For me, it seems that my feelings are the root of the issue, not the thoughts. To heal, I need to deal with my feelings. CBT seems to want to focus on thinking, which of course will not get at the root of my problem. I think different therapies work for different people. Scott, you say you can't seem to apply CBT because you are so down in the hole. Could you work on improving being so down by other methods? Then when you feel somewhat better, maybe CBT would then be useful? Can you ask your therapist if he/she has any other tools in his toolbox besides CBT and ask if you can try those for a while? It's worth a shot. If your T is strictly CBT and you really feel stuck, you could look for a new T with a wider range of skills.