Anne has struggled all her life with food and weight issues and has dieted dozens of times, only to gain the weight back. In this very human, and touching session, Beck emphasizes the development of a new set of skills as the crucial element of weight loss. Beck takes an extensive dieting history—including Anne’s assessment of “good eating days” and “bad eating days,” she identifies Anne’s motivations for losing weight and teaches self-motivation techniques, and she prepares Ann to recover quickly from the inevitable mistakes she will make. Other techniques she uses include identifying the obstacles that may prevent Anne from making these changes, strategizing solutions, exploring Anne’s eating triggers and working with Anne’s “all-or-nothing” approach to dieting.
While Beck bases her approach on the core principles of Cognitive Therapy, the tools and techniques demonstrated in this video can be integrated with many types of therapeutic styles and will be useful to any therapist working with clients with weight issues. Clients with weight issues frequently become caught in a vicious cycle of losing weight and gaining it back, impairing their ability to enjoy their lives fully. At the same time, many therapists struggle with how to be helpful to these clients.
