Dialectical Behavioural Therapy
What is Dialectical Behavioural Therapy?
DBT first emerged as a treatment modality for borderline personality disorder but since adapted to support individuals who feel emotions very intensely across a wide range of mental health challenges such as depression, anxiety, PTSD, substance abuse, ADHD and ASD. DBT can also be particularly useful for addressing issues related to impulsivity, relationship difficulties, stressful parenting situations, anger and general emotional regulation.
The ‘dialectical’ in DBT means trying to understand how two things that seem opposite could both be true. Accepting yourself and changing your behaviour at the same time might feel contradictory but DBT teaches that it’s possible for you to achieve both of these goals.
Whilst DBT and CBT have some similarities, DBT incorporates many of the tools and techniques of CBT along with mindfulness and acceptance strategies to manage intense emotions and improve relationships. DBT also tends to treat deeper-rooted issues related to emotional regulation.
A large body of research studies and reviews show that DBT is a highly effective form of therapy, particularly for those looking to improve their ability to regulate their emotions and improve interpersonal relating.
How DBT works
The aim of DBT is to help clients understand and accept difficult feelings, learn skills to manage these feelings and be more able to make positive changes in life.
DBT can be carried out in individual therapy as well as skills groups. Whilst individual therapy targets specific emotions and behaviours, skills groups empower clients by teaching coping skills in four key areas:
- Mindfulness which enables clients to note, be present with and accept emotions and how they shift and change, thereby decreasing the power of emotions to direct actions and behaviour
- Improving distress tolerance – the ability to tolerate difficult emotions rather than needing to escape or responding in ways that make difficult situations worse.
- Emotion regulation strategies that give clients the tools to manage and change intense emotions that are causing problems in their life.
- Techniques of interpersonal effectiveness, enhancing communication with others in way that is assertive, maintains self-respect, and strengthens relationships
Our Approach at The Therapy Collective
At The Therapy Collective, our individual DBT sessions are focused on teaching clients how to recognise, understand, label and regulate emotions and how to handle interpersonal situations that lead to painful emotions.
Together, client and therapist identify target emotional responses and behaviours that the client wishes to address. Therapy focuses on acceptance techniques – understanding yourself as a person and making sense of how come you resort to certain behaviours. For most clients, problematic behaviour has been their only way of coping with intense emotions. Using change techniques, like thought challenging, and finding new ways of dealing with distress, your therapist will focus on helping you replace behaviour that harms you and your relationships with behaviour that is more helpful.
DBT at The Therapy Collective often makes use of homework as an integral part of the process. Your therapist will likely suggest the use of a diary cards, to track your emotions, impulses and actions and to look for patterns and triggers in your life. The diary card is a useful tool that helps clients gain awareness of their feelings, understand which situations are especially challenging for them, and can use the information from the get- go to gain control over their own behaviour. During sessions, your therapist will review difficult situations and feelings faced the prior week and engage in problem-solving by actively discussing ways of behaving that might have delivered a positive outcome and teaching you skills that you apply in your day-to-day life.
A DBT therapist is typically a licensed mental health professional who has additional training and experience in DBT. As DBT is a complex treatment modality it requires extensive training to be administered in the way it was developed and tested. At The Therapy Collective, our DBT therapists have additional certification in DBT through the South African Institute of DBT and DBT Central Australia.
Through the DBT process at The Therapy Collective, you will learn that emotions are not the enemy but are useful and serve specific functions. You may still feel them intensely, but will be able to identify and know how to manage them without using harmful behaviours. Our therapists can help you build skills in emotion regulation, distress tolerance, interpersonal effectiveness, and mindfulness to navigate life’s challenges both individual therapy and through the skills groups we offer.
You can anticipate a supportive and validating environment where you can learn to manage intense emotions, improve relationships, and improve your overall happiness and satisfaction.