Today I've decided I'm going to use specific skills to address a couple of things that I've been finding problematic in my current relationship. It's been an issue of mine for years and because it annoys me so much I'm going to try and do something about it instead of waiting for it to magically go away.
Now I could say that the problem is that 'men don't listen' but if I reworded it I would say 'I find it difficult when I feel like I'm not being heard or listened to'. I know now that it brings up feelings of abandonment and rejection because it feels as though I'm not important when the words that come out of my mouth seem to be for a waste. I can talk about what I've done during the day, about what's happened to someone I know, have actual conversations with my other half and then it's like the words did not even get exchanged. The way I used to try and fix this problem is to not talk. It didn't work. It won't work. I even used to say the word 'sex' before speaking to gain the other genders attention. That certainly got their attention but then they couldn't concentrate. I've also tried many times to explain how I feel but I think now perhaps I need to be more mindful of how I react, what skills to use to deal with the emotions and learn to improve the situation and do something that is effective.
The skills in the following list that I will talk about are skills that have been created by Dr Marsha Linehan, the founder of Dialectical Behaviour Therapy (DBT). Use this link to find out more on DBT.
I think the specific skills that I'll try to solve the problem above will be ...
1. using the GIVE skill - an acronym to be able to communicate more effectively by being GENTLE, acting INTERESTED, VALIDATING, using an EASY MANNER.
This may help me to remember not to get stroppy when the 'not listening' occurs. It should remind me to continue being an effective listener myself. I'm hoping it will help me to decrease my feelings of sadness because when I am sad, he's sad because he blames himself.
2. Effectively using what works (mindfully) - simply put, this is to try and find whatever seems to work well. So when he's doing something that completely takes his mind off anything in the room (i.e reading a book), I'm going to call his name and wait for him to look at me and stop what he's doing the I will talk. I will of course tell him beforehand this is what I want to try.
3. Identify the emotion. If I'm able I'm going to try really hard to spot the emotion right when I feel it then get my DBT worksheets to try to understand more about why I feel the way I do. This is one of the hardest skills I'm yet to master as I can feel about 7 different emotions in 10 seconds so I guess a bit of practice is desperately needed.
I'll try really hard to do the above skills and see where it gets me. I'll keep you posted.
Sunday 7 February 2016
Thursday 4 February 2016
A Cunning Plan
Here I was thinking I had it all worked out. I was going to blog yesterday in order to abstain from drinking. I was going to talk about all the skills I put in place beforehand so that when I had thoughts of alcohol I would do them. Ha! Well it didn't work out that way at all. Perhaps I could have written in my blog when I first thought of it instead of putting it off then it may have helped. Anyway there is no use dwelling on it now. I'm going to move on and just think about what I might write now and perhaps make another plan for next time.
I want to share a 'brief' snapshot of what's been going on in my life since the last time I wrote back in August 2013.
I want to share a 'brief' snapshot of what's been going on in my life since the last time I wrote back in August 2013.
- went on a diet - lost 30kg dramatically and gained an eating disorder (binge eating bulimia)
- recovered (I'm hopeful) from bulimia after doing an intense cognitive behaviour therapy program which consisted of 2 therapy sessions a week for about 6 months
- recovered from PTSD (I think it just went away as I don't suffer the symptoms anymore)
- started drinking again after being sober for 18 months (working on that now)
- started up a beautiful friendship with my first love
- moved out of my home to try to learn to be independent
- finally left my husband of 10 years
- began a whirlwind romance with my first love (best decision I ever made)
- gained 3 teenagers
- dealt with people (my family) who disapproved of my new relationship
- moved in with my now partner, his 3 children and my son (and loving it)
What's happening now .... drinking is now getting worse which is partly why I am trying to be more mindful of using DBT skills and so I can be a better role model in the household.
Now to get to skills practice.
Till next time.
Tuesday 2 February 2016
Inspiration
I want to celebrate firstly that I am back on my blog after more than 2 years. Yay me! I want to also share how proud I am of myself for taking the steps to get back on. So much has happened during my blog hiatus and while I will talk about some of my breakthroughs and tribulations I am merely posting on her now to initiate another attempt at journalling my road to recovery. First things first, my new motto (at least while it lasts) is ....... WILLINGNESS.
