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Rapunzel I came back here looking for an old post, and I'm looking around and realizing that I have really come a long way.
 
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Default Apr 30, 2009 at 03:10 AM
  #61
Bumping so this is easier to find. Any chance of making it sticky?

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Default May 05, 2009 at 12:11 AM
  #62
Bumping to remind myself as much as anything (I have a cold and my brain is fried and I'm just so tired). Chat is in the morning at 10:30 Eastern Time. Someone wake me up if I'm not there. I'll do my best.

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Default May 05, 2009 at 09:36 AM
  #63
Chat is in progress now.

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Default May 12, 2009 at 12:40 AM
  #64
I am still sick, and I'm in and out of it if you know what I mean. But chat is in the morning and if I'm late someone please wake me up, ok?

Last week we talked about mindfulness in the sense of being mindful of emotions - paying attention to them, or observing and describing emotions. There are several things to pay attention to besides naming the emotion. What do you feel in your body, and where? How do you express the emotion? What action urges are associated with the emotion? What is the function of the emotion? Do you have other emotions related to the first emotion, such as secondary emotions (feeling mad about feeling sad, etc.)?

We also discussed the "Opposite to Emotion Action" technique. To practice this, observe what action urges you have with a painful emotion, and choose to do the opposite.

If you are sad or depressed, the emotion says to hide, sleep, avoid, shut down, etc. To change what you are feeling, do the opposite. Get moving, do something fun, exercise, call a friend, or do something that makes you feel competent.

If you are scared or afraid, you might feel like running away or avoiding the thing you are afraid of. To reduce your fear, face the thing you are afraid of instead (if safe).

If you feel guilt or shame, see where it's coming from. If you do need to apologize or set something right or make amends, then do so. But if you feel guilty or ashamed and you are not doing anything wrong, then keep doing what you are doing. Like if you feel ashamed when you go to T and talk about trauma or abuse memories, keep on talking about it until you don't feel ashamed.

If you feel angry you might feel like breaking something or being aggressive or hurting someone. The opposite could be to stay away from that person, or it could be to do something nice for them, or generally do something constructive.

See 'ya in the morning!

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“We should always pray for help, but we should always listen for inspiration and impression to proceed in ways different from those we may have thought of.”
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Default May 12, 2009 at 12:15 PM
  #65
Today we talked more about understanding emotions, and about Opposite to Emotion.

I don't post specifics from chat, but this chat reminded me of some examples from my own life, so I'll use those.

Does anyone here subscribe to Flylady? She's great, and you can find her at flylady.net - anyway, back in 2003, Flylady's theme for the year was "Be kind to me in 2003." I had been following her program at the time, and I could not handle that theme at all, and stopped reading Flylady because of that trigger. She was suggesting tasks that involved self-care and pampering your body. I couldn't deal with it.

If I had known then about DBT skills, and what we have just been learning, I would recognize that I had strong feelings about that because I was afraid of being out of control if I didn't maintain strict discipline with my body (pampering was definitely out - I was restricting eating and also self-injuring in order to maintain control, and was afraid to let go of that). Another emotion involved is shame. I felt worth less than anybody else and undeserving of better treatment.

Opposite to Emotion means not letting the feelings be in control. If you are afraid, you need to face what you are afraid of. If you are ashamed, and not doing something wrong, then do it anyway. Baby steps are always acceptable. So the approach would be to take steps towards doing the self-care even if afraid and ashamed. Note, you don't have to do anything overwhelming. Just little things to start with. You decide what you can do.

I'm also practicing Opposite to Emotion right now by posting this. I almost deleted my personal example from this post because of fear and shame. But I will post it anyway. And then go eat some chocolate and make some warm herb tea. Even if I have to fight through fear and shame to do it.

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Default May 19, 2009 at 02:24 PM
  #66
This week we talked about emotions and Distress Tolerance. Distress tolerance strategies are for getting through the moment, or surviving a crisis. They are a temporary solution, and should not replace managing the situation and/or your emotional reactions. But it isn't always the right time to stop and process emotions. Also, if you get overwhelmed with your feelings or whatever is going on, you can stop and take a break and get back to it later.

