DBT is NOT helping me

I'm sick of people trying to force me into DBT even though I've already been in it for a year. NOTHING has changed, I am still dependent, still desperate, an extremist crazy fanatic about every little thing, unbearable mood swings, still sabotage my relationships (yes my year long roller coaster ride with a man has just ended because of me), and if it weren't for the anti depressant medications I would still be cutting my wrists and trying to overdose. I know this because a few weeks off of my pills and I am back in that self-harm state. Not to mention my anorexia comes back as well once my pills wear off. It seems hopeless that I will ever be able to get off of these ridiculous drugs. I spent 5 different months in the hospital last year alone after 5 attempts to stop my pills, two of those were suicide related. If I go back one more time I have to go to a mental institution. To make matters worse I also have schizophrenia so maybe this is why DBT isn't helping me. Or it could be that my BPD is extremely severe - as in I have every symptom. Either way I had high hopes for this treatment program, supposed to be the be all and end all for BPD and I have been utterly disappointed.

Tacedhyse, don't try to get off the meds again, maybe you just need them all the time. There is no shame in it. Do you think that maybe getting off the meds interfered with the DBT treatment? Maybe there's just been too much chaos (caused by not being on meds and getting hospitalized) in your life recently for it to work properly.

Hi Tacedhyse,
I was in DBT for about 4 months, was kicked out for financial reasons, now trying to get back in with my new insurance company. I would have to say it did help me in that short amount of time, but on a very basic level. I stopped cutting/burning myself, and suicide attempts turned to just thoughts. However, my malfunction shifted heavier on substances. I need to finish treatment, I honestly believe it does help and that I will be in a better place once I complete a year, and even better if I continue. I haven't given up hope just yet, and I don't believe you should either. Granted your situation sounds much more difficult and dire. It seems like you are at a point where you are overwhelmed. The DBT or any type of therapy works best when you are proactive. DBT gives you the tools, and YOU have to put them to use. It is not easy by any means. I get so depressed, it is so much easier to resort to unhealthy behaviors, its habitual and its escaping the real problem. If I get myself to do the exercises I always find myself in a better state of mind, it gives me a second wind. I know how difficult it can be to get yourself to be proactive. I really encourage you to try, and to push through things. Take things one step at a time. You've been through a lot and it's going to take a lot of time to resolve all your problems. The best you can do is deal with the here and now, make sure that you are safe, and as happy as you can possibly muster.

The problem with DBT is that it is very easy to get the illusion that you are doing it when maybe you are really not. I just finished a 2 year DBT program with embarrassingly little progress. It was like I was faking it the whole way. I was hospitalized once and had contact with emergency services more than 3x during the program.

I had an extremely upsetting incident with someone and tried the Emotion Regulation and Distress Tolerance skills and I still felt like crap. I think after that I lost faith in DBT quite a bit and could never quite get engaged thereafter.

Sorry the DBT didn't work for you. It is not the be all and end all for BPD, as it is quite flawed. For one, you have to have a really good relationship with your therapist. If not, it can really destroy one's resolve to practice the skills.

It seems the ideal therapy for us BPDers may be a combination of mindfulness (and other DBT components) with an empathetic approach. DBT is very rigid and inflexible, and if the therapist isn't doing it correctly the patient can get easily discouraged.

Tacedhyse wrote:I'm sick of people trying to force me into DBT even though I've already been in it for a year.

I can completely relate to this. I've been in it four years. They tell me that taking it two years is the optimal time amount, but I'm not even close to where I need to be. I don't believe that DBT works for everyone like most of the therapists I've had. I think they force us into it because they believe it's the only treatment for BPD.

Wow, so I'm sitting here wishing I could be in a DBT program for my BPD or in any therapy program for that matter... there are none I can afford in my area because I have no insurance or piles of cash laying about...

Couple things to consider:
1) Some of you actually have people who care enough about you that they're still willing to have anything to do with you, to include encouraging you to be in therapy
2) DBT isn't effective unless you WANT to be there.