Wednesday 21 August 2013
A whole new perspective
I'm not sure what has happened with my new focus on regulating emotions. I feel a lot calmer and my head doesn't feel so overwhelmed. I think I was honestly going overboard with so many distress tolerance skills I didn't give myself time to just relax. I still swear by them but it is interesting to note the difference in being mindful of regulating emotions than constantly trying to distract myself, which has been resulting in suppression. I am not getting too excited though because I haven't had any negative emotions the last 3 days and I am almost positive that when I do I will struggle to do the skills that I am working hard on using this week. Though as time goes on I will hope to pull these skills out easily and use them in times of labile emotions.
I received some fantastic tips from my case manager 2 days ago. I told her that I can't seem to observe and describe my emotions easily because I have a hard time picking which came first when I experience all different emotions in one hit. She could tell it was really bugging me to the point of being overwhelmed and advised that perhaps I could just choose the one that stood out the most in order to just work on that one emotion. The other tip she gave me is to write them all out on the separate worksheets (which you are meant to do) and not label which came 1st, 2nd, 3rd. It seems so silly but I have been so hung up on what came where, when that happened and how that came next, that I have lost sight of just working on any emotion that came. She said that perhaps by focusing on one, the others may come easier or I may even discover which came first. The most important thing that matters is that by working on one and radically accepting one emotion I would suppress less. So this is what I will be doing next time I need to fill out an observe and describe worksheet. I look forward to it.
Yesterday when I was trying to think of positive experiences I could have, (a skill that is part of Emotion Regulation), I looked at a list that I got from my DBT class, written by Dr Marsha Linehan. It is surprising how even the tiniest thing can be considered as increasing positive emotions. I chose a few that I enjoy doing:
The list isn't scary (that's only a fraction of things to do out of a list of 176). It would be scary if it was climb a mountain or visit Africa but things like saving money and doodling is an achievable thing to start with and it can increase to harder things as confidence is built. It excites me to think of doing things to increase positive emotions.
I received some fantastic tips from my case manager 2 days ago. I told her that I can't seem to observe and describe my emotions easily because I have a hard time picking which came first when I experience all different emotions in one hit. She could tell it was really bugging me to the point of being overwhelmed and advised that perhaps I could just choose the one that stood out the most in order to just work on that one emotion. The other tip she gave me is to write them all out on the separate worksheets (which you are meant to do) and not label which came 1st, 2nd, 3rd. It seems so silly but I have been so hung up on what came where, when that happened and how that came next, that I have lost sight of just working on any emotion that came. She said that perhaps by focusing on one, the others may come easier or I may even discover which came first. The most important thing that matters is that by working on one and radically accepting one emotion I would suppress less. So this is what I will be doing next time I need to fill out an observe and describe worksheet. I look forward to it.
Yesterday when I was trying to think of positive experiences I could have, (a skill that is part of Emotion Regulation), I looked at a list that I got from my DBT class, written by Dr Marsha Linehan. It is surprising how even the tiniest thing can be considered as increasing positive emotions. I chose a few that I enjoy doing:
Having quiet evenings
Laying in the sun
Imaging beautiful scenery
Singing around the house
Coming home from work
Doodling
Laughing
Tuesday 20 August 2013
Using emotion regulation skills
The last 2 posts I've written about implementing more skills from the Emotion Regulation module of DBT, the treatment for Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD). Today, when I woke, I did my usual thing and wrote a little list of skills I'd like to use today and made a conscious effort to do them even though I was out house most of the day.
To increase positive emotions I made contact with 2 of my friends (through text) that I wish to keep in regular contact with. This in itself is huge because just 6 - 9 months ago I was shutting myself off from everyone. Luckily, because I don't handle rejection very well (a day in the life of a person with BPD), both my friends responded and I had a great to and fro with a friend I thought I'd lost. I also had a couple of gaps in between jobs and so I spent those times at the beach. Again this is huge for me because I was almost agoraphobic the same amount of months ago. Not only that, I would never go to the beach even before that because I never saw the beauty in it. Even though I only spent a little time there it gave me time to experience it with all of my senses. I also shouted myself to lunch and even though up til recently I was using this as my positive experience almost everyday I decided this week that this was the one day I would allow it (long story short, I am putting on tons of weight so had to cut it back).
