DBT Skills Group Therapy

I started my 8 week DBT Skills group on Thursday. I wasn't sure what to expect but I knew that I needed help.
There were supposed to be 10 people in our group but only 6 showed up. 2 called in saying that the roads were bad and wouldn't be coming.
I met some nice people there. Not all are necessarily Borderline but all have issues with emotion regulation. There's one lady there that I'm not sure of her motivation or commitment but whatever.
We learned about the Bio-social Theory. I understand the concept and it is somewhat of a relief knowing it but I can't really describe it myself so I am going to take an excerpt from Wikipedia.

Biosocial theory in DBT

It is common for therapists using a Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (DBT) model in the treatment of Borderline personality disorder to stress to clients that causes for their condition come both from a biological propensity to their emotional state, and an invalidating environment, that, by its negative reactions, reinforces their dysfunctional behavior. A traumatic event can start the emotional or interpersonal disregulation that spawns a vicious cycle of increased negative behavior as the person continues to react to the environment's invalidation and the environment increasingly devalues them.

"DBT is based on a biosocial theory of personality functioning in which BPD is seen as a biological disorder of emotional regulation. The disorder is characterized by heightened sensitivity to emotion, increased emotional in-tensity and a slow return to emotional baseline. Characteristic behaviors and emotional experiences associated with BPD theoretically result from the expression of this biological dysfunction in a social environment experienced as invalidating by the borderline patient."^[3]

The importance of stressing the biosocial theory to the client in therapy is that the information becomes a tool of validation in itself, offering the client the option of seeing their problems as no fault of their own while also offering them the possibility if taking responsibility for future change.

"The biosocial theory suggests that BPD is a disorder of self-regulation, and particularly of emotional regulation, which results from biological irregularities combined with certain dysfunctional environments, as well as from their interaction and transaction over time"^[4]

LOL I hadn't read this entire excerpt through before I posted it. It's kinda funny how I said that it was a relief just knowing it and the excerpt says that it is a tool of validation in itself.

We also started to learn about the first DBT skill - Mindfulness. It is one of the core concepts of DBT and is considered a foundation for the other skills. It helps individuals accept and tolerate the powerful emotions they may feel when challenging their habits or exposing themselves to upsetting situations. DBT mindfulness is the capacity to pay attention, non-judgmentally, to the present moment; about living in the moment, experiencing one's emotions and senses fully, yet with perspective.

WHAT THE HELL DOES THAT MEAN???

Consider that you are driving home from work taking the same route you always take. You are almost home and you suddenly realize you have no recollection of the last 10-15 minutes or how you got from point A to point B. This would be you NOT being mindful, NOT being in the moment. If you had been mindful, you would remember the entire distance you drove, took notice of all the things around you and all the things you drove past. You would have taken notice of different sounds and different "physical" feelings (such as the feeling of the car seat against your legs or your hands on the steering wheel).

There are different levels of mindfulness - or maybe NOT being mindful would be more appropriate to say.

1. Being Mindful -
2. Zoning/Numbing Out
3. Depersonalization
4. Dissociation

The first 2 are kinda self-explanatory but numbers 3 & 4 - well those are just plain scary. I had a horrible experience with dissociation and numerous depersonalization ones.

Child Protective Services triggered a MAJOR meltdown in me and my emotions raced so extraordinarily high that I lost a short block of time - or at least I think it was short. But during that time I had sent a text message to my daughter giving the impression that I was going to kill myself. For the life of me, I have ZERO recollection of doing that. It was really scary because it makes me wonder what else I did or could have done.

That is all for now.......