I can't but help to be jealous on both points. The kind of family and friends that would encourage me to go into therapy wrote me off for dead years ago. I spent a few months working through 5 different DBT and CBT workbooks on my own... it helped a bit, but it's not enough. I wish I could be in therapy. At least then I'd feel like I was trying to get better. Honestly, I think I would, and I think you would too if you could convince yourself of it.

whatitsliketolose wrote:The kind of family and friends that would encourage me to go into therapy wrote me off for dead years ago.

I don't have family/friends that support me, either. My family doesn't understand and I don't have any friends.

I spent a few months working through 5 different DBT and CBT workbooks on my own... it helped a bit, but it's not enough. I wish I could be in therapy. At least then I'd feel like I was trying to get better. Honestly, I think I would, and I think you would too if you could convince yourself of it.

I do want to feel better, it's just really hard. I've had to do some hard things in therapy. My frustration usually ends up in the type of complaining that I do...it's such a complicated thing to explain. I should look at it differently and try to do better than I have, admittedly...it's change...it scares me.

I think any treatment program, DBT or otherwise, can be soured by personal experience or therapists who didn’t measure up in some way. From what I’ve read in Brokenopen’s other comments regarding her DBT experience, I can understand her reservations about it.

I’m finding my DBT to be helpful. A big part of that is who my therapist is and who the people are in my group. I also feel like my DBT group is a combination of therapy and a classroom. If my group therapist and I were together in a one on one setting, it wouldn’t work for me at all.

I have not been to DBT in particular and so can't speak for it. However I do relate to your experiences.

I have been to therapy in general (not for BPD but something else) which was similar somewhat to CBT. When I first met my therapist, she told me that she will first take me through sessions to "open my mind" to therapy. Within a month of sessions, she said she had realized that I had, infact, come with an open mind. ( I must confess that for the first few sessions, I did play mind games with her until I realized that it was not useful to me.)

Within 5 months of sessions, I had begun to realize changes in how I saw life and at the end of 5 months, one day, I told my therapist that I didn't need her. It was a compliment to her and she was very happy for me. Then I was out on my own trying to put into practice all that I learnt, with occasional meet-ups with my therapist just to update her about my progress.

On the first day of therapy, my therapist explained to me that her role was merely to guide me on the path to unlocking my own potential, but that the potential and the ability to realize it lay within me. I kept that in mind during the whole 5 months.

In contrast, a person I know (who is an N) went to the same therapist roughly during the same time. He became extremely bitter with the therapist and left therapy in one month. He even went to the extent of smearing the credibility of the therapist to others. ( I am not sure who lost and who gained in that effort.)

My learning about therapy is that it shouldn't be treated as a "quick-fix" or "medication" as if it can cure you of all your flaws. Neither can it provide a easy-to-use checklist that you can just bound yourself to. Nor is there a guarantee that within a specific time everyone will have the same level of recovery. I went into therapy with the spirit of self-discovery. My therapist was merely my guide who opened up new possibilities for me. But the hard work, responsibility and commitment was mine. I owed it to myself for my own well-being.

I don't know how each of your specific situations have panned out, but you may be able to relate to this experience of mine with therapy.

I don't have family/friends that support me, either. My family doesn't understand and I don't have any friends.

brokenopen - I understand this. My family still doesn't get it. But the point is that I do and that is enough. I don't expect everyone to understand, since its difficult for them.

I should look at it differently and try to do better than I have, admittedly...it's change...it scares me.

That is a start you have. Its true that change is scary. But I have realized that it was my own fear that kept me from facing the world without fear. And the fear of change was perhaps the biggest fear.

Forgive me for not searching yet for a more current thread on DBT but I am genuinely curious where any of you members who posted on this thread, are at now and would love to (pending you are comfortable to do so) know your thoughts on looking back to these posts and the experiences you were all having back then (or had had or were wanting to have)?

Did DBT ever become of more value than it was at the time?
Less value?
A long standing blessing?
I'm curious after 8 years... for those who continued using DBT and for those who didn't (be it because it didn't work or because they couldn't continue) ... where it all led to when commenting retrospectively.

TIA