To reduce vulnerability to negative emotions I put the following PLEASE MASTER skills, (see last post), in place. I built mastery by doing a bit of a strange art journal page. I'm not a fan of weaving but decided to give it a shot and love my page. Also I think I did a pretty good job today at a particular job where I knew I would be with a client that I consider difficult. I didn't need to treat any physical illness today, I balanced my eating well (ate at regular times and made good choices) and I avoided mood altering drugs. I didn't participate in exercise however I did think about it. I'm concerned that magpies and plovers will get me because they're out now but I am trying to convince myself to wear a hat if I walk (hate to because I feel stupid - a fear that I look dumb and people will talk about me if I wear a hat - silly I know). Will need to act opposite to emotion and just go for that walk with a hat. I'm working on it.
So that's my day. I will use pictures next time I talk about my skills. It's just late and I needed to finish this post before the night was over.
Till next time.
To increase positive emotions I made contact with 2 of my friends (through text) that I wish to keep in regular contact with. This in itself is huge because just 6 - 9 months ago I was shutting myself off from everyone. Luckily, because I don't handle rejection very well (a day in the life of a person with BPD), both my friends responded and I had a great to and fro with a friend I thought I'd lost. I also had a couple of gaps in between jobs and so I spent those times at the beach. Again this is huge for me because I was almost agoraphobic the same amount of months ago. Not only that, I would never go to the beach even before that because I never saw the beauty in it. Even though I only spent a little time there it gave me time to experience it with all of my senses. I also shouted myself to lunch and even though up til recently I was using this as my positive experience almost everyday I decided this week that this was the one day I would allow it (long story short, I am putting on tons of weight so had to cut it back).
To reduce vulnerability to negative emotions I put the following PLEASE MASTER skills, (see last post), in place. I built mastery by doing a bit of a strange art journal page. I'm not a fan of weaving but decided to give it a shot and love my page. Also I think I did a pretty good job today at a particular job where I knew I would be with a client that I consider difficult. I didn't need to treat any physical illness today, I balanced my eating well (ate at regular times and made good choices) and I avoided mood altering drugs. I didn't participate in exercise however I did think about it. I'm concerned that magpies and plovers will get me because they're out now but I am trying to convince myself to wear a hat if I walk (hate to because I feel stupid - a fear that I look dumb and people will talk about me if I wear a hat - silly I know). Will need to act opposite to emotion and just go for that walk with a hat. I'm working on it.
So that's my day. I will use pictures next time I talk about my skills. It's just late and I needed to finish this post before the night was over.
Till next time.
Monday 19 August 2013
More about regulating emotions
Today I made a bit of an epiphany (refer to last post) where in order to regulate my emotions I need to be focusing more on the Emotion Regulation module of DBT - yeah I know, der! Because I have been having an extremely difficult time with my marriage I have been spending all of my energy on distress tolerance skills and not enough on regulating my up and down emotions. Doing distress tolerance skills is great and I am in no way going to stop doing them, however I am now aware that I need to be spending an equal amount of energy on emotion regulation skills.
According to Dr Marsha Linehan, founder of Dialectical Behaviour Therapy (DBT) in order to regulate your emotions the goals are to:
understand the emotions, understand the function of the emotion, reduce vulnerability to negative emotions and decrease emotional suffering
To understand the emotions experienced it is recommended to observe and describe emotion/s by filling in a worksheet or mentally go through the model shown below:
I have seen some of these models with another section called 'Vulnerability Factors' which slots in after Prompting Event. I won't go into the model too much here but will post about it separately.
