DBT gives me PTSD

I was rereading this thread, looking for something else, and happened to notice this by deli a good three months ago:
I sometimes do labeling with skills (whether life or technical) that I've just learned, haven't had much practice with yet, and am still trying to keep straight and learn to apply correctly.

With skills that I consider really "mine," I'm more likely to first do something and notice how it worked, and only afterwards ask myself whether it represented some skill that I already had a name for, or whether I invented it on the spot.

I attend the weekly groups that are more like classes as we do share some in the class, but mostly about our homework & how successfully we practiced the skills we have been learning. I’ve been attending for about 6 mos. now. There is learning through lecture & discussion & we follow a manual & have daily homework assignments & are to practice the skills we are learning.
I also started indiv. therapy w/the therapist (Ph.D. who is specifically trained in DBT--this is a must; the therapist must have the proper DBT training & certification, not just read a book or 2 about it).
You can find a trained therapist in your area. It was developed by Marsha Linehan Ph.D. primarily for people w/borderline personality disorder but has been shown to be useful for bipolar, as well. BTW, Dr. Linehan will be speaking at the upcoming NAMI convention in San Francisco in July (nami.org for info.).
Call 1-888-4-TARA APD for brochure "Guidelines for Choosing a DBT Therapist" & also refer you to a DBT program. Also a web site: www.TARA4BPD.org
There are other web sites that have exercises that have been developed by “consumers” (those who are being treated for a mental illness), as well as web sites with articles about “mindfulness.”
A list of therapists trained in DBT: www.behavioraltech.com
Call the head of the nearest University Dept. of Psychiatry or Psychology & ask for a referral to a DBT program.
Call the commission of the state, county or city office of mental health & ask for a referral to a DBT program.
If not available in your community, read books from the TARA recommended list. Attend self-help groups like Recovery, Inc. Seek out others & start a study group. Start a TARA chapter in your community. Contact TARA for help in starting an affiliate. These are all from my manual "The Dialectical Behavioral Therapy Skills Workbook." I know there are other such workbooks available at Barnes & Nobles & one directly aimed at bipolar coming out in July.
This manual is specifically made up for therapists teaching the class as it has DBT for private practice "skills sheets" & pages from other books by Dr. Linehan inserted so I don't know what year this was originally compiled.
There are too many skills & subjects that are addressed but some of them are: emotional regulation (helping to decrease over-reactions & doing rash, irrational & dangerous behaviors from these strong emotions; for example, I am EXTREMELY sensitive to any kind of criticism from my husband {or PERCEIVED criticism} which I seem to be able to perceive from movement of an eyebrow or his saying he liked my earrings meaning he couldn't say anything nice about ME--just my earrings--so, of course, that sends me into the depths of low self-esteem, depression, self hatred; my self-esteem is already in the gutter so it doesn't take much as you can see!!
Or once a father of one of our son's friends came over & saw a wedding photo of me on the mantel & said, "Boy, you sure were cute!" I heard WERE so when he left I smashed the glass-framed photo & tore it up. I was going to tear up our whole wedding photo album, but my husband was able to grab it away from me first. I'd say A BIT of an over-reaction on my part, but that was typical of my rash behaviors as my emotions were way over the top.
