Topic Tuesday // BPD Awareness featuring SPECTRUM VIC // Tues 1 Oct, 7pm AEST

Time has flown crew! We are up to our second last question for the night

For Andrew and Julian at spectrum, are there any types of therapy that you would suggest those living with BPD explore?

And for everyone else as you are reading their responses, tell us, have you heard of the different therapies mentioned by @AndrewSpectrum and @JulianSpectrum ?
Are there any other approaches you'd like to share?

@JulianSpectrum @AndrewSpectrum I’ve done bits of CBT in the past to limited success yet I’ve always wanted to do DBT but haven’t been able to due to no private health cover or the public health system doesn’t offer it or want to offer it to me. I’ve called Spectrum on several occasions to limited success. I can’t afford to do it privately so what are my options to access this treatment please? Thank you!

Good question @Judi9877 🙂 The guys may not have time to get to it, and are a bit limited at providing specific tailored options for members due to our anonymity guideline - however I can make a note to follow up tomorrow on some further resource you may be able to access 🙂

There are not enough places that offer dbt like public hospitals. If you go somewhere private it’s so expensive.

So I feel left out for treatment.

@Former-Member @AndrewSpectrum @JulianSpectrum

@BlueBay that's really understandable. It can be so hard to imagine how things might ever change when they've been a particular way for so long, but hang in there. Great to hear you're a year into DBT, it can be a massive challenge to put into practice but keep at it!

Totally agree @Judi9877

@Former-Member

From a support person point of view I try and encourage my wife to do something.

At the moment it is gardening. In the past she has volunteered at a charity store. But do something that requires even a small commitment. The result is a greater feeli g of achievement and worth. Understanding that this is different for each individual though.

@Former-Member

Although Dialectical Behaviour Therapy (DBT) is usually the treatment most people are aware of, there are actually quite a few therapies that have proven effectiveness with BPD including Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT), Schema-Focused Therapy, Transference-Focused Therapy, Cognitive Analytic Therapy (CAT) and Mentalization-Based Treatment (MBT). It can sometimes be tricky to find DBT programs, particularly in regional areas, but many of these other therapies are much more easily accessed through clinicians in the private or public sector.

Julian and I are MBT therapists. The ‘mentalizing’ part of MBT means thinking about mental states – thoughts, feelings, urges, memories, perspectives, needs, desires, and so on.

Mentalizing is something that we all do to try and understand ourselves and others: it helps us recognise why anyone thinks, feels or acts the way they do. It’s a skill that fluctuates though, and at times it can be hard to know what we think about something, or how we’re really feeling, or why we do what we do. We’ve all had the experience of misunderstanding others as well – think of a time that you’ve been certain someone was angry with you, only to find out later they were focused on something totally different. The stronger our feelings are (like anxiety, anger, depression, or numbing) the worse our mentalizing gets: it becomes harder to understand ourselves and easier to misunderstand others.

In MBT we work to improve mentalizing by exploring and communicating about mental states with a non-judgemental and curious attitude. Over time this tends to help people increase their understanding of themselves as well as their ability to communicate and more effectively meet their own needs; it also helps to broaden understanding of others, leading to smoother relationships. We really enjoy the work that we do and find it a real privilege to work with the clients we see.

I totally agree @BlueBay That’s why I’d like more funding for this type of therapy in public hospitals and even in community health settings as I do believe it works.