The list below helps to understand the functions of emotions:
1. Is the emotion to motivate/organise action?
2. Is the emotion to self validate?
3. Is the emotion to communicate to others or to influence others?
To reduce vulnerability to negative emotions the skills are PLEASE MASTER (an acronym) and increasing positive emotions.
PLEASE MASTER skills:
Treat PhysicaL illness
balance Eating
avoid mood Altering Drugs
balance Sleep
get Exercise
build MASTERy
To increase positive emotions:
1. do things in the short term that are pleasant and possible now
2. for the long term work towards goals, attend to relationships and avoid avoiding
3. be mindful of positive experiences
4. be unmindful of worries
Letting go of emotions through mindfulness and changing emotions by doing opposite action can assist to decrease emotional suffering.
Just briefly, to let go of emotions through mindfulness notice the presence of the emotion and step back from it, experience it, don't act on the emotion, don't judge it, practice willingness and radically accept it.
To act opposite to the current emotion you do exactly that. If anxiety causes withdrawal then do the opposite and face it. If sadness creates curling up in a ball do the opposite by doing something that is opposite.
Of course none of the above are easy to do but by learning about them through therapy or DBT classes and practice it can be done. I hope that with this new found epiphany I can make a new goal now to focus on doing more of my PLEASE MASTER skills and increase positive emotions.
According to Dr Marsha Linehan, founder of Dialectical Behaviour Therapy (DBT) in order to regulate your emotions the goals are to:
understand the emotions, understand the function of the emotion, reduce vulnerability to negative emotions and decrease emotional suffering
To understand the emotions experienced it is recommended to observe and describe emotion/s by filling in a worksheet or mentally go through the model shown below:
The list below helps to understand the functions of emotions:
1. Is the emotion to motivate/organise action?
2. Is the emotion to self validate?
3. Is the emotion to communicate to others or to influence others?
To reduce vulnerability to negative emotions the skills are PLEASE MASTER (an acronym) and increasing positive emotions.
PLEASE MASTER skills:
Treat PhysicaL illness
balance Eating
avoid mood Altering Drugs
balance Sleep
get Exercise
build MASTERy
To increase positive emotions:
1. do things in the short term that are pleasant and possible now
2. for the long term work towards goals, attend to relationships and avoid avoiding
3. be mindful of positive experiences
4. be unmindful of worries
Letting go of emotions through mindfulness and changing emotions by doing opposite action can assist to decrease emotional suffering.
Just briefly, to let go of emotions through mindfulness notice the presence of the emotion and step back from it, experience it, don't act on the emotion, don't judge it, practice willingness and radically accept it.
To act opposite to the current emotion you do exactly that. If anxiety causes withdrawal then do the opposite and face it. If sadness creates curling up in a ball do the opposite by doing something that is opposite.
Of course none of the above are easy to do but by learning about them through therapy or DBT classes and practice it can be done. I hope that with this new found epiphany I can make a new goal now to focus on doing more of my PLEASE MASTER skills and increase positive emotions.
Revisiting my weekend
Unfortunately, after having set GIVE skills as one of my goals this weekend, I was not very good at following through. I spent Friday night and most of Saturday and Sunday irritable. I blasted my son over trivial things and was snappy and sarcastic towards my husband. I have spent time trying to figure out where this irritability is coming from but because I lack skills in behaviour chain analysis and struggle to sometimes get my head around observing and describing emotions I am really having a difficult time figuring it out. The only solution I had over the weekend was to try and de-escalate by distracting and self soothing as well as to stop myself carrying on (repeating myself, escalating more and more) by just shutting my mouth and literally biting my tongue. So here I am the Monday after still confused as to why I was, and still am, feeling this way. I have a few different scenarios, better known as vulnerability factors, that possibly could be contributing to this feeling of irritability.
1. Friday was my dad's birthday (he passed away just under a year ago and I have PTSD).
Yet, I struggle to accept that this is the reason I am irritable because on Friday I had a great day. I felt fine. I wasn't ruminating, in fact, I was suppressing it.
2. A few things my husband did reminded me why our marriage is failing. I have days where I don't think about it (more suppressing) and days where it just smacks me in the face
3. I have had a stressful week (by stressful I mean in my Borderline perspective I have had a lot on and I've been given bad news, all which overwhelms me).