So, in your mind, you can have a closet. On that closet, there is a top shelf. You can keep a box on that top shelf in the closet for putting your emotions in when you need to put them away until later. The thing is, you do need to come back and get them out of the box and deal with them. Don't let them pile up in there and overflow or burst out.

Emotions have a purpose. They come from somewhere, for a good reason, and they have something important to tell you. Even if you, like most of us, were taught that you couldn't have your emotions or that it wasn't safe to feel them, you need your emotions. They are an important part of what makes you who you are. They could be trying to tell you something, or to help you to communicate to someone else, or to motivate you to do something. Observe your emotions. Take a step back from them and see what you feel in your body, where it is, how it shows on your face, in your body language, in your words, etc. What does the emotion want you to do? You don't have to act on the action urges, but it helps to know where they are coming from. They you can be in control and decide what to do with it.

When you need to get through intense emotions and painful situations, you can use distress tolerance. Some of these skills build on accepting what you feel and what is happening around you. Some are about distracting, and self-soothing. There are a lot of things that you can try, so find something that works for you, and try a few that you haven't done before too.

Distracting (Wise Mind ACCEPTS )
Activities - go do something, exercise, play a game, call someone, ...
Contributing - do something to help someone else
Comparisons - compare yourself to others coping like you are, or someone less fortunate
opposite Emotions - read something or listen to music or watch a movie that creates different emotions
Pushing away - leave the situation and come back to it, or block it out of your mind for a while
Thoughts - count to ten, do a puzzle, count all the colors you can see, read, ...
Sensations - hold ice, squeeze a rubber ball, take a hot or cold shower, listen to loud music, ...

You can use the 5 senses to sooth yourself. Find something beautiful, listen to music or nature sounds, sing, put on perfume or lotion, get a scented candle, eat chocolate or peppermint candy or gum or a treat, take a bubble bath, pet the cat or dog, get a massage, ...

Some other great strategies to IMPROVE the moment:
Imagery, visualization, go to a safe place in your mind
Meaning - find purpose and remember your values and what you are living for
Prayer - especially for acceptance, or turning things over to God
Relaxation
One thing in the moment - remind yourself you just have to get through this moment right now
Vacation from adulthood (as long as you are responsible and don't check out for too long and make sure your responsibilities are covered).
Encouragement - cheerlead yourself and tell yourself you can do this, and you are doing the best that you can, and it won't last forever.

Also try making a list of the Pros and Cons of tolerating or not tolerating the distress, short term and long term. Focus on your goals, and the light at the end of the tunnel.

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Thanks for this!
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Default May 19, 2009 at 02:58 PM
  #67
Anyone interested is also welcome to come to the DBT social group for more discussion.
http://forums.psychcentral.com/group.php?groupid=52

I promised in the chat that I would post a link to a list of emotions. You will find some good lists if you google "emotions list." If it is hard to figure out what you are feeling, you may be experiencing more than one emotion, or more complex emotions, or maybe you need more practice identifying emotions. I need to get a lot better at it, myself. I carry around a "cheat sheet" (a copy of an emotions list) for when I get stuck. See if you can find the ones that fit when you get stuck.

There are only a few basic emotions. The rest are related emotions - different combinations and intensities. Different theorists name different groups of basic emotions, but they are similar. This page has a chart of some of the basic emotions, and also a tree structure that groups emotions based on the basic ones.
http://changingminds.org/explanation...20emotions.htm

I have a copy of the emotions tree chart in my planner and have kept it for several years. It comes in handy sometimes.

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Default Jun 16, 2009 at 03:08 PM
  #68
The DBT chat continues each week. I've been keeping the summaries on the DBT social group message board http://forums.psychcentral.com/group.php?groupid=52 because having it all over the place was getting confusing and hard to keep up with. Anyone interested is welcome to check it out.

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Thanks for this!
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Default Jun 16, 2009 at 03:11 PM
  #69
Forgot to say, we have been discussing mindfulness. So far we have covered states of mind, "what" skills, and started on "how" skills. For further explanation, look at the social group message board. We're planning to follow the outline from here, unless we decide to spend a chat working on something that somebody brings that they would like help with.

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Default Oct 14, 2013 at 02:01 PM
  #70
is the dbt chat still going on?

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Default Oct 15, 2013 at 02:51 AM
  #71
I have not been doing chats for some time, but I'm not sure if someone else might be doing a DBT chat.

