Dialectical Behaviour Therapy London
Living in Big Cities like London can sometimes be over whelming. Many stressors such as financial difficulties, safety concerns and work life balance and relationship challenges can contribute to feelings that are overwhelming. DBT therapy in London can help us to navigate the stressors of city life and help us to find peace and calm in stressful situations. DBT can assist us to manage and regulate our emotions and build positive relationships with others and our inner selves.
What is DBT?
Dialectical Behavioural Therapy is a type of therapy designed to work with those diagnosed with BPD. Since its creation it is shown to have a good evidence base for treatment of other forms of psychological distress. It can help with relational challenges, mood regulation, emotional balance, anxiety and help to create peace of mind in stressful situations.
There are four key elements to DBT
There are four key elements to DBT. The first is distress tolerance, you will work with your therapist to explore situations in your life when distress occurs. You will work to identify your distress and explore methods to help you relax, reflect and begin increasing your tolerance in distressing situations. This might include things like keeping note of distressing experiences and reflecting on them in therapy. It may also include developing strategies to help you relax when these situations happen. You may then begin to learn to evaluate situations in a more balanced and calm manner and begin to set intentions in how you choose to react.
Increasing distress tolerance might include planning for future distressing situations with exercises such as keeping logs and role play. You could also explore methods that help to distract you, relax you and give you calm of mind. This leads us onto our next element of DBT which is mindfulness. Many people will have herd of mindfulness, but did you know that there is significant evidence that shows the incredible psychological benefits for the practice. Mindfulness can help us stay calm, let go of difficult feelings, and prepare us to tackle the stressors of everyday life with confidence and peace of mind.
Sometimes people might feel intimidated about the prospect of mindfulness and often say things like, “I can’t meditate” or “this doesn’t work for me, I’ve tried it”. When working with your DBT therapist you can explore alternative methods to become more mindful, you can find what works for you, it’s not just about meditation. Mindful practice can be explored in therapy and tailored to the individual, some examples could be, taking time to observe nature, tasting meals with more intent, dancing or singing along to a favourite song. Mindfulness is about training the mind to be present in the current moment and learning to let go of the constant trail of thoughts that can usually occupy the mind.
It's best to think of the mind like a muscle when attempting to become more mindful. A muscle can be exercised and to become stronger, with the practice of mindfulness you can begin to develop your ability to allow thoughts to come and go without judgement. A strong mind will feel present in the current moment, mindfulness frees our mind so it doesn’t feel busy and clustered with noise. In my dialectical behavioural therapy London clinic, you can work with your therapist to develop these skills week by week. Sometimes the commitment of therapy and reviewing your mindfulness journey is a core component of maintaining your development.
The next element of DBT is emotional regulation. Your therapist may begin by exploring the psychology of emotions with you and take a bit of a educational role. It’s often useful for people to learn about emotions from a scientific perspective, for example, did you know that there is a difference between primary emotions and secondary emotions? You might think of fear as a primary emotion for example, then when faced with fear your mind might add on anger and sadness and other emotions that cause situations to become more complex. Educational and reflective work will help a person explore and become aware of what their primary emotions are in distressing situations and learn to cope better with these rather than allowing further secondary emotions to evolve.
Emotional regulation will also include cognitive and behavioural work associated with your emotions. For example, you may begin to keep track of your emotions in relationship to your thoughts by keeping a thought and mood record. You might also explore your emotions in relationship to your behaviours, such as, active lifestyle vs inactive, staying up late vs an early night or eating healthy food vs unhealthy food. Understanding and exploring how our activities impact our emotions is key in being able to regulate them and achieve greater wellbeing. In this section you can start to set goals with your therapist to develop your emotional regulation capabilities.
Final Element of DBT:
The final element of DBT is interpersonal effectiveness, in this element you will begin to explore your relationships with others. This might include understanding your relational style. Some people might have an aggressive relational style which they might deploy to keep someone they care about from leaving them, almost forcing them to stay. The problem with this is that ultimately, they will push the person away. On the other hand, an individual might have a passive relational style which can create perceptions of weakness, and then lead to people taking advantage and lacking respect.
Interpersonal effectiveness work will help you to identify what your needs are in relationships with others, such as family, friends or colleagues. You will learn how to be assertive and clear about your needs in a balanced and fair manner. You might learn how to set boundaries with others and yourself regarding your relationships allowing you to pave a pathway towards stability and fairness.
Your DBT sessions should then take a consolidation process where you practice putting it all together. With the numerous skills and methods, you have learned you can almost begin to set these in stone with your therapist. You may do things like experimental role play or thought exercises, future planning and setting contingency plans. I hope this blog has been helpful in clarifying the DBT process. Feel free to contact me if you have any questions or would like to book session at: CMH Counselling.