I tell you it is awful living like this. It seemed like I could get triggered so easily & could feel so hurt & cry inappropriately. We’d be out to a nice dinner to celebrate our anniversary & I’d be crying by the time the salad arrived, ruining another occasion that should have been joyous. I bought Visine by the case at Sam’s Club. The low self-esteem prevented me from doing so much. I just wanted to avoid life. I felt so inferior.
Medication helped me, not enough as I also had grown up in a not so great family w/a severely bipolar mother who was not able to be helped & committed suicide when I was 15 & alcoholic father who was very uninvolved or helpful w/us kids—mainly dumped us kids in a boarding school after she died (probably would have been better if he did that earlier as she was quite abusive & the home life was chaotic to put it mildly w/her in & out of mental institutions).
Some of the topics & skills learned in DBT: How to analyze emotions in a rational way so as to de-escalate them & feel the appropriate emotion (not the over-the-top reaction that leads you to do destructive behaviors to get relief from it as it feels unbearable; some women in the group are cutters, bulimic, anorexic, alcoholic or drug abusers; I tend to overeat & do rash behaviors like start some kind of fight or crisis or get depressed or start the “silent treatment”). We learn to identify the “real” or “pure” emotion we are feeling & not to stuff it or avoid it, but to go ahead & feel it & not be afraid of it, but not to “feed” it so that it will escalate. Not to add to it by ruminating on all the past occasions that caused our feelings to get hurt or sad or feel lonely, etc. Let the emotion go its natural course as it will decrease on its own. It will not last forever. It teaches what you “feed” will grow so if you feed your emotion by heaping fuel of past hurts or anger or whatever the emotion is on it, you will get mired in it & escalate it.
Live in the “here & now.” Don’t look at the past w/regret or the future w/anxiety. What is going on right now? My family is happy. Things are generally OK. I don’t live in the past (my unhappy childhood; I accept it; it was hard & sad, but I cannot change it). I don’t think ahead about maybe my husband will develop a serious illness. Maybe I’ll feel anxious & uncomfortable on Friday night when we have to attend a wedding (but then I get to practice another skill of DBT—distress tolerance & anxiety reduction!!).
There are the mindfulness techniques, breathing techniques, anxiety reduction, assertiveness while not causing antagonism in the other person, effective communication skills, goal setting & reaching those goals (Are your behaviors helping you reach those goals? When you want to get drunk as you are feeling very upset or yell at your boss, “play the tape all the way to the end” & see what the ultimate consequences of those behaviors will be. Will the end result lead you to be closer to your ultimate goals of having a peaceful life; a good, stable job; being a productive member of the community; staying out of jail; having a good relationship w/your family & friends, etc.?)
Skills to control anger, steps to change negative thinking, build positive experiences & build mastery (which increases self-esteem)…
Practice “wellness” by taking care of your body through stress reduction, exercise, proper eating & sleep; avoiding mood-altering substances (except prescribed meds!); learning how to do the things you fear; getting perspective & acknowledge the other person’s opinion & right to it, even if you don’t agree. Avoid “black & white thinking”; “all or nothing thinking”; perfectionism which basically paralyzes you & prevents you from even attempting difficult or scary or new things; “mind reading”; jumping to conclusions without evidence—those conclusions tend to be negative & catastrophic in scope; accepting that you cannot control other people’s thoughts, behaviors, or emotions.