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Default Dec 18, 2018 at 07:55 PM
  #72
Quote:
Originally Posted by Rapunzel View Post
I am leading a chat about DBT at 10:30 a.m. on Thursdays (now). It isn't on the chat schedule, but I will be there if anyone wants to talk about DBT therapy or skills. If you have any experience with DBT, I would welcome your input, and if you want to learn about it, come on in.

Please note that this is a chat intended for informational purposes only, and is not intended to take the place of any therapeutic intervention. I am hoping to learn a lot too.

That said, I am a counselor intern, and I am running DBT groups IRL. I am learning as I go, as I have mostly read the books from Marsha Linehan and I'm trying to figure it out for myself. I am working on how to get more specific training and network with other, more experienced, DBT therapists. I'm also aware that I need DBT Skills myself, and I see this group as a peer group discussion, where I will be just one of the group and I would appreciate support and feedback too.

I would be happy to have any comments, suggestions, requests, etc. from any of you. Feel free to reply to this thread, PM me, come to the chat, etc. If you want to study more about DBT on your own, DBT Self Help is a terrific source. I have found examples there beyond what is in the skills manual, and variations on diary cards that I like better than the one in the skills manual (if you want to use a diary card, go pick one out and print it). My vision for this chat is something like the self-help groups that the author of dbtselfhelp.com talks about. I wish that there were such a live support group available where I live. I would join it.

Anyway, see 'ya in chat!

Rap
Ok! Thanks for letting me know!
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Default Dec 18, 2018 at 08:18 PM
  #73
Quote:
Originally Posted by Rapunzel View Post
I promised that I would post an explanation of what DBT is. DBT stands for Dialectical Behevioral Therapy, although that doesn't really tell you a lot. Dialectics are pairs of opposites, or extremes, and the object of DBT is to find those extremes, and balance them, finding the middle ground. For example, you might tell yourself "I am completely worthless" and also "I have to be perfect in all areas in order to be okay." Those are both extreme ideas, and if you hold on to both of those extremes, it would be very hard to ever accept yourself for who you are. DBT would attempt to find the wisdom that is in each of your statements and bring them together into a synthesis such as "I am okay just the way that I am, AND I have things that I would like to work on and change about myself."

In DBT Skills Training, there are four modules, and the skills all fit into those areas.

Mindfulness is developing more awareness of yourself, your thoughts, your feelings, and your environment, very similar to grounding skills. Mindfulness is helpful in managing dissociation, thinking errors, and any problems that you might have in connecting with yourself and real life.

Interpersonal Effectiveness is very similar to assertiveness training. It teaches you to monitor your relationships, identify what is important to you, prioritize, and ask for what you need and want in a way that enhances or improves both the way that others feel about you, and your own self-respect.

Emotion Regulation helps you to understand and manage your feelings or emotions appropriately, rather than shutting them off or letting them blow up and get out of control.

Distress Tolerance is about getting through intense and painful emotions without losing control, shutting down, having a melt-down, acting impulsively, etc.

Although DBT was originally developed as a treatment for Borderline Personality Disorder, it has been found to be useful for addictions, impulsive behaviors, depression, anxiety, dissociation, PTSD, and other applications as well. The skills are basic skills that probably most people have not perfected but people who are effective in life are generally able to use at least some of these skills in ways that work for them (although they probably don't name them and analyze which skill they are using and why on a day to day basis). All of us have some skills, and most people have room for improvement in some areas.

DBT is a Cognitive-Behavioral therapy, that also uses insight and borrows from Eastern philosophy and spirituality. Basically, it is CBT with a kick.

Feel free to jump on in if you have anything to say, or any questions, here, and/or join us next Thursday.
Okay thanks for explaining
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Default Dec 18, 2018 at 08:20 PM
  #74
Quote:
Originally Posted by lifelesstraveled View Post
(((Rap)))

Thanks! My T is acutally working on these skills with me. She recently gave me a set of emotional regulation worksheets, has talked to me about wisemind, which I still have trouble understanding. I was hoping that I'd gt a chance to join that chat and learn a little more about DBT skills, more specfically wisemind...so I can actually start making use of that skill, but I am at work Thursday mornings. But thanks for the link

--LLT
What is emotional regulation worksheet?
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