With the aid of Marcus’s exaggerated antics, the client learned that the reason Marcus was so relatable to them was due to their own engagement in self-sabotaging behavior. In our weekly therapy sessions, the client began to see real progress. We discussed better communication skills, better frustration tolerance, and better emotional regulation. Over the course of the next six months, the client had better medication adherence, better school attendance, NO mental health hospitalizations, and significantly decreased substance usage. This is the same client that had threatened suicide twice in the last six months prior to our “Marcus Behavioral Therapy”, as they and I now jokingly refer to it as. 

I love counseling teenagers here at Kranz Psychological Services. In my almost two years of working here, I have noticed that teenagers’ greatest need is to be known and seen. In Erik Erikson’s stages of psychosocial development, the adolescent stage is known as Identity vs. Role Confusion. One of the most important aspects of a teenager’s life is the relationships around them during this time period. Does anyone understand me? Do I even understand myself? Neurodivergent teenagers (i.e. teenagers with autism, ADHD, OCD, bipolar disorder, etc.) struggle with these questions even more due to combining adolescent hormones with a brain that veers into hyper-fixation extremely easily. In other words, crudely, everything is “pissing them off”. 

Enter my friend Marcus. He is not a teenager. In fact, he is not a person. But he is strange, awkward, and clearly has no idea what to do with his big emotions. So, he might as well be a teenager! After the use of Marcus, I have now used several memes in therapy with my teenagers. It makes them laugh and invites collaboration and increased rapport between us. Most of all, it helps them feel seen. For parents and other therapists, don’t be afraid to engage your teenagers with creativity and humor. In the words of Oscar Wilde, “Life imitates art far more than art imitates life.” And you just might find that your teenager’s life imitates my friend Marcus the worm.