How to Use Dialectical Behavioral Therapy in the Treatment of Borderline Personality Disorder
Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) is a bio-social disorder that effects a person's emotional development. Characterized by emotional dysregulation, those who suffer from BPD often have poor interpersonal skills, poor emotional cognition and self-harming behavior. Yet it is not a hopeless situation. A treatment developed by Marsha Linehan in the 1990s called Dialectical Behavioral Treatment (DBT) has shown great success in the treatment of this debilitating disorder.
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Instructions
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Teach the major skill modules to the patient in a large group setting. These include interpersonal skills, mindfulness skills, emotional regulation skills and self-soothing skills. These skills are designed to help patients step back and examine their behaviors, or inclinations toward certain behaviors, before they act on them
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Practice the skills in the large group setting. This allows patients to try out on one another more appropriate ways of behaving in a safe and protected environment. This practice can include small group work, role-playing and writing exercises.
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Distribute "diary cards." These cards allow patients to monitor their feelings and use of skills through placing a numerical level for each action. The bottom of the diary card also allows patients to make specific notes about events that triggered or made a day difficult for them.
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Have one individual therapy session every week so that patients can begin to tackle the problems that led to the development of the disorder. These individual sessions also allow patients to explore problematic behaviors that have come up for the week and/or work more deeply with skills they may have trouble understanding in the larger groups.
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Tips & Warnings
This kind of treatment must be a daily experience, in which attendance is carefully monitored in order to allow the patient to gradually integrate the variety of skills modules taught. The therapist must also make themselves available for coaching over the phone to help patients avoid self-harming behaviors.
Often patients are inconsistent with treatment and will attempt suicide over and over again to gain a response. DBT does not help everyone, but it has shown better results than more traditional treatments for BPD.
Resources
- Photo Credit www.bpd.org