Remember this unresolved discussion from almost four months ago?
Thanks to the link Trying & Caring just posted, I found a reposted New York Times article where an unidentified therapist (apparently not Linehan herself, though her picture appears nearby) is quoted discussing suicide with a patient as follows:-- "With Toughness and Caring, a Novel Therapy Helps Tortured Souls," by Benedict Carey, reposted by TARA from The New York Times, July 13, 2004.

I suppose with a good deal of taking out of context and stretching, that quote could be turned into something like an I-dare-you. It sounds to me, though, as if the therapist is only inviting her patient to notice for herself that she does in fact also want to live.

my T had a similar conversation wiht me - i was calm and in control and talking about a plan i had - he went through it and by discussing it it did help me realise as FooZe said that i did actually want to live.

SO discussing these things is not always a bad thing if done in the right manner and yes my T uses DBT amoungst prob every other therapy known to man lol clever old T

That kind of thing has to be done with the utmost self-awareness on the part of the therapist, though; I think many of us here have experience with how our minds will lead us to the most dreadful conclusions. I know therapists who do not have that kind of awareness.

THANKS for not crucifying me for standing up for or posting that I have benefited greatly from DBT. As far as challenging statements, like I'll kill myself or divorce you (to my husband--often statement from me)--these are the kind of RASH behaviors or statements I make when I am emotionally dysregulated (which is what DBT is targeting). BUT with my DBT I realized I don't want a divorce, I don't want to be dead--I just don't have the skills to deal with the overwhelming & scary emotions I feel. So DBT has given me the skills (not like I'm "cured"), but I tell you I am able to de-escalate my out of control emotions much sooner, feel more pleasure in life, decrease anxiety, TRYING to feel "real" (you all with borderline or "others" may know what this feeling is).

ANYWAY--I had my individual therapy w/the therapist who leads the DBT group & then immediately after that DBT group. She (T) stays for an extra 45 min. to make sure we are OK (only 2 of us at the DBT group today but other young lady has been struggling a lot in that an alter took control & the police had to be called & handcuff her & take her to the psych ward; I thing she was there 7 days).

This is a young lady (young to me!) in immense pain & after I left after therapist spent an extra 30-45 min. "hanging out" w/ us after DBT was officially over, I saw the T hug her & pull her into her arms & apparently was going to spend more time w/her privately (off the books as in no charge; this T has done EMDR treatments for me w/no charge as well. She cares for us for some reason).

What a thought--a therapist or pdoc who cares? I am really lucky in that I have both...

Thank you for sharing about your experiences with DBT, here and in the social group.

It seemed to me as if the people in this thread with the most negative views of DBT were mostly the ones who'd had the least actual contact with it. It might really not be for them, either because they weren't ready for it or because they didn't need it in the first place, but sometimes I though they might be getting scared off just by things (not always accurate) that they'd heard or read.

We were just discussing that very subject in this thread

How's this for possibly one of the latest replies ever?
I'd say that what makes DBT "dialectical" in the first place is that the therapist would probably pick up not only on "you feel passive and helpless and weak" but also on "it seems to you that acting passive and helpless and weak is what you have to do to stay safe" and "you don't entirely want to keep feeling that way".

About a year ago another member happened to mention Steven Hayes and ACT ("Acceptance and Commitment Therapy"). I liked what I read about it online so I bought his book (Get Out of Your Mind and Into Your Life) and read that, too. It was based on ACT and turned out to be all about applying mindfulness techniques in everyday life.

I kept thinking that most parts of it sounded a good deal like Zen and also reminded me quite a bit of the workshop that I mentioned earlier in this thread (here and here, for instance). Well, small world! I came across an interview where Hayes mentioned that years ago, he had in fact been in one of those workshops himself.

More recently, I discovered that Hayes and Linehan had edited a book together, Mindfulness and Acceptance: Expanding the Cognitive-Behavioral Tradition; there's a review of it here. For better or worse, it's geared more to psychologists and such than to the general public. From one of the Amazon reviews:

this will be a very useful book to folks who are interested in how concepts of acceptance and mindfulness can be integrated with, or change for the better, cognitive behavioral treatments. if you have no idea what the previous sentence means, then you are probably not one of those folks!

Hey I'll join back in too

Quote:

This site does not recommend or endorse DBT because of its emphasis on philosophies derived from Buddhism and Eastern religion. However, some of the principles of DBT, less those of Eastern religions, can be of value. (In public schools there is a separation of religion and education. Some might consider DBT as teaching the practice of a form of religion, insomuch as Buddhist philosophies and meditation form a part of the treatment. Teaching religion on an academic level, however, is accepted in public schools). However, it has been noted, that DBT has been effective for many, more effective than standard treatments, probably in large part, because of the specific training of therapists, and the intensity, specific and regularity of the treatment schedule.

http://www.winmentalhealth.com/diale...al_therapy.php

That site does give a good explanation of DBT though. But this is the main reason I shy away from DBT for myself, as I don't hold to those philosophies. It can help many who do, or don't "care".

I don't see DBT or mindfulness as being about promoting a philosophy or choosing one philosophy over another. As far as I'm concerned, Hayes's book could just as well have been titled, "Get out of your philosophy and into your life."