The Dbt Skills Workbook

[Nighthawk]

Basic distress tolerance skills:

Just reading some of this activates me. It upsets me that I do this stuff without even knowing it.

The big list of pleasurable list: If you don't find anything there might be a problem.:D

 

[Srain]

I'm stuck on the "Common Coping Strategies"...a few of those may be food for thought.

Thank you for posting this Night. :)

 

[Hashi]

I'm stuck on the "Common Coping Strategies"...a few of those may be food for thought.

Yes, all too common for me.

My list of pleasurable activities is not big. A lot of the ones in their list would have me hiding behind the sofa - organise a party??? go to a cinema to watch a film??? It's depressing how little I can do/enjoy now. Still, I've got some so I suppose I have to try them.

 

[Hashi]

PS I have to say, though, that I've been trying the distraction skills for about two months now and today was the first day that I got through some really bad emotions and urges and actually felt better on the other side. Usually, if I'm resisting the urges I'd be chewing the carpet by now. Instead I feel surprisingly calm.

 

[MyStarryNight]

I'm working through the workbook along with the "The DBT Diary." The diary is really helping me track and see my progress and it's great cause it has a short synopsis of the skills in the frust 50 pages of the book. I try and carry it with me wherever I go so if I run into a situation where I don't know what to do I can do a short skim through the thing and come up with a strategy to deal with the situation.

 

[Hashi]

I've been doing OK so far this week. It's a real battle, though, every day.

My (short) list of pleasurable activities is helping.

My list for self-soothing is even shorter. This is a problem for me. I had kind of an unsoothed childhood, I started dissociating at a very young age and I've never liked being hugged or liked soft toys. My T's comparison to thinking what you would do to soothe a child has no meaning for me because I don't relate to children at all.

Going through the senses hasn't helped me much. For touch, I've got blanket and wearing a bracelet a friend gave me. For taste, a cup of tea (what can I say? I'm British, lol).

I have some activities that calm me down - guided meditation, looking at art, colouring, gardening. Those are soothing to my mind, which is good, but I'd really like to have more of the blanket-type physical soothing things. It feels important for being gentler with myself. I don't seem to like any of their suggestions, though.

Anyone have any thoughts (that are not about teddy bears or ice cream)? Ot just can relate?

 

[Nighthawk]

I have not been able to work on the book for a few days.

 

[MyStarryNight]

Hashi, I have had a very similar experience growing up not being able to self soothe and I started dissociating at an early age as well. Physical things never really have ever seemed to comfort me very much either.

The only thing that ever really slightly helped was hot drinks like coffee or tea. I have found that if I drink tea specifically made for relaxation it helps even more like chamomille or sleepytime tea.

However, I did seem to make a lot of prgress in the self soothing department after starting to connect with my t. I don't know how it happenned or exactly when but now if I get really distressed I can usually stop and bring up a picture of my t in my mind and imagine myself in therapy talking with him about what's bothering me and it calms me down.

It doesn't always work but a lot of times it does and I'm able to calm down at least a little bit. Sorry, I don't know if that helps at all. I guess what I'm saying is that if there's a person or animal or even object that you have an emotional connection with or that you feel safe around maybe thinking about that could help.

Sometimes though no amount of imagining or attempts at self soothing work. That's why I think the radical acceptance and coping thoughts skills are so important. It's really helped me in the moments where I'm melting down to be able to logically accept that I'm upset and not try and fight it but instead focus on the fact that it won't be like this forever.

 

[Tinyflame]

Yep, under stress or times like those my ability to visualize or self-soothe or any of that leaves me entirely. Not that it's that great to begin with, visualizing that is.

 

[Srain]

The diary is really helping me track and see my progress and it's great cause it has a short synopsis of the skills in the frust 50 pages of the book. I try and carry it with me wherever I go so if I run into a situation where I don't know what to do I can do a short skim through the thing and come up with a strategy to deal with the situation.

Great idea!

Like Night, I haven't been able to work in my workbook for a couple of days, just too distracted to focus. Focusing is a tough one for me but I'll take the book with me today.

 

[Srain]

Okay, got to the activities I might enjoy. So I do, obviously not the "throw a party" one, and not all the time but I do try to get out (once a year or.....so:unsure:), I have done a lot of painting, (not lately) but these are things I have loved in the past so good things to be reminded of.

Yeah, I took one look at the Radical Acceptance list...things like "watch the world news on television without being critical of what's happening." :speechless:...YEAH, right! --This is probably NEVER going to happen unless I'm in a room full of people with opposing view because I can do this all by myself just fine.

I understand Radical Acceptance but when it comes to this type of issue, really??? I don't know. I can accept some things better that others, core believe issues are a different story. I can accept that half or more of what's presented on the news is slanted one way or another, depending on the news station, that still does not change my feelings about the subject matter.

Okay, so I will have to make my own list of things???
Anyone else have problem with that list?

 

[Nighthawk]

The truth is I look at this book and the words just don't even register. What am I supposed to do . I want to work on it. I tried for over an hour yesterday and all II got was that I don't remember anything I have read in the book so far. Maybe I have too much on my mind. Or maybe the fact that I don't retain written matter is the problem. Whatever it is I am having a problem.