DBT
Dialectical Behaviour Therapy
The dialectic in DBT is the balance it keeps: you are doing the best you can, and something needs to change. Both, at the same time.
Dialectical Behaviour Therapy was developed for people whose emotions arrive fast and land hard. Its central move is refusing to choose between acceptance and change. Being told to simply accept how things are can feel dismissive. Being pushed to change without acknowledgement can feel like a judgement. DBT holds both, which is often a relief for people used to getting one or the other.
The skills fall into four groups: mindfulness, distress tolerance, emotion regulation, and interpersonal effectiveness. In plain terms, that is noticing what is happening, getting through a bad hour without making it worse, understanding what your emotions are responding to, and asking for what you need without either flattening yourself or going to war.
What this can look like
- Naming an emotion precisely instead of settling for "bad"
- Building a plan for the hour when everything feels unbearable
- Working out what a feeling is actually responding to
- Practising how to ask for something, or say no to it
- Holding two things that are both true without collapsing either
Is it for you
Who this tends to suit
Worth being clear about something: comprehensive DBT is a specific programme with weekly individual sessions, a skills group, and phone coaching between sessions. That is not what I offer. What I draw on are DBT skills, used inside individual therapy, which is common practice and useful for a lot of people.
If you think you need the full programme, I will say so rather than approximate it, and I can point you toward finding one. The skills on their own tend to help most with emotional intensity, rejection sensitivity, and the gap between knowing what you want to do and doing it while flooded.
Also drawn from
Other approaches
These are not alternatives you have to choose between. Most of the work borrows from more than one.
ACT
Making room for difficult thoughts rather than fighting them, so your choices can follow what matters to you.
ERP
Approaching what sets the anxiety off, gradually and by agreement, without the compulsion that usually follows it.
CBT
Looking at how thoughts, feelings, and behaviour feed each other, and finding the points where that loop can be interrupted.
Mindfulness-based therapy
Noticing what is happening while it is happening, instead of only recognising it afterwards.
Ready to take the first step?
Book a free 15-minute consultation to see if we're a good fit. No pressure, no commitment, just a conversation.