I recently looked into the bpd patient's guide by Fusco and Freeman--I don't have the therapist's guide or a narrative manual. I just have the patient's guide. I started taking myself through the exercises in it, found them difficult and confusing because they brought up instant emotional blocks for me. But I kept going back because the questions are very, very good. I"m working in itnow, in a section called "Seeing Red: Keeping Your Cool". I am impressed. And, at the bottom of the page, the credits for the exercises almost always go to J. S. Beck, Cognitive Therapy: Basics and Beyond. I'll be buying that book next.

I have yet to put anything into action. We'll see if I get that far. I hope to.

I am often confused in doing this on my own. I think I'll get the manual, the text that goes with the workbook (doh!!!) and see if I can sort that out. If not, and if it's making sense to me to stick with it, I think I'll look for cbt...It's worth a try. DBT helped me tremendously, but I want more improvement, and I've been through DBT three times, none of which was probably done as really should be done: Once might have been a year long....I don't remember, but it hardly slowed me down. The second time around, I began to get it and it helped a very great deal. A year ago, I had a rather bizarre three-month course at a local mental health agency....I needed a refresher, but that's as good as it gets around here.

I like a great many of the skills in DBT, and we need a collection of skills. What I'm doing now, though, it appears, is branching out into "sources"--like mindfulness on it's own, communication and relationship skills on their own, now some cbt............

Different things are helping me at different times, it seems. Which sounds perfectly reasonable....