Posts Tagged ‘Counseling’

CBT, CBT-E, DBT… Have you ever wondered what all those letters stand for and why they are so often talked about at The Emily Program and by other eating disorder professionals? If so, this is the post for you. Let’s dissect these terms, help you understand them, and explain why they are important to the work clients and clinicians do every day.

Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT)

“By correcting erroneous beliefs we can lower excessive reactions.” – Aaron Beck, M.D.

Cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) was developed by Dr. Aaron Beck in the 1960s. His work focused on how the conscious mind plays a role in how people interact with the world around them. Prior to his work, most therapeutic models focused on the unconscious mind—concepts like impulses, analyzing unconscious thoughts, conditioning, and “uncontrollable thoughts.” Dr. Beck changed mental health by introducing the belief that our thoughts are fundamental to how we interpret our experiences and consequently behave or respond. Dr. Beck and many other researchers have discovered that by identifying, monitoring, and effectively changing our thoughts, we can change or alter our maladaptive perceptions, leading to positive behavioral change.

By Christy Zender, MSW, LICSW

One of the most important elements of your treatment will be having a “good fit” with your provider(s). While “good fit” can mean a lot of things, we feel the most important element of fit is having a good level of comfort with your provider. We frequently talk about uncomfortable and difficult things in treatment so it is important you feel heard and responded to by your provider. All people have different communication styles so it is important that you talk openly about what is and what is not working for you.

Like many other eating disorder facilities, The Emily Program offers multiple levels of care for adolescents and adults. What makes The Emily Program different is that our services are based in outpatient treatment. As The Emily Program founder Dirk Miller says, “We didn’t start as an inpatient program and develop outpatient services to support that model. The reason is pretty simple: most change occurs as an outpatient. We live our lives as ‘outpatients.’ Ultimately we must apply what’s learned to a life of recovery that we live outside the treatment program.”

Lately, I’ve wondered what we mean when we talk about recovery. Some people use the term “recovered,” others say “recovery,” and yet others don’t use either. When someone enters into treatment, either that person or their loved ones want to know our success rate. Of course, this presents the question, “Success as measured by what?” As a field, we are at a loss on this question.

Re-posted from Cleveland Center for Eating Disorders (CCED) blog archives. CCED and The Emily Program partnered in 2014.

By Drs Lucene Wisniewski and Mark Warren

Over the last 15 years Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (DBT) has gone from being virtually unknown to being a term utilized by many treatment programs. DBT is an evidence based therapy, initially designed for Borderline Personality Disorder, and more lately for other diagnoses including eating disorders (Wisniewski, L., Safer, D., & Chen, E.Y., 2007). With its increase in popularity among treatment providers it is important to be clear about what it means to “do DBT” so an individual knows if they’re receiving evidence based care.

Comprehensive DBT treatment, initially described by Marsha Linehan, has four components: Individual therapy, skills group, 7 day week phone consultation availability, and consultation team for therapists known as “therapy for therapists”. Unless all four of these components are present, a program is not providing comprehensive DBT treatment. Additionally, in order for a therapist to be capable of providing DBT, a significant training process is generally required. This training process necessitates a therapist taking a non-judgmental stance, the ability to encourage motivation and commitment with their client, extensive knowledge and understanding of the DBT skills and therapeutic techniques, and the balance of accepting where a client is while moving them towards change.

By Dana Rademacher, intern at The Emily Program

“Gardening is the most therapeutic and defiant act you can do…plus you get strawberries.” -Ron Finley, Ted Talk: A guerilla gardener in South Central LA

Let’s be honest here for a second, I do not have the best track record when it comes to gardening and caring for plant life. I always get excited by the idea of gardening, but when push comes to shove, I’m just no good at keeping anything alive. I have the opposite of a green thumb if there is such a thing. Being busy between work and school, it is hard to find time to learn which plants are best for the climate, which fertilizer to use or to even pay attention to the rain-to-sun ratio every day.