4. I reduced all my meal portion sizes on Friday (I have been overeating and comfort eating a lot since giving up alcohol and drugs in the last year).
With all of those things in writing I can now see where of course it would be normal for the average person (not just a person with BPD) to have these feelings of irritability after all the above situations. All anger and frustration comes from a place of hurt, sadness, disappointment and all kinds of other emotions. Suppression is also never a good thing but I guess it is just how I am dealing with things right now so I don't crumble. It's getting me by but unfortunately I do now see the consequences.
I realise I am on the road to recovery and can't have the answers straight away. It feels like things would just be easier if I could do the skill of observing and describing my emotions as they come but because a multitude of emotions can occur so fast it is difficult to do this. As I think back to Friday when I first got cranky with my son it would have been better for me to fill out an observe and describe emotions worksheet. I did think of it, however, it requires you to fill in one sheet for each emotion. The problem is I didn't know which emotion started first and there were so many that I decided not to. This is where I think a behaviour chain analysis would have been good also.
Anyway, looking forward, I think the following post on 'coping appropriately with feelings of anger and irritability' by Debbie Corso (another person with BPD with a fantastic Blog) is a great strategy to try while I am unsure of the exact origin of the irritability. Another thing I have tried today is reading my Emotion Regulation workbook again from DBT class. Just going over the goals of the Emotion Regulation module has really encouraged me to focus more on these skills. The start of the module explains (paraphrased by me):
1. Friday was my dad's birthday (he passed away just under a year ago and I have PTSD).
Yet, I struggle to accept that this is the reason I am irritable because on Friday I had a great day. I felt fine. I wasn't ruminating, in fact, I was suppressing it.
2. A few things my husband did reminded me why our marriage is failing. I have days where I don't think about it (more suppressing) and days where it just smacks me in the face
3. I have had a stressful week (by stressful I mean in my Borderline perspective I have had a lot on and I've been given bad news, all which overwhelms me).
4. I reduced all my meal portion sizes on Friday (I have been overeating and comfort eating a lot since giving up alcohol and drugs in the last year).
With all of those things in writing I can now see where of course it would be normal for the average person (not just a person with BPD) to have these feelings of irritability after all the above situations. All anger and frustration comes from a place of hurt, sadness, disappointment and all kinds of other emotions. Suppression is also never a good thing but I guess it is just how I am dealing with things right now so I don't crumble. It's getting me by but unfortunately I do now see the consequences.
I realise I am on the road to recovery and can't have the answers straight away. It feels like things would just be easier if I could do the skill of observing and describing my emotions as they come but because a multitude of emotions can occur so fast it is difficult to do this. As I think back to Friday when I first got cranky with my son it would have been better for me to fill out an observe and describe emotions worksheet. I did think of it, however, it requires you to fill in one sheet for each emotion. The problem is I didn't know which emotion started first and there were so many that I decided not to. This is where I think a behaviour chain analysis would have been good also.
Anyway, looking forward, I think the following post on 'coping appropriately with feelings of anger and irritability' by Debbie Corso (another person with BPD with a fantastic Blog) is a great strategy to try while I am unsure of the exact origin of the irritability. Another thing I have tried today is reading my Emotion Regulation workbook again from DBT class. Just going over the goals of the Emotion Regulation module has really encouraged me to focus more on these skills. The start of the module explains (paraphrased by me):
The goal of emotion regulation is to decrease labile emotions. In order to regulate my emotions I need to observe and describe them and understand what they do for me. I need to reduce emotional vulnerability by using PLEASE MASTER skills and increase positive experiences. To decrease suffering I need to let go of painful emotions through mindfulness and change these emotions through opposite action.
Here I have been madly distracting and self soothing with Distress Tolerance skills, possibly to the point of suppression, where I could have been focusing more on Emotion Regulation. It's not to say that Distress Tolerance skills won't come in handy, (I love them way too much), but for this moment it makes sense if I want to regulate my emotions and moods to focus on the module specifically designed for that.
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