When a client enters the room in a palpably agitated state—or experiences chronic emotional dysregulation over time—how do we support their calming response while remaining calm ourselves? In this reassuring training video, DBT experts Drs. Shelley McMain and Carmen Wiebe demonstrate an invaluable array of key interventions from Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT), uniquely geared toward helping clients surf the waves of emotional reactivity and suicidal ideation. You’ll find much to implement in this hour-long presentation.
Here, McMain and Wiebe are focused on helping Ashley, a young woman with a history of self-harm and interpersonal tensions. In a series of brief didactic interviews alongside clinical vignettes, they illustrate the effective use of validation, commitment strategies, problem solving, and distress tolerance skills training. You’ll discover the three core tenets of DBT: learning theory, Zen philosophy, and dialectics. You’ll also learn about the significance of an invalidating early environment on a client’s current presentation, and find eight DBT assumptions about clients that can help you stay compassionate. Practical skills are covered as well, including validation techniques; commitment strategies such as devil’s advocate, pros and cons, and more; the AVIS-R skills coaching protocol; behavioral and solution analyses; and making collaborative thought records. Finally, McMain and Wiebe present distress tolerance skills that you can start using with your clients today.
While each host has a different style, they both remain firmly in command of the session while also communicating genuine concern and empathy. By the video’s end, Ashley reports in a separate epilogue that she has a deeper understanding of her anxiety and self-harm, feels more in control of her life, and has abstained from cutting herself for three months.
With its rich set of takeaways, this video offers practical tools to support your work with clients in distress. If you’re in search of integral resources on DBT, emotional dysregulation, or distress tolerance skills, be sure to add this to your library.
By watching this video, you will:
- Analyze the theoretical underpinnings of DBT and its application to emotional dysregulation.
- List various methods to effectively validate your client’s experience.
- Compile ways to incorporate commitment strategies, problem-solving tools, and distress tolerance skills into your client work.
Length of video: 1:01:20
English subtitles available
Group ISBN-13 #: 978-1-60124-516-8
Shelley McLain, PhD, a researcher, psychologist and educator, is an associate professor in the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Toronto, Ontario Canada; and head of the Personality Disorder Treatment, Research and Capacity Building for the Clinical Assessment and Triage Service and Women’s Programs at the Center for Addiction and Mental Health in Toronto, Ontario Canada. She is also the head of the Borderline Personality Disorder Clinic at the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health. Dr. McClain is a Member, DBT Individual and Group Certification, DBT Board of Certification and Accreditation (Seattle, Washington); and was an advisory board member of the International DBT Strategic Planning Research Committee at the University of Washington and Affiliate Board Member at the Linehan Institute, also in Seattle. Dr. McLain has won the coveted Ian Silver Award for Excellence in Psychiatry Continuing Professional and Practice Development, and the Colin Woolf Award for Excellence in Course Coordination in relation to her training in DBT.
Carmen Wiebe, MD, is assistant professor in the Department of Psychiatry, Faculty of Medicine at the University of Toronto, Ontario, Canada, where she is the course coordinator and presenter in the DBT certificate program. She has won the coveted Colin Woolf Award for Excellence in Course Coordination and the Ivan Silver Award for Excellence in Continuing Mental Health Education for her work in the DBT Certificate Program. She won the Joint CPA-COPCE Award for the Most Outstanding Continuing Education Activity in Psychiatry (academic) in Canada for her course, “Using Dialectical Behaviour Therapy Strategies in Your Practice”, presented at the Canadian Psychiatric Association Annual Meeting, Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Dr. Weibe is also a staff psychiatrist at the Borderline Personality Disorder Clinic at the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health, also in Toronto where she coordinates Dialectical Behavior Therapy education for the postgraduate program.
CE credits: 1
Learning Objectives:
- Discuss the theoretical underpinnings of DBT
- List various methods to effectively validate your client's experience
- Plan ways to incorporate commitment strategies in your clinical work
Bibliography available upon request
This course is offered for ASWB ACE credit for social workers. See complete list of CE approvals here
© 2013
Course Reviewed